Over 20,000 rail workers demonstrated in Paris Nov. 13 to protest the European Union’s plans to fully privatize the rail system.
The European Transport Workers’ Federation called the demonstration, which drew trade union participants from 12 European countries. Messages of solidarity were sent from rail unions in Thailand, Mongolia, India and the United States.
Referring to the 1996 British rail privatization, Alex Gordon, an official with Britain’s National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers said: “We have experienced now in Britain full-scale privatization of railways—infrastructure, trains and maintenance—with disastrous results for safety and the quality of service to the public. We’re here to tell the people of France and Germany and other European countries that are now being threatened with these same policies: Don’t make the same mistake that the British made.”
The demonstration came a week after French rail workers went on strike over new rules affecting work hours and wages. Unions are planning future strikes against privatization.
