In terms of social relations, the SNCF definitely cultivates a form of originality. While the days of Tuesday 18 and Wednesday 19 October promise to be complicated for users (100% of TGVs but on average a transport plan that will not exceed one out of two trains in the region), the pressure is starting to mount between the management and trade unions. “We are in front of a political strike, of an interprofessional nature which goes beyond the SNCF. Above all, this strike comes one month before our professional elections (November 17-24)”, deplores François Nogué, the HRD of the SNCF.
In his sights, the hardening of the SUD Rail line which has been calling since Monday to renew the movement and install it over time. Third representative organization at the SNCF, behind the powerful CGT (1st) and the reformer UNSA (2nd), the central union representative Fabien Villedieu plans to hold general meetings from this Tuesday evening to ask the question of the renewal of the movement . “The justice of the peace will be the railway worker, if the railway worker says after a day that’s enough, we will do a day, if the railway workers say in the majority ‘we are renewed’, we will go on renewable strike”, explained the person concerned to the AFP. And according to him, “there is a chance that it will continue fairly broadly until Wednesday”. Moreover, the SNCF is already preparing to experience new delicate days.
To anticipate, the SNCF relies on the law on the minimum service passed at the end of 2007 which obliges the strikers to inform their management of their participation in a social movement at least 48 hours in advance, which leaves time for the company to be able to adjust its transport plan. And for Wednesday, the day after the day of mobilization for wages, the SNCF transport plan will still not exceed 50% on certain TER or Transilien lines, where we try to remain reassuring since the participation rate is it seems similar to the movement of last July, around 20% of strikers. But there is a trade union practice that is beginning to upset the staff of the house of Ferré: the “notice of dormant strikes”.
In principle, the strike must be preceded by five days’ notice given by a representative union, which mentions the start time and the duration of the work stoppage. However, very often, organizations “forget” to declare the end of the movement, which gives them the possibility of quickly reactivating the procedure. “It’s curious all the same: in the strike notice filed in haste by the CGT, the text dates from November 2019 and concerns pension reform. This notice was in fact dormant and had not been lifted by the CGT since that date”, confides the HRD of the SNCF, François Nogué. Moreover, this 2019 text had been signed by the UNSA, which is not calling for a strike this week. Find the mistake.
Thus, this current practice within the public company gives rise to some originality, to say the least comical. Among the comrades of Sud Rail, the union delegates no longer hesitate to file strike notices “every two months, whatever the situation, as a precaution”, deplores the management of the SNCF. At FO, it was even decided not to bother with the dates, the union having recently filed a notice running until 2045-2050. You can never be too careful…
