Welcome to mjventertainment.blogspot.com: Listen FRANCE LABOUR DEMONSTRATION TRADE UNION FRENCH POLITICS Issued on 22-06-2016 • Modified 22-06-2016 to 16:18 French minister lifts labour reform demo ban after meeting unions by RFI CGTleader Philippe Martinez and Force Ouvrière's Jean-Claude Mailly at a press conference on Wednesday Reuters/Baz Ratner French unions say their demonstration planned for Thursday will go ahead, following a last-minute agreement with Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve on a changed route. Earlier Paris police had banned the march because of violence on previous protests against the Socialist government's labour reform plans. "After tough talks with the interior minister, the union and student organisations obtained the right to demonstrate on a route proposed by the interior ministry," Philippe Martinez of the CGT union told a news conference. The government also gave the go-ahead for a demonstration next Tuesday, on the eve of a Senate vote on the proposed labour reforms, Martinez said, although details have yet to be sorted out. "We told the minister we cauldn't cancel," Jean-Claude Mailly, of the FO union that also called for the protest, said, adding that the march would follow a shorter route of 1.6 kilometres. Cazeneuve said that no violence would be tolerated. On Wednesday morning Paris police announced that they had banned the demonstration, following the unions' refusal to call off the march and just hold a rally. The decision, which came after calls from Prime Minister Manuel Valls called on unions to scrap the protest because of violence on a demonstration on 14 June, caused an outcry on the left. Hard left and far right slam ban Communist senators called for the debate in the French upper house to be suspended because "the democratic conditions no longer exist" and the hard-left Left Party said it would join the unions if they decided to defy the ban. The Senate is to vote on the bill on Thursday. On the right, National Front leader Marine Le Pen called the ban a "serious attack on democracy", although mainstream right-wing former prime minister François Fillon welcomed it. Even the two major unions that accepted the government's amended version of the bill, the CFDT and the CFE-CGC, criticised the move and called for continuing dialogue with the rival unions. First union demo ban for 54 years No union demonstrations have been banned in France since 1962 when the CGT and students' union Unef joined left-wing parties in a demonstration about the war in Algeria. A police charge led to the deaths on nine people in the Charonne metro station during that march. Under the present government, a demonstration against Israel's offensive on Gaza was banned in 2014, marches relating to the Cop21 climate conference were forbidden because of the state of emergency declared after the 13 November Paris attacks, pro- and anti-migrant demonstrations in Calais were banned this year, as were two protests against the labour reform were banned in the western city of Nantes.