Macron’s defeat of the railway unions is as historic as Thatcher’s victory over Scargill

Who would have thought it? French president Emmanuel Macron has defeated the French railway unions. His victory is as symbolic as that of Thatcher’s defeat of the miners and suggests that the days when unions in France can hold the country to ransom are over. Those who initially dismissed this putative Napoleon as an empty suit have gravely underestimated him.

The nationalised French railway is not merely a transportation system. It is a quintessential expression of France itself. Globally admired for its pioneering high-speed TGV intercity trains, it has been a pillar of the national economy, a mighty symbol of the unitary French state and a monument to the enduring power of trade unions. It was also considered irreformable.

Well, that might once have been true. Macron inherited a Société Nationale de Chemins de Fer that is drowning in 50 billion euros of debt. Much of its rolling stock is obsolete. Some of its stations, notoriously the Gare du Nord in Paris, are practically slums – the north Paris terminus having been memorably described by Andy Street, then the boss of John Lewis, now the mayor of The West Midlands, as the “squalor pit of Europe.”