Row over bid to add holidays

Terra Nova, a left-leaning independent organisation which has close ties to the French Socialist Party, says this would treat all religions more equally. “The goal is to have common holidays for everyone,” said Marc Olivier Padis, director of studies at the think-tank.

“Today, the problem is that a Jew or a Muslim who wants to celebrate his religion has to take extra days off, and thus expose his personal religious beliefs to his employer, who is normally not required to know,” he said.
He says that the fairest solution is to have official days off for every principal religious holiday, so that no one is forced to expose their religion to anyone. But the suggestion has proved controversial. “Our suggestion was ‘misunderstood’ for two reasons,” he said.

“The first is that it was seen as a sort of ‘gift’ that the French Republic is offering to a certain cult or religion. The second is that it is considered a disrespect to Christianity, a way to replace the importance of the religion by another one.”
The secularity organisation Forces Laïques is against the plan. Its president Laurence Marchand-Taillade told Connexion that it is unfair to impose religious holidays on people.

“The solution is not to set new holidays, but to remove them all and set a number of days that an employee can take whenever he likes during the year,” she said.
“Let’s not forget that 70% of the French are atheists, and it is unfair to give all of these holidays to only 30% of the population.”

From an economic point of view, she argued that the Forces Laïques solution would help growth. “It would be best if not all employees are on holiday at the same time. It would help create a balance in the market.”
France already has 11 public holidays per year, compared to eight in the UK, nine in Germany and Ireland, 10 in the US, and 14 in Spain.