Taxi strike: snail operations in Paris, Toulouse and Rennes

Snail operations, rallies, and even roadblocks... Taxi drivers are mobilizing again this Monday March 4 to protest against the reform of the reimbursement of “health transport” by Health Insurance. Around 8 a.m. this morning, hundreds of drivers organized a snail operation on the A13 towards Paris, making traffic very difficult. A little before 10 a.m., the Ile-de-France road information site Sytadin announced the end of this demonstration.

But the taxis mobilized in this action do not want to stop there. At midday, they converged on Paris, taking the Paris ring road at low speed. “Processes from Île-de-France and the entire territory will converge in Paris, Place du Trocadéro, at the call of the FNAT and the FNDT, two of the main professional organizations,” announced the National Federation of Taxi Artisans (FNAT) and the National Taxi Federation (FNDT) in a press release published last Thursday. This weekend, the president of the FNDT Emmanuelle Cordier announced to Le Parisien “at least 2000 taxis” which will pass “through the Paris ring road” this Monday.

The movement is also being followed outside the capital. In Toulouse, taxis blocked the main access to the airport from 6 a.m. They then had to reach toll booths for filtering operations. In Bordeaux, taxis were to converge in the morning towards Bordeaux-Mérignac airport, to spend the night there. A filter dam is planned there for Tuesday morning.

In Nîmes, the drivers demonstrated this Monday morning at the Nîmes-Ouest motorway exit, and then had to carry out a snail operation with the CPAM (Primary Health Insurance Fund) and then the Gard prefecture as drop-off points. In Rennes, a snail operation is underway on the ring road. The taxis will then reach the Ille-et-Vilaine prefecture at the end of the morning.

Also read: Why are taxis on strike again this Monday?

This is not the first time that the unions, who are not slowing down, have called for mobilization in recent months. This is even the fifth day of demonstrations in the space of three months. In their sights, the new agreement which links taxis to Social Security on medical transport prices. The drivers in fact believe that the “new pricing”, “published unilaterally” by the National Union of Health Insurance Funds, is “unsustainable”. They also fear for their future, emphasizing the challenges of the negotiations of the “2025-2029 convention”.

“The suffering of taxis is reminiscent of the despair of another profession, that of farmers,” the unions asserted in their press release, denouncing “above-ground demands.” “Bankruptcies follow one another and colleagues even deplore suicides,” they added.