Delays, Migration Problems and Blame Stretch Across English Channel
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Version 0 of 1. PARIS — On both sides of the English Channel, thousands of longhaul trucks have come to a halt, the lines stretching into the flat green countryside of France and England on Wednesday as the trucks sat idled by the third day of a strike by ferry workers. But, erupting as it has in the port of Calais, France, what might have been just another labor dispute has become entangled with a signal issue that has sown discord in France, Britain and across Europe: migration. Calais has long been a place of special and perennial tensions over migration, because the port is a magnet for thousands of migrants who congregate on the French side of the Channel Tunnel and try to enter Britain, where they hope to find better prospects for jobs and potentially more generous welfare benefits. The migration issue and the labor dispute by ferry workers angered over job cuts have come together primarily because the strike has slowed to a crawl or halted altogether the truck traffic on the French side, making it easier for the migrants to try, sometimes successfully, to board the trucks and smuggle themselves into Britain. In some cases, the migrants seem to besiege the trucks in groups, forcing the drivers to let them stow away. While the migrants are often intercepted by the police when the trucks reach the other side of the Channel, the situation has intensified the finger-pointing between France and Britain, and has made drivers on the French side feel precarious. “Drivers are fearful, and they can’t do anything about it when they’ve got 10 to 20 people trying to get on board,” said Richard Burnett, chief executive of the Road Haulage Association, which represents 83,000 haulers in Britain. He estimated that more than 8,000 trucks were stranded in Calais and in Dover, England, and described migrants swarming trucks, threatening drivers and demanding that they let them board the vehicles. “The impact on business is enormous,” he said. “We’re angry and frustrated at the French authorities, who aren’t tackling this issue.” Unable to stop the strike, the British government went as far as to pledge on Sunday that it would work to put up a security fence in France, on the road to the Calais port, to stop illegal migrants from boarding the British-bound trucks. The French transport organizations, however, are similarly upset, and some place much of the blame for the troubles on the other side of the Channel. Nicolas Paulissen, managing director of the National Federation of Road Transport, which represents transport companies, described the situation at Calais as “chaos.” “Not only is the port blocked, but so is the tunnel,” he said. Access to the tunnel was restored later on Wednesday, but the backlog of trucks and cars prevented traffic from running smoothly. The ferry workers announced that they were partly lifting their blockade, at least for some hours, because they were meeting with the French transportation minister. Mr. Paulissen noted that when traffic was normal, 10,000 trucks from around Europe went through each day. More critical are local French officials, who blame the British for the strike, which stalled the ferries, and for refusing to take more migrants. Migrants are streaming into Europe from North Africa and the turbulent Middle East. The European Union has been trying to force countries to share the burden, but the bloc has so far failed to agree on how to do so. In Britain, the issue is particularly charged, and euroskeptic politicians are pushing for the country to leave the union, with immigration a chief complaint. The mayor of Calais, Natacha Bouchart, said she held the British responsible for the troubles there. “Calais has been taken hostage by the decisions of the British government,” she said. Amid the arguments, businesses are losing millions of dollars in trans-Channel trade and thousands of travelers are being inconvenienced, for hours if not a day or more. On Wednesday, the Eurostar train service was running regularly, but on Tuesday, the service was interrupted for hours by strikers who threw burning tires on the tracks. The labor dispute in Calais has its roots in a ruling by Britain’s Competition and Markets Authority, which has a say in the transport service that runs between the two countries. The authority ruled last year that Eurotunnel, which manages and operates the Channel Tunnel, had too much control over Channel transport and was undercutting competition. The authority ruled that Eurotunnel could not operate its ferries from Dover. After pleadings before the regulatory authority, Eurotunnel lost. Although it later won an appeal in Britain, it had already decided to sell two ferries. The new owner, a Danish company, is sharply reducing the number of jobs, with at least 400 people losing their positions, said Ms. Bouchart, the Calais mayor, who added that her sympathies lay with the workers who are about to be unemployed. Furious employees began a strike on Monday after a court rejected their request to extend their contract with Eurotunnel. The strike has blocked access to the port of Calais and the ferries, and also at times to the train traffic that goes through the tunnel. Normally, cars and trucks can drive onto a freight train or can go on a ferry. With the port closed and tires burning on the tracks, it was impossible for them to get across either way. Ms. Bouchart has spoken to the British ambassador and also appealed to both Emmanuel Macron, France’s economy minister, and Bernard Cazeneuve, the interior minister, to help Calais. Prime Minister David Cameron of Britain confirmed on Twitter on Wednesday that he had spoken with François Hollande, the French president, about the situation. “I’ve called @fhollande on Calais & the need to stop the illegal blockade & maintain port security,” he wrote. “We’ll continue working closely together.” |