Name: Ratpocalypse.
Age: Ten days and counting.
Appearance: Lithe, grey and partout (everywhere).
Is this a dystopian sequel to Ratatouille? Has Remy gone rogue? Well, we are talking about Parisian rats, but these ones aren’t cute Disney cartoons. They’re real life Rattus norvegicus invading the streets, like rodent sans-culottes.
You wouldn’t expect rats to wear culottes, just little chef’s hats, but continue. Why? The city’s refuse collectors are on strike, so there’s rubbish everywhere: about 6,000 tonnes of the stuff and rising.
Ah, France is brilliant at strikes. I saw one of the unions has even created a barbecue that travels on tram rails so they don’t have to stop protesting to eat. Yes, there’s some epic striking going on. Like most of the country, refuse collectors in Paris and other cities have downed tools to protest at Emmanuel Macron’s hugely controversial pension reform, which would raise retirement ages. In their case, from 57 to 59.
Fifty-nine? That doesn’t sound too bad! But refuse collectors are very poorly paid and it’s a really tough job. Belgian statistics show they have a very high early mortality rate.
Fair enough. So what’s been happening while they fight for their rights? A rat smörgåsbord of rubbish. The Parisian pest controller Alexandre Woog says he is receiving 10 times as many calls as usual. “People are worried,” he declared on French television.
This can’t be good for tourism. You can’t recreate your favourite Emily in Paris scenes with a rat gnawing a discarded pain au chocolat in the background. What kind of monster discards a pain au chocolat? But you’re right – disenchanted tourists have complained to the TV channel BFM about the sights and smells spoiling their romantic breaks.
So what are the city authorities doing about it? Nothing. Anne Hidalgo, the Socialist mayor of Paris, has declared her “total, complete solidarity” with the strikers and says she can’t requisition workers to deal with the rubbish backlog. Her opponents say she is also “on strike” and needs to act because of the public health risk posed by rats. Hidalgo has countered by saying it’s all the Macron government’s fault.
Maybe Paris needs a “rat tsar”, like New York. New York did indeed advertise for a “bloodthirsty” director of rodent mitigation with a “general air of badassery” last December, like Javert from Les Misérables with the city’s famed Pizza Rat as Jean Valjean. But the mayor, Eric Adams, told reporters in January that the position is still unfilled.
Hmm, so maybe this problem needs a different approach. If Ratatouille taught us anything, it’s that rats are intelligent. Could they be trained to collect garbage? Remy’s no scab.
Do say: “Liberté, égalité, rat-ernité.”
Don’t say: “Garçon, there’s a rat in my soup.”
