Apart from that, how was the meeting? HE ARRIVED at the office in a suit and tie but left it topless, his shirt torn off his back, fleeing over a high fence. Xavier Broseta, head of human resources at Air France, escaped a mob of irate unionists on October 5th after they disrupted a works-council meeting about planned job cuts. His colleague Pierre Plissonnier, in charge of long-haul flights, got away at the same time, his shirt and suit jacket ripped to shreds. Their dramatic getaway, which went viral on social media, seemed to mark a new low point in France’s antagonistic labor relations.
It is unclear exactly who the provocateurs behind the mob attack were. Reports suggested that Air France had identified 20 suspects, half of them unionists—many from the Communist-linked Confédération Générale du Travail (CGT)—and possibly only three company employees. They managed to turn an already tense works-council meeting, called to discuss a plan to cut 2,900 jobs and five long-haul flights, into what looked like an attempted lynching. Manuel Valls, the prime minister, said he was “scandalised”.
Most French labor disputes merely…
