After three weeks of blockades, strikes at sites belonging to French oil giant TotalEnergies began to ease on Wednesday despite uncertainty over fuel supplies as the country goes into the autumn holidays.
Several of France’s seven refineries and a tank farm have been out of action in recent weeks as striking members of the far-left CGT union rejected a salary offer from the hydrocarbon leader, which other unions accepted.
But on Wednesday, the CGT said the strike at the Donges refinery in the west of the country had been suspended, as had two other oil sites in France, one in the north and one in the south.
Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne said the situation “is improving significantly”.
The blockades in Normandy and on the Rhone continue.
The strike at two Esso-ExxonMobil refineries ended last week after a collective agreement between management and moderate unions representing the majority of workers.
“We hope that management will heed the demands of the strikers to end this conflict,” Benjamin Tange of the CGT union told AFP.
The CGT announced on Wednesday morning that it had proposed a “protocol to end the conflict” to the management of TotalEnergies.
According to the union, the proposal was rejected by management, a statement the company did not confirm when asked by AFP.
The union proposal called for “negotiations on employment and investment” and guarantees that strikers would not be penalized.
The CGT – which started the industrial action three weeks ago – is pushing for a 10 percent pay rise for TotalEnergies employees backdated to the start of the year.
It says the French group can more than afford it, citing TotalEnergies’ $5.7 billion net profit for the April-June period as energy prices skyrocketed from the war in Ukraine, and the payout billions of euros in dividends to shareholders.
But the strike action has forced many petrol stations to close and has affected all sectors of the economy.
Faced with fuel shortages, many people have started canceling holidays ahead of the upcoming school holidays, impacting the expected boost for the country’s tourism sector.
Energy Transition Minister Agnes Pannier-Runacher said the government is doing “everything so that people can go on holiday in peace”.
According to the Ministry of Health, around 20 percent of the petrol stations still lacked petrol or diesel on Wednesday.
To alleviate the shortage, the government has used requisition powers to force some strikers back into opening fuel depots – a move that has enraged unions but has been upheld in court.
