Oh dear, the French are up to their usual tricks again... <BR> <BR>Fishermen protesting over high fuel prices have blocked ALMOST ALL PORTS along France's Channel and Mediterranean coasts on Wednesday, severely disrupting ferry services to the UK and Corsica. Blockades are expected to remain until Thursday August 31st. <BR> <BR>Blockades are currently affecting the ports of Calais, Boulogne and Dunkirk. The ferry company P&0 said it was shutting down its services to Dover, England. Further west, the ports of Cherbourg, Granville, Carteret and Saint Malo were also shut down and Saint Malo taxi drivers barred trucks from entering the port area. <BR> <BR>Down south, most ports are shut along the Mediterranean coast; traffic to Corsica and North Africa ias blocked in Marseille but some ships were still sailing from Toulon. <BR> <BR>

I am re-reading William L. Shirer's book, "The Collapse of the Third Republic." One must wonder why this sort of job action has not been addressed by the French government over the past 55 years. If it isn't the museum guards it's the farmers, if it isn't the ATM service personnel it's the railway workers or the truckers. If a group inconveniences the public at large enough or long enough, they get their way. Surely, a nation as sophisticated as France can do better than this hostage-taking. Are they heading back to the 1930s once more?

Vote with your feet as I do, don't go !

to the top for anyone travelling 8/31/00

Is anyone really surprised by this type of nonsense anymore? We've seen it so many times in the past. The French have long been the laughing stock of the modern world. <BR> <BR>Remember the laid-off textile workers that threatened to blow up their factory in Givet last month? They settled for merely dumping 800 gallons of sulphuric acid into the sewers that drain directly into the Meuse, which flows into Belgium and the Netherlands.An environmental disaster was averted only because the local fire brigade blocked the sewers with sandbags. The predictable response of the French government to this act of ecoterrorism was to offer the workers a generous severance package along with a guarantee of 80% of their salary in unemployment benefits. Can anyone say "stupid" in French? The ironic aspect of this episode is that the primary reason investors unwilling to save the struggling textile factory from bankruptcy was that the local workforce had a long-standing reputation for unreasoning militancy. <BR> <BR>Every European nation has at least one unique and defining characteristic. In the case of France, it is to be governed by weak-minded idiotic bureaucrats.

Strike still on. Back to the top.

Oh, Thank God! I was afraid they weren't letting gays into France!

Strike still going on, and even worse ... <BR> <BR>If you need to take the Chunnel to the UK, make sure to bring something to eat and to drink because the strikers have decided to "be cooperative" and every 20 minutes they allow 20 cars and 20 trucks to pass through. <BR> <BR>By this evening P&O Stena Lines (ferry company) expects waiting times of 2 to 4 hours for cars ; 12 to 15 hours for trucks and buses! This also applies in the other direction (UK / France). <BR> <BR> <BR>

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Looks like strike is now OFF. French government has met their demands. Expect the backlog will take a few days to clear. All of this is no doubt a legacy of the Revolution, and of May 68, but one wonders why such actions are always teetering on the brink of the Terror. Perhaps some Francophiles on the board can give us the positive spin on such actions. A necessary evil of "l'exception francaise"?

It's a shame that innocent people were caught up in this, but at least in France people still have the spunk to face down the government and big business. People Power is not necessarily evil, nor is direct political action.

The events of the past few days are proof, if proof were needed, of the ineffectiveness of the EU authorities in promoting free movement of goods and people around Europe. The French don't give a damn about the rule of law or the inconvenience their actions cause other innocent people. No wonder many of us in the UK are sick and tired of the idea of closer European integration. It's one rule for the French and another for everyone else. <BR>

Yeah, right, Kenny! And we did SUCH a good job when the animal rights people had all the calf transport ports closed down, didn't we?

I'm afraid you missed the crucial difference Sheila. Any attempts to illegally blockade ports in the UK (or any other form of secondary picketing for that matter) are met with a swift response by the local police force. <BR> <BR>In France, however, the Gendarmerie sit back and let the demonstrators get on with it..!

Kenny, the EU has no "authority" due mainly to euro-sceptics who won't give it any.I am no great lover of the EU but this is down to the French & them alone. <BR> I do agree that the French gov. have lost any small amount of credibility they had left after the beef crisis.But it is is their country and unless we go to a higher level of European integration its up to them. <BR> Anyway it's over now but not before a woman in the queue miscarried.She was not best pleased.The press are reporting that the local situation was about to turn very ugly when the French "government" gave in to the blockaders.(BBC R4) <BR> The UK gov is making very threatening noises.With an election in the offing it's my guess that if it happens again soon major legal action will be taken. <BR>Note : still some delays due to backlog. <BR>(Sheila, the anti-veal protesters were middle-class & therefore inviolate.The UK miners were not treated so gently, as would our fishermen be if they tried this) <BR>

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