Unions force French on GE

Technology giant General Electric has agreed to conduct almost all its business at its Yvelines branch in French.

Unions forced the American firm, which is the third largest company in the world, to provide all information required by its employees in a language that everyone could understand.

The move comes after employees campaigned at General Electric Medical Systems (GEMS) France for ten years to be able to use training manuals, emails from management and enterprise software in the language of Moliere.

A deal was signed at the same time as the CGT union was taking the company to court where they sought to have French imposed by legal order.

Union rep Jocelyne Chabert said: “The abusive over-use of English in all work-related areas was discriminatory against less qualified and older employees.”

At GEMS, which employs 1,600 people in France where they manufacture complex radiological equipment, more than 80% of work related written material is not in French.

Unions have accepted that not everything can be translated into French, and a list of those documents that must be translated has been drawn up and will be reviewed every year.