Who remembers the heatwave?

[SaligoBay]

The one that killed a lot of old people a couple of years ago, that is.  We're just coming up to the day that used to be a bank holiday, but that the working population now work unpaid, to pay for the calamity.   Or do they....... 

"The plan to give up one of France's 13 bank holidays was at first greeted with widespread approval. Ernest-Antoine Seilliere of the French employers' federation, hailed "a great novelty in France - the belief that problems can be solved by working harder".

But the enthusiasm has worn off. CFTC, the trade union federation, said the project amounted to "forced labour" and contravened the European convention on human rights. It has called for it to be scrapped and said it would take the matter to the European court.

Several other unions have called strikes for May 16, and a number of Socialist-led regional and city councils are maintaining May 16 as a bank holiday, prompting one cabinet minister to criticise the "egocentricity" of those who "are all for solidarity in theory, but when it comes down to it don't want to know". "

Plus ça change....

 

[Battypuss]

I remember the heatwave clearly.

Was informed by both dd3's school and dd2's College yesterday that school would be operating on the 15th/16th I forget which and can't be arsed to look it up, but there would be no school this Friday, the 6th. In consequence, dd3 has school all day Wednesday (not normally the case) dd2 has her usual half day and their mother is totally confused...

[Tourangelle]

I remember the heat wave, but hasn't the government chosen the wrong year to try to do this with the 1 and 8 May falling on a Sunday. I hear that this is being challenged in the courts on the grounds that it is a return to the corvée....à suivre

[Val_2]

We have had three notices about the journée de solidarité - "A défaut d'accord de branche ou d'entreprise, la journée de solidarité est fixée d'office au Lundi de Pentecôte. Il est possible de ne pas faire travailler les salairiés le Lundi de Pentecôte, il peut s'agir alors du décompte d'une journeée de RTT, ou d'une journée de congé payé. Lorsque le lundi est une journée de repos hebdomadaire de l'entreprise l'employeur peut choisi la date et le type de jour de repos qui sera travaillé: un autre jour férié (sauf le 1er mai) ou un autre jour habituellement non travaillé."

This day does not concern apprentices under 18years old as in effect this day of solidarity has always been considered a legal bank holiday in the Code de Travail which is not a compulsory working day to paid workers in this personal category.

[Battypuss]

So, if the buses don't work but the teachers do, how do my kids get to school?

[BJSLIV]

So, if the buses don't work but the teachers do, how do my kids get to school?

Presumably the same as happened in the areas who did their bit at  Easter.

Only 10% of the kids arrived at school and spent the day playing games.

Then of course there were the parents who were off work that day so didn't bother sending their kids to school.

[SaligoBay]

The situation is clear as mud, then!

Saw a discussion of it on the TV this morning, the old man I was with just laughed and said "Everyone's for solidarity, as long as it's not them who has to pay for it". 

[Tresco]

Well at least they had a bash at it. Can anyone imagine such a scheme in UK, where evey year there are hundreds of unneccessary deaths as a result of sometimes very short periods of bitterly cold weather? Every year it amounts to a few 'slow news days' media fodder.

It does seem to me that this scheme was a knee jerk reaction to an exceptional event. If the approval of it was greeted with 'widespread', but not universal approval, and then applied unevenly, it was doomed to failure.

".....the old man I was with just laughed and said "Everyone's for solidarity, as long as it's not them who has to pay for it".

I'm into solidarity, theoretically and personally, but I would resent working a day for no pay, there's something about that which would make me wince, especially if others elsewhere, having originally said 'i'll do it too!' then backed off.  I would rather me, and everyone else, pay a penny in the pound extra tax, which would amount to more money, but somehow hurt less. (By the way, I have done what amounts to 3 years full time voluntary work in the past, and am doing a bit now, all my choice, my gift, no problems with that).

That would leave the question of how workable such a scheme would be anyway. Was/is the money raised to be spent on fleets of temporarily paid workers driving around visiting the independent elderly on a daily basis with water, fans, misters, mini air con. units? That would work.

Does anyone know, because if it was a leaflet scheme, in my opinion, that wouldn't work! One of the first effects of dehydration is mental confusion - people who are seriously dehydrated simply don't realise or remember they need to drink water, no matter how many leaflets or TV ads they see. Very elderly people succumb very quickly to the effects of extreme heat or cold, as do babies, but babies are pretty much constanty attended to.

I arrived here in the middle of the canicule, and the temperatures were so high, and sustained into the nights, for a very long period, it did not surprise me that many independent elderly people died. The fact that people were dying also in retirement homes indicates further the exceptional nature of this event (or poor levels of care).

Could it be that the French, like the British are still doing a lot of hand wringing about societal changes which mean there are many elderly people who don't see someone from one week to the next?

It's ironic though, that people here immediately started to talk about the item SB posted, which was about soildarity (or otherwise) with the elderly or vulnerable, in very individualistic terms.  No offense to you guys, If I had had children/a business here I would have been thinking along the same lines, little doubt about that...but it's all part of the picture.

 

[David]

Aaah but ----

 

Does anybody think we will have another canicule this year?  After shivering most of last summer, we have fond memories of the heat wave when all work stopped and we had a perfect excuse to "rest" on the terrace under the shade of the trees, with copius amounts of long cool drinks and splashes in the inflatable paddling pool (we do not have a swimming pool).

Being selfish, and of course hoping that the French health system has improved, we would love some heat in the northern Deux Sevres this summer.

[Jo53]

In la Mayenne, money is being supplied to equip all maisons de retraite with air-conditioning. Trouble is, the people who run the homes say they don't need air-con and there are other things they'd rather spend the money on. But the law has been laid down and air-con they will get, in case there is another canicule. It was miserable and wet here last summer, which is far more normal than scorching sun.

Jo