[PEN-L:1969] Strike action in Brussels

[D Shniad <shniad@xxxxxx>]

PROTESTS OVER CUTS PARALYSES BRUSSELS

BRUSSELS -- Thousands of Belgian public sector workers
brought central Brussels to a standstill Wednesday as they
protested against impending government budget cuts.
   Trade union organizers said more than 40,000 people took
part in the march, which wound its way along a three
kilometre route that took it past the stock exchange.
   Organizers said the protest was just the start of a
campaign to force Prime Minister Jean-Luc Dehaene's centre-
left government to abandon sweeping budget cuts.
   Unions say Christian Democrat Dehaene plans to slash the
equivalent of $5 billion Cdn. from the 1996 budget,
threatening jobs, pensions and pay.
   Dehaene has been forced into cutting the budget to meet
the European Union's Maastricht Treaty criteria on entry
into a future economic and monetary union.
   "You cannot have Belgium in Europe without fixing
Belgium first," said one trade union official.
   A recent slowdown in economic growth was limiting
government funds for the public sector and the social
security system is becoming unaffordable.
   Unions are calling for a halt to privatizations and what
they see as a stripping of public assets.


   -- Reuter