PARIS – Hundreds of thousands of people demonstrated across France on Saturday seeking to keep up pressure on the government over its pension reform plans, including a move to raise the retirement age to 64 from 62.

After three days of nationwide strikes since the start of the year, unions are hoping to match a mass turnout from Jan 19 when more than a million people marched in opposition to the plans.

“If they’re not able to listen to what’s happening on the streets, and are not able to realise what is happening with the people, well they shouldn’t be surprised that it blows up at some point,” Ms Delphine Maisonneuve, a 43-year-old nurse, told Reuters as a protest in Paris kicked off.

The French spend the most number of years in retirement among nations in the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development – a benefit that a substantial majority of people are reluctant to give up, opinion polls show.

President Emmanuel Macron says the reform is “vital” to ensuring the pension system’s viability.

Early estimates showed that numbers had increased in Paris by about 20 per cent from the last protest last Tuesday, newspaper Le Figaro reported.

Unions were hoping for a huge turnout for the first weekend protests since the movement began and to draw people from all ages and backgrounds to show the government that the anger against the reform runs deep.

Shutting down France

In a joint statement ahead of Saturday’s marches, all the main unions called for the government to withdraw the Bill.

They warned that they would seek to bring France to a standstill from March 7 if their demands were not met. A strike is already scheduled for Thursday.

“If the government continues to remain deaf then the inter-union grouping will call for France to be shut down,” they said ahead of Saturday’s marches.

The protests are the first on a weekend, when workers do not need to strike or take time off. They follow the first week of debate on the pension legislation in Parliament.

The opposition has suggested thousands of amendments to complicate the debate and ultimately try to force the government to pass the Bill without a parliamentary vote and through decree, a move that could potentially sour the rest of Mr Macron’s mandate. He was re-elected in April 2022 for five years.

Raising the retirement age by two years and extending the pay-in period would yield an extra €17.7 billion (S$25 billion) in annual pension contributions, letting the system break even by 2027, according to Labour Ministry estimates.

Unions say there are other ways to do this, such as taxing the super rich or asking employers or well-off pensioners to contribute more.

“Even though at my age, I’m not really affected (by the pension reforms), it’s important to be vigilant about our society, that there is solidarity, that it’s one where people are very close to one another, and to be vigilant about caring not only for our elderly but also for our children,” said Mr Kamel Amriou, 65, a retired graphic artist. REUTERS