In Seine-Maritime, ExxonMobil employees continue to mobilize for their jobs

Dialogue between management and employees has been at a standstill since the beginning of August, after the unions rejected the draft job protection plan (PSE).

For almost three months, several hundred ExxonMobil employees have been on strike in Port-Jérôme-sur-Seine near Le Havre, formerly Gravenchon, in Seine-Maritime. On April 11, management announced that it wanted to close the site’s “chemical” activity – which also has a refinery – and which is used to manufacture plastic materials for the pharmaceutical and automobile industries. In total, 659 jobs are affected, the vast majority of which are in Port-Jérôme-sur-Seine. After tense negotiations, in early August, the unions rejected the PSE (job protection plan) project proposed by management. In particular, they are demanding more resources to support employees who will lose their jobs. Since then, dialogue has been completely blocked.

Despite the machines being at a standstill, striking employees take turns 24 hours a day to monitor the installations, because the site is classified as Seveso. On the banners hung on the gates, we can read “No to closure” Or “Long live chemistry.” With a closed face, Cyril prepares to enter with about twenty colleagues; he has already spent 26 years at Exxon. “I don’t know what will become of us, but we’re waiting to see if things will change or not.”he said.

It has been 66 days since “the hammer blow”, as Cyril says, fell on him and everyone else. “We knew that there were parts of chemistry that were in a bad position, he assures, but we didn’t think they would shut down all the chemistry at once like that.” At 46, he will look for work elsewhere. Others will have to take early retirement, like Arnaud, 54 years old, 35 of which were spent at ExxonMobil: “It’s black, I’m not old enough to retire”.

Exxon management justifies this closure by the financial losses and the lack of competitiveness of its chemical activity, due to high energy prices in France. It assures that it wants to limit forced departures through age measures, financial aid according to seniority, support for retraining, which represents 153 million euros in total for the PSE. Measures considered insufficient by Christophe Aubert, CGT coordinator of Exxon. “We simply have to fight until the end”he asserts in front of the marquee set up two months ago.

More generally, he denounces a check policy. “These are employees who are going to find themselves unemployed, who, in their household, may have taken out loans, have young children. And how are they going to be able to cope with their future with only a financial package? asks the CGT coordinator. Unfortunately, they will not find the same status at the same social level in terms of employment in the Normandy basin.”.

In the Normandy basin, 3,000 direct or indirect jobs will be affected, according to the CGT. At least 75 subcontracting companies will be affected, from pharmaceuticals to automobiles, specifies Gérard Leseul, socialist deputy of Seine-Maritime. “It would be totally absurd to depend on supplies of these products coming from the United States, Singapore or Asia, when we know how to produce here,” argues the elected official.

“We’ve been producing it here for many, many years.”

Gérard Leseul, socialist MP for Seine-Maritime

to franceinfo

Without the unions’ signature, ExxonMobil’s management will present its project to the Regional Directorate of Labor next Monday, with perhaps fewer benefits for employees. Limited to current affairs since the dissolution of the National Assembly, the outgoing Minister of Industry acknowledges having little room for maneuver, but assures that discussions continue with Exxon, the unions and local elected officials.