French refinery strikes continue at Total but Gravenchon action ends
Quantum Commodity Intelligence - Strikes across TotalEnergies' French oil refineries are set to continue after the CGT union rejected renewed talks, while the union decided to stop industrial action at ExxonMobil's Port-Jérôme-Gravenchon refinery.
The Total strikes were renewed Friday afternoon, CGT coordinator Eric Sellini told Agency France-Presse, with deliveries from oil depots at La Mède, Feyzin, Flanders and Donges also blocked.
It means that industrial action will continue to block operations at Total's Gonfreville (240,000 bpd), Feyzin (119,000 bpd), the biorefinery in La Med, and Donges (231,000 bpd) until at least the start of the weekend, roughly half of French refining capacity.
The two-week-long strike action has left 28.5% of French forecourts short of at least one fuel, often diesel, on Friday, data from the French government showed, a slight improvement from the 29.1% on Thursday.
U-turn
However, while Sellini said strikes at ExxonMobil's 240,000 bpd Port Jerome-Gravenchon oil refinery near Le Havre will continue until Tuesday, workers decided to stop the action only an hour after he made the comment.
"The strike movement has been lifted here [Gravenchon] as in Fos-sur-Mer, negotiations with management are blocked and requisitions are in place, we no longer have any leverage to fight," Christophe Aubert, central union representative CGT told Le Figaro Friday afternoon.
"Employees are already calling management for a new negotiation on 6 December for the mandatory annual negotiations," he added.
Friday's u-turn from the CGT on the action at Gravenchon indicates the mounting pressure on the union after the French government ordered workers at the site to return to work earlier this week.
The administrative court of Rouen sided with the government, ruling on Thursday evening that the requisition order "does not constitute a serious and manifestly illegal violation of the right to strike."
CGT initially said it wanted to appeal that decision.
With industrial action now over in Fos and Gravechon, some 340,000 bpd of French refining capacity will come back online, leaving the 590,000 bpd from Total still affected.
The rejection from the hard-left CGT union to join talks with Total's management comes just hours after the energy giant struck a deal with the more moderate unions CFDT and CFE-CGC unions.
TotalEnergies agreed to pay those workers 7% more and a bonus between €3,000-€6,000 ($2.9-5.8k), while the CGT demands a 10% increase backdated for 2022.