The UK’s biggest Civil Service union has backed the striking French public services workers that have closed schools, airports and post offices across the Channel.
According to reports, 30% of civil servants joined 58% of high school teachers and significant numbers of transport and energy workers in walking out over low pay and job cuts.
The Public and Commercial Services (PCS) union has led strikes over the same issues in the UK this year and sent a message of support to its French counterparts.
PCS general secretary Mark Serwotka said: “We stand shoulder to shoulder with French public sector workers, who are striking today over low pay and job cuts.
“Our members have faced and continue to face the same issues and understand the damage that cuts have on essential public services, which has only been compounded by below-inflation pay offers that result in a pay cut in real terms.
“We support the motivation behind today’s industrial action by French public sector workers and wish them every success with their industrial action and campaign,” Serwotka said.
The French 24-hour strike is in protest at French president Nicolas Sarkozy’s ‘Civil Service revolution’, which aims to slash Europe’s most expensive state bureaucracy.
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