For the fourth day in a row, the Eiffel Tower will remain closed on Thursday February 22 due to the strike by SETE (Eiffel Tower Operating Company) employees, who criticize its financial management, the Agence France-Presse (AFP) the CGT and FO, the two unions representing staff. A meeting is planned for 1 p.m. between the unions and SETE management, said the CGT and FO on site.
Around a hundred employees gathered Thursday morning at the main entrance to the monument, to mark, among other things, their opposition to the fee, according to them too high, that the SETE will have to pay to the Paris City Hall, owner of the monument, in the amendment to the public service delegation contract which must be presented, and put to a vote, in May to the Paris Council. This provides for a 20% increase in ticket prices.
The employees, in the colors of the CGT and FO, chanted the following slogans: “Eiffel Tower in danger, fees too high”; “City management, Eiffel Tower in danger”; or even “The town hall is stuffing itself, sorry Gustave [Eiffel]”. This conflict, which had already led to the closure of the Iron Lady on December 27, the centenary of Gustave Eiffel's death, occurs in the middle of the winter school holidays, and five months before the Olympics (July 26-August 11). .
A “reasonable” fee
The general secretary of the CGT, Sophie Binet, came to support the strikers Thursday morning. “It is absolutely necessary that negotiations begin and, visibly, the management of the Eiffel Tower has not understood what negotiating means,” declared Ms. Binet, who asked that the inter-union be able to “negotiate directly with Paris City Hall”.
The trade unionist asked for a “reasonable” fee so that “the Eiffel Tower has sufficient resources to be able to invest and guarantee maintenance, in particular the works”. Even if the inter-union does not report salary demands, "the Eiffel Tower must also have the means to pay its staff and recruit them", she also noted.
However, “these unreasonable royalties” impose “austerity on staff in terms of recruitment and salaries for all years to come”, she estimated.
In the days before the closure, the Iron Lady welcomed between 17,000 and 20,000 visitors per day, FO union representative Nada Bzioui told Agence France-Presse. The four days of closure therefore represent a potential loss of around 70,000 entries. Management has not communicated about the cancellations caused by the social movement.
