The 2007 strikes in France were a series of general strikes, mostly in the public sector, which started on 13 November 2007. The strike was over President Nicolas Sarkozy's and Prime Minister François Fillon's attempt to reduce early retirement benefits for 500,000 public employees. Sarkozy had stated that pension reform is the first in a series of measures designed to roll back protections for trade unions in France, and both unions and Sarkozy saw the pension strikes as a key political test. Cause of the strikes France's national labour law permits workers in certain hazardous or difficult professions to retire with full pension benefits after 37.5 years rather than 40 years. The Sarkozy administration claims the current pension system allows some public sector workers to retire as early as age 50. The government calculated the cost of these early-retirement benefits at $7 billion a year. President Nicolas Sarkozy felt that his victory in the 2007 presidential election gave him a mandate to carry out labour reforms, stating "I said before I was elected what I would do," and "we will do these reforms because they have to be done." He declared the strikes a test of political will. "I will pursue these reforms to the end," he said in a speech to the European Parliament. "Nothing will blow me off course." Prime Minister François Fillon attacked the unions for depriving millions of French people "of their fundamental freedom—the freedom of movement and even perhaps to work." Bernard Thibault, the secretary of the Confédération générale du travail (CGT), France's second-largest labour union, compared the strikes to the 1995 strikes in France, saying, "The general discontent is as strong as then," and "We're not trying to copy 1995, but the strike could last." Beginning of the strikes On 13 November 2007, SNCF rail workers and Paris Métro personnel became the first group of workers to commence their strike. Labour Minister Xavier Bertrand met with union leaders on 14 November 2007 to try to find a resolution. On the first day of the strike, only 90 out of 700 TGV trains were running, and other rail services were reduced sharply. In Paris, the Métro was only running at 20% capacity and bus services only at 15%. However, some Métro lines experienced fewer disruptions than expected, leading some observers to conclude that support for the strike was not as strong as unions claimed. 30%