On Thursday this week (22/01/2009) a Peugeot factory in Poissy, just west of Paris, annonced it was going to operate shorter weeks, due to a decrease in car sales. This will help them to reduce some of their variable costs in employment.
It shut down completely for four weeks over Christmas. Some people were lucky enough to be able to keep their jobs however others were less fortunate. 700 workers who pr
eviously had temporary contracts have lost them. “There’s a real fear that redundancies could be next,” says Georges Martin, a union official who has worked there for 33 years.
eviously had temporary contracts have lost them. “There’s a real fear that redundancies could be next,” says Georges Martin, a union official who has worked there for 33 years.The French may not be troubled by heavy mortgages, or credit-card bills, but fears of unemployment are rising as recession takes hold in the country. In November France’s unemployment total reached 2.1m, compared to an 8.5% rise on a year earlier. Other European Union countries such as Spain and Ireland are seeing even sharper rises in unemployment, as Europe’s economies head into 
what European Commission forecasts suggest may be their worst year since the 1970s (see chart). French unemployment, now 7.9%, could top 10% by 2010. Joblessness is growing fastest among under-25s, many of whom are being laid off as firms cut those on short-term contracts.
what European Commission forecasts suggest may be their worst year since the 1970s (see chart). French unemployment, now 7.9%, could top 10% by 2010. Joblessness is growing fastest among under-25s, many of whom are being laid off as firms cut those on short-term contracts. The government is most worried about the car industry, which directly employs 700,000 people in France (6,600 of them in Poissy), and indirectly 2.5m. This week François Fillon, the prime minister, told car-industry bosses that state help would go only to firms that kept production (and jobs) in the country. The Europe-wide concern that rising unemployment could provoke social unrest is particularly acute in France, where even in good times protesters take readily to the streets.
There have been various outbursts in recent weeks. When President Nicolas Sarkozy dropped in on a town in Normandy, the police had to use tear-gas to control a crowd of protesting students and teachers. Militant unions in Paris forced the closure of a railway station, Saint-Lazare, for a day, and have paralysed public transport in Marseille. In December Mr Sarkozy postponed a school reform out of fears, prompted by riots in Greece, that French high-school protests could get out of hand and even set off a rerun of May 1968.
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