PARIS: Protesters poured into streets across France on Thursday in the latest mass demonstrations against a pensions overhaul that critics say would require millions of people to push back retirement.

Unions are demanding the government drop its reform in their biggest show of strength in decades, with a record-breaking public transport strike now in its 36th day.

Teachers and other public sector workers joined a fourth day of nationwide rallies against the project since the strike began on Dec 5, leading to school closures that forced parents to scramble for daycare.

Commuters in Paris were again hard hit by the metro strike, and national train services remained severely disrupted.

Aviation authorities warned of potential cancellations as traffic controllers walked off the job, though Air France said at least 90 per cent of domestic flights would go ahead as planned.

Unions asking government to drop reforms as transport strike enters its 36th day

Officials have said they are ready to negotiate, in particular on the hotly contested “pivot age” of 64 the government has suggested people will have to work until for a full pension — beyond the official retirement age of 62.

“Between the government’s stance of `We’re talking, everything is on the table’ and the reality, you have to wonder if it really intends to... take the views of unions into account,” Philippe Martinez of the hardline CGT union said ahead of a march in Paris.

Previous rallies in the capital have been marred by vandalism and clashes with police, and the Eiffel Tower was shut ahead of Thursday’s protests.

Thousands of people demonstrated as well in Toulouse, Nantes, Marseilles and other cities against the pension reform, a key plank in President Emmanuel Macron’s pledge to shake up wide swathes of the French economy.

“This isn’t a reform, it’s a sellout,” read one banner in the central city of Clermont-Ferrand.

Both sides are hoping to win a battle of attrition for public support.

Published in Dawn, January 10th, 2020