Driving cars has always been seen as a stressful activity in France, especially because French motorists rarely seem to learn from their experience. For example, they seem prepared to endure a traffic jam on holiday weekends year after year, never changing their date or time of departure.

However, making cars has now become even more stressful, judging by the number of suicides among car workers in recent months, six for example in the Peugeot-Citroën group.

This prompted a survey commissioned by the daily paper, Pèlerin, on conditions in the workplace. A representative sample of 1,000 employees was interviewed face-to-face at home. Over 61% of workers believed conditions had deteriorated and that many more of their fellow employees suffered from stress than in the past. Lack of job security (54%), lack of appreciation (45%), and poor relations with the management (27%) were cited as the principal reasons.

The French government is to hold a conference in the autumn to discuss ways of improving working conditions in the industry.

September 2007