French arts workers threaten to shut down main festivals with strike

Industrial action over plans to reduce rights to extra benefits and social security has already led to cancellations.

Strikes by performers, actors and technicians are threatening to shut down some of France’s leading arts events, including the renowned Avignon festival.

Part-time and temporary workers are angry at plans to reduce their right to extra benefits and social security, aimed at cutting government debt. They say the proposals will hit the country’s exception culturelle (cultural exception), a fiercely-guarded principle that means anything considered to be of cultural value to French society should be protected by the state from market forces.

The industrial action has already led to the cancellation of the Latin American Rio Loco festival in Toulouse, due to open on Wednesday, along with a Paris flamenco event. The Paris-based British singer Jane Birkin has cancelled her 22 June appearance at the Montpellier theatre festival in support of the strikers and performers, who have protested nude during a visit by the culture minister, Aurélie Filippetti, to a culture centre in northern France .

The disgruntled performers and technicians say they will step up their action to hit the big summer festivals, including the Avignon festival in July, which attracts tens of thousands of arts lovers.

At the heart of the dispute is the special status given to more than 254,000 workers in France’s film, theatre, television and festival industry. Known as intermittents, a 1936 law gives them higher compensation, benefits and social protection than the average unemployed person in recognition of their job insecurity. They have to work 507 hours over 10-and-a-half months for performers and over 10 months for technicians to qualify for the payments.

more: TheGuardian