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Black Friday sales postponed

In the face of growing pressure the Black Friday sales were delayed last month by one week after representatives for small business owners reached an agreement with large retailers and online platforms. Originating in the US, where the event takes place on the day after the Thanksgiving holiday, the Black Friday sales have become a consumer phenomenon across the world in recent years. The sales extravaganza had been due to begin on Friday 27th November, but with the country's “non-essential” shops still closed due to the national lockdown, there was significant pressure to move the date.

In the early days of the second lockdown, supermarkets and other “grandes surfaces” were permitted to stay open for everyday essentials, but were also allowed to sell other goods such as clothes, toys and shoes. Unions for shopping centres and smaller retailers collectively published an open letter calling on the government to allow sales of “essential products only” during confinement, as well as demanding the cancellation of online Black Friday sales in France.

“The measures taken to control the virus will only increase the scandalous inequality of treatment that already exists between physical shops and online retailers, to the peril of the former and exclusive profit of the latter,” the group said.

“They do the same job as us. They sell goods and services to consumers, and so the same rules should be applied to them, starting with the closure of sales judged non-essential,” said Jacques Ehrmann, president of the Conseil national des centres commerciaux (CNCC). “The government has shown it knows how to close aisles in bookshops and hypermarkets. I do not see why they are not in a position to act against Amazon and its consorts for Black Friday.”

The government swiftly brought in a ban on the sale of items deemed nonessential in supermarkets, but online sales remained possible and there was no update on the timing of Black Friday.

Geoffroy Roux de Bézieux, president of the Medef union which represents small and medium businesses, initially rejected any movement, saying that it was “not reasonable” to expect shopkeepers to delay Black Friday at such a late date. “Everything is possible, but not nine days before. Supermarkets have prepared their catalogues, and everyone is talking a lot about Amazon, but there are plenty of French businesses that have prepared their sales.”

Eventually, the online giants and traditional retailers appeared to reach a compromise and representatives signed an agreement at the Ministry of the Economy, to delay the flash sales by one week, on the understanding that small businesses would be open by that date. At the time of the agreement, no official announcement had been made on the end of the lockdown and on when non-essential shops could once again open their doors. Following Macron's announcement, however (see front page), the sales will now begin on December 4th .

The date is an important one in the retail calendar – in 2019, a total of €6 billion was spent by the French public during the Black Friday sales. ■ Est. in France since 2004

Brittany Ferries to restart Portsmouth to Cherbourg route

credit: Brittany Ferries

After a difficult year, Brittany Ferries has recently taken delivery of its first new ship since 2009 and plans to re-open the Cherbourg to Portsmouth route. Hard-hit by

Covid-19 and subsequent quarantine rules, the company was forced to stop serving the route earlier this year, but the eco-friendly ferry will now re-start the Channel crossing once a week from as early as December.

The Galicia is powered by liquified natural gas and has a number of other innovative features aimed at reducing its impact on the environment. The ship, which was built in China and has now passed berthing trials and other pre-service checks, will be joined in service by its sister ships Salamanca and Santoña in 2022 and 2023.

“I'm delighted to welcome Galicia to the city on behalf of the people of Portsmouth,” said Mike Sellers, director of the Portsmouth International Port, which is currently home to the new vessel. “2020 has been a challenging year for us all, so it's great to be able to look to the future positively.”

Although the new ferry is currently based in the UK, the company has said it will eventually be moved to a French port, in line with their policy of registering long-term fleet members in France. ■

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Anaesthetist jailed over Briton's Caesarian death

ABelgian anaesthetist has been jailed for three years following the death of a British woman during a botched Caesarian section operation at a hospital in Orthez near Pau in September 2014. Whilst under the influence of alcohol, Helga Wauters pushed a breathing tube into the throat of 28-year-old Xynthia Hawke, rather than her oesophagus. Wauters was found guilty of manslaughter over the incident and was also banned from practising medicine.

The young mother had passed her due date when she was admitted to the maternity ward of the hospital. Shortly after her arrival Wauters administered an epidural, but following complications, it was decided that an emergency Caesarian would be necessary. When Wauters returned to the maternity ward after being called in to administer a general anaesthetic, witnesses said they could smell alcohol on her breath.

Hawke subsequently woke up during the operation and began vomiting and shouting “it hurts” before ripping out her breathing tubes. One nurse told the court the scene was like a war zone. While her baby survived the procedure, Hawke suffered a cardiac arrest and died four days later.

Wauters, who had only been in the job for a few weeks, moved to France after she was fired from her job at a Belgian hospital for being under the influence of alcohol. She has since admitted to being a chronic alcoholic who began each day by drinking vodka mixed with water to stop her hands from shaking. The recruitment company that hired the doctor after she arrived in France did not check her credentials or disciplinary record, investigators said.

When she was taken into custody, the alcohol content in her blood was 2.38 grams per litre, or the equivalent of around ten glasses of wine. “I recognise now that my addiction was incompatible with my job,” Wauters said during an earlier hearing. “I will regret this death my entire life.”

Wauters had initially denied being solely responsible for the tragedy, insisting that other staff were to blame and claiming that the ventilator was not working at the time of the incident. Investigators found this to be untrue and the court ordered the former anaesthetist to pay almost €1.4 million in damages to Ms Hawke's family. “Justice has set an example for this type of doctor who, in my eyes, is not a doctor,” the victim's partner, Yannick Balthazar, said. ■

First Covid cases in country's mink farms

© Patrick Reijnders (WikiCommons)

The future of the country's fur industry is in question after Covid-19 was detected at a mink farm in the Eure-et-Loir. Time had already been called on mink farms after a recent law change which targets circus animals also legislated that fur farms must be closed in the next five years. With the presence of Covid-19 now confirmed, the controversial farms may now be phased out much sooner.

The ecology ministry stated in early November that France's four mink farms have been under government surveillance since a farm in the Netherlands reported an outbreak in June. Similar outbreaks have also since been reported in Spain and the

United States.

On 4th November, the Danish prime minister confirmed that Denmark was set to slaughter all 15 million mink currently in the country following an outbreak of a suspected mutated version of SARS-Cov-2, which then spread from these animals to at least a dozen people.

For the time being, France has not gone this far, but the government did confirm “the slaughter of all the one thousand animals still present on the farm and the destruction of any products associated with them.” Of the remaining three farms in the country, one has been given the all clear for now and “analysis is currently ongoing at the other two,” a spokesperson said. “If the results are positive in either of these two farms, the same slaughtering measures as in the first concerned farm will be applied.” ■

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