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The one day strike will hit driving tests, regional centres controlling the flow of motorway traffic as well as the half yearly introduction of new number plates, and is in response to a series of below inflation pay offers and widening pay gaps between the predominantly female staffed DVLA and the predominantly male DfT and related agencies.

There have been three major types of protests: filtered barrages on motorways; blockades of motorways and rolling barrages. The strike action is planned to last five days and is likely to seriously affect the 70% of Italian freight that is moved by road. According to La Stampa the strike will cost up to €5bn although the FAI union estimate is €2bn.

The Manchester Evening News reports:

Parking attendants in Manchester have gone back to work after a day of industrial action. They turned up for work this morning but refused to go out to work in a continuing row over pay and treatment by management.

Meanwhile, having obtained the withdrawal of the CPE, university and high-school students demonstrated calling for the abolition of the rest of the 'law of equal opportunities' which the CPE was a part of, and of the CNE contract which was introduced last September.

Demonstrators injured in Paris

From the BBC:

- Four student demonstrators and one policeman were injured on Thurday, the 6th April. At the end of the aftermoon, the police force removed some 450 students who were blocking the railways on the North Matabiau station and stopped traffic for an hour and half. According to the local authority, the five injured people were transferred to the hospital.

-The police force have opened the Gustave Eiffel High School, in Gagny, by force

-A hundred anti-CPE demonstrators, including the Revolutionary Communist League figurehead and postal worker Olivier Besancenot, blocked the postal sorting office in Nanterre earlier today

22h00

A meeting was called for 2.30pm outside the former Palais de Justice. Around 1,000 people answered the call, including older students from the university. The action originally decided upon, a blockade of the main crossroads in the town, quickly transformed into a series of spontaneous demonstrations.

-Photos just in of a road blockade of the 'periph' (periphery in Caen, from Thursday 30th March. The blockade was eventually cleared by CRS riot police using water cannons and tear gas, and is represented here in 70 photos of the events.

New eyewitness accounts

Late Friday night up to 10,000 were said to be still be in the streets after a protest at Chiracs announcement that he would promulgate the controversial CPE.

Round up of earlier events

-Socialist MP François Holland warns Jacques Chirac that in his broadcast tonight, sticking with the CPE would open "a major crisis"

-"the fever mounts" writes Le Parisian after yesterdays day of blockings by high-school pupils, and the constitutional Council Decision to validate the CPE

Earlier blockades and protests have been reported already.

Teargas used as 400 high school students occupy Lorient station

Latest Poll
62% of French 'united', or 'in solidarity' with the anti-CPE movement (LCI poll)

Groups of a hundred in moving blockades, Lille

French press comment on crisis
Read the BBC's summary of French press analysis.

Boulevard Peripherique blocked this morning

Toulouse Office of Emplyoment & Work occupied
Le Figaro is reporting that several dozen high school and university students have occupied the buildings of the Haute-Garonne departements Office of Employment and Work this afternoon in an anti-CPE protest.

Ouest France hit by strike action

"We will probably continue to call for new demonstrations, but indeed, we will also diversify our methods of action, sometimes calling for gatherings, sometimes indeed calling for the blocking of airports, stations..." Le Figaro is reporting him saying.

The three road blockades set up in Rennes were cleared at around 10am, on order of the CRS riot police, which at times used teargas. But the operation took place without confrontations according to the police force.

Thibault Boyer, vice-president of the UNEF to the board of directors of Rennes-II said that "its a symbolic blocking to show our determination against the CPE".

This is just one example of the recent politicisation of French high school students.

300 students from the tiny medieval town of Hennebont, population just 13,000, were said to have been blocking the bridge from 3.30pm French time