No Surrender, Says Sarkozy As Strike Action Widens Out

Nicolas Sarkozy yesterday vowed there would be "no surrender" in the face of the widest ranging strikes of his leadership, as French civil servants, teachers and nurses joined transport workers in walkouts over his reform plans.

France's chaotic "Black Tuesday" saw some primary schools closed and flights canceled as air traffic controllers downed tools alongside tax inspectors, customs officers and more than a third of France's 5 million public sector workers. They demanded pay rises and protested against Sarkozy's plans to streamline France's bloated and costly public sector by not replacing one in three retirees next year.

The civil servants' one-day strike added to the stress of commuters as a transport strike entered its second week. Many are waking at 4am, sleeping on office floors or using roller-skates, bikes and scooters to make it to work through gridlocked traffic while rail services are crippled. Bike, car and scooter accidents have soared. Industry and small businesses have recorded losses, with boutiques and clothes shops complaining of a 50% drop in trade not seen since the May 1968 protests.

Sarkozy yesterday broke his long silence on the strikes, vowing: "We will not surrender and we will not retreat."

The president said his modernizing agenda and incentives for French people to work harder would be achieved despite the strikes. France must revolutionize its outdated state sector and its social structures, ditching its "old behavior", if it was to compete internationally, he insisted.

He denied forcing workers on to the streets for a standoff, saying he would be "firm" but his door was open for dialog: "I do not want a winner or a loser."

Transport strikes were due to continue today as a small hardcore of grassroots trade unionists stood their ground. But this morning talks will begin between the government, the state rail company and unions over the key issue: special pensions deals which allow certain workers to retire early on favorable terms.

The government insists it will succeed in reforming the special deals. Incentives are on the table, including a €90m (£64m) a year financial package offered by railway management for unions to accept the change.

While the public backs Sarkozy over the pensions, the civil servants had more sympathy. Their key concern is also the biggest worry of the French public: falling "purchasing power" - the inability of meager salaries to meet the cost of living. Sarkozy said he would announce measures to boost family budgets this week.

As tens of thousands of civil servants marched through Paris, Nicolas Joseph, 26, a sewer worker, said: "Contrary to beliefs, French state workers are not privileged. I have to raise a family of four on €1,300 a month. In France there used to be poor, middle class and rich. Now the rich are getting richer, the middle-class are getting poorer and the poor in real trouble."

Sarkozy wants to preserve his modernizing image while setting the tone for his hardest reforms, which will come next year with health care, general pensions and the labor code. The leader of France's Communist Revolutionary League, Olivier Besancenot, warned that the strikes were just the aperitif and the "main course" was still to come.