It is a last stand against the latest consequences of the law for a new railway pact passed in 2018, at the start of Emmanuel Macron's first five-year term and, above all, against the opening of rail to competition. The four SNCF unions are calling for a strike on Thursday, November 21, and are considering a repeat movement starting on the evening of December 11.
The 2018 law certainly relieved SNCF of 35 billion euros in debt, but it also transformed the SNCF public industrial and commercial establishment into a limited company (SA). This SA, 100% owned by the State, is itself a shareholder in a multitude of companies, including Fret SNCF, all managed independently.
For the CGT, the UNSA, SUD-Rail and the CFDT, this “balkanization” of a once strong and unified group weakens its cohesion and commitment on the ground. “We are mobilizing for the collective interest”assures Thomas Cavel, general secretary of the CFDT-Cheminots.
Yet they know there will be no turning back. The liberalization movement is accelerating: on December 15, railway workers working for the first TER lines open to competition will be transferred to new subsidiaries, created for the occasion, including when the SNCF won the market. The 1is January 2025, Fret SNCF employees will be transferred to two new entities.
Illegal state aid
This company of 5,000 railway workers, leader in rail freight transport in France, is forced to transform, not because of the 2018 law, but because of the competition department of the European Commission. She accuses him of having received 5.3 billion euros in illegal state aid between 2007 and 2019 and can force him to repay it. To avoid this, the State and the group's management decided to cut Fret SNCF by 20% of its turnover, left to its rivals, and to divide it into two entities on 1is January 2025: Hexafret, 4,000 people, which will take over freight activities, and Technis, 500 people, which will offer a locomotive maintenance service. The capital of the company which will oversee these two companies – Rail Logistics Europe – could be opened to a public or private shareholder, with SNCF remaining in the majority.
“The 500 people, who are not taken over by either Hexafret or Technis, were all offered a solution within the group”insists the management of Fret SNCF. It also ensures that, from 2025, Hexafret will have regained, through internal growth, the turnover of Fret SNCF. And that it will have fewer expenses to pay since it is the head company of the SNCF group which will finance the additional contribution to the special pension scheme for railway workers, i.e. 12% of the payroll (from 18 million to 20 million euros each year). Hexafret will thus have the same conditions as its private competitors.
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