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Fresh protests in France as Senate begins debate on pension reform
Oct 5, 2010, 18:32 GMT
Paris - Unions made calls for fresh strikes and several thousand people demonstrated outside the French Senate on Tuesday as it began debating the government's planned pension reform bill.
But Work Minister Eric Woerth said the government would stick to the planned raise in the retirement age, which is set to increase from 60 to 62 by 2018.
Those who cannot prove that they have paid the minimum 40.5 years in contributions will not be able to claim the full pension until the age of 67. Until now that has been possible from the age of 65.
The Senate debate is expected to last for two weeks with 1,200 amendments to be examined.
Previous protests against the bill, which has already passed the National Assembly, have seen hundreds of thousands of people take to the streets.
The weekend saw the third protest against the reforms in less than a month.
According to a trade union spokesman, about 2.9 million people protested in more than 225 French cities on Saturday. The Interior Ministry put the number at substantially less - about 900,000.
Unions have scheduled another day of protests and nationwide strikes for October 12.
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