Goodyear workers protest in France

French workers distraught over the planned shutdown of a Goodyear tire factory in northern France have staged a protest against the plan.

On Thursday, hundreds of Goodyear employees protested outside the plant in the city of Amiens, located 120 kilometers (about 75 miles) north of Paris, setting fire to a pile of tires in order to give vent to their anger over Goodyear’s attempts to shutter the facility.

Earlier in the day, Goodyear’s attempts to hold a Workers Council meeting to discuss the situation at its money-hemorrhaging plant and finalize the consultation process obliged under French law were thawed by union action.

Representatives of the Confederation Generale du Travail (CGT) labour body -representing around 80 percent of the nearly 1,200 employees at the factory- walked out of the meeting soon after it had begun.

They said that Goodyear had failed to honor its commitments.

In February, some 800 workers from the Goodyear tire plant in Amiens, backed by more than 1,000 workers from other parts of France, protested outside the company’s French headquarters at Reuil Malmaison in Paris in their last-ditch attempt to save their jobs.

Goodyear’s employees scuffled with riot police, and scores of them were wounded.

Goodyear’s workers in Amiens have waged a five-year legal battle to keep the plant open. They have rebuffed the company’s demands that they agree to a four-shift system or face layoffs.

Since 2009, there have been one suicide and four attempted suicides at Goodyear’s factory in France.

The Titan Tire Corporation has offered to take over part of Goodyear’s plant in Amiens, which manufactures tires for tractors and other farm vehicles.

Titan’s plan would save nearly 335 jobs out of some 1,200 and contribute to an investment of tens of millions of euros to guarantee staff employment for four years.

France’s unemployment rate reached record highs in September, with nearly 3.3. million people out of work.

People are angry at the government’s economic policies, as a poll published on November 5 by IFOP showed 91 percent of French people want the government to change policies.