STRIKE IN FRANCE.

Dominion, Volume 2, Issue 506, 13 May 1909, Page 7

STRIKE IN FRANCE.

POSTAL EMPLOYEES. GOVERNMENT REFUSES TO YIELD. DEBATE IN CHAMBER. (Br TELEGRAPH —rIIESS ASSOCIATION—COPTKiaiXT.) (Rec. May 12, 11.50 p.m.) Paris, May 12. The French Chamber of Deputies reassembled yesterday. The Socialists introduced an interpellation on the subject of tho postal employees' claims, and alleged that tho Promier, M. Clemenceau, had deceived tho officials by refusing to dismiss tho Under-Secretary, M. Simyan. The Minister for Public Works, M. Bartliou, replying, denied that any. promise to dismiss ha dbeon mado. Government, lio said, would bo.impossible, if trade unions of State servants wero allowed to become stronger, than tho representatives .of tho nation.. ■ . ■, • ' The debate was adjourned. _ A meeting of 10,000 postal employees wa3 then held, and bitterly denounced the adjournment. The meeting voted a strike, which began immediately. . , . M. SIMYAN'S POLICY. M. Simyan, the Undor-Sooretary whose dismissal the strikers demand, denios tho charges :of favouritism brought against him, and olaims that the disorganisation of the Civil Service is I duo to the "pull" whioh the employees .have had with members of the Chamber of Deputies. It is said that an attempt by M. Simyan to abolish promotion by seniority and . substitute a merit .system precipitated the strike; , But the contest is really over the question of the right of Government employees to organise and strike in their own interests like other employees. The French labour_ unions have long been trying to force this to an issue, and if they find that the employees are being beaten a universal strike may be called in their defence. The comparative triviality of the occasion and the great inconvenience to the community tended on the occasion of the last strike to > alienate publio sympathy, and the firm stand of the Government was generally approved. The matter was brought up before the Chamber of Deputies by interpellations on. March 19, and M. Barthou, ■ Minister for Public Works, defended the course of the.Government. He held that the servants of . the State, in thus deserting their'posts in a: body, had put themselves in the position of mutineers, and to make concessions.to them under threat would be. to give way to anarchy. , , M. Simyan offered his resignation to the Cabinet,- but it was not accepted. ; 7 "''