AN ERUPTION of steel piping in the middle of wheatfields, the Grandpuits refinery is the chief petrol supplier to the Paris region. But no crude has flowed in, and no petrol tanker driven out, since unions began a strike there on May 17th. On a weekday, striking workers in lemon-yellow jackets from the Confédération Générale du Travail (CGT), a hardline French union, huddle on the picket line in a show of masculine solidarity, defiantly cooking sausages despite the beating rain. A little fridge, under a canvas awning, is stocked with beer. A brazier, in an old oil drum, is flaming. “We’ve got fresh baguettes, and all the meat sauces,” declares one striker. “We’ll hold out to the very end.”
For the past two weeks a battle over the survival of a reformist French government, and with it the future of the Socialist Party, has been playing out at refineries, oil depots and on the transport network. Last week strikes and oil blockades brought petrol shortages. Some 2,300 petrol stations—a fifth of the total—either ran dry, or rationed sales at the pump. This week, after riot police cleared most of the blocked refineries, petrol distribution eased. But…
