Strike action against the planned reforms across the country has marred France since the start of December last year. Just over half of French people – 51 percent – expressed support or sympathy for the strikers in a survey by pollster Ifop poll for the Sunday Le Journal du Dimanche.
A third of French people, however, disapprove of the strike action, the poll found, while 16 percent are “indifferent”.
The public sector strikes are now in their 47th day but the industrial action has sputtered out since M Macron’s government has made some concessions and as strikers face mounting financial pressure to return to work.
M Macron’s plan to merge the country’s 42 separate retirement schemes into a single, points-based system under which for every euro contributed, every pensioner has equal rights, has prompted major uproar among his critics.
The 42-year-old centrist says the new system will be fairer and help plug a stubborn deficit.
But the unions widely perceived to be most left-wing remain deeply unsatisfied despite the government’s decision last week to suspend a central piece of the proposed reform plan, that of raising the retirement age to qualify for a full pension from 62 to 64.
They want the government to scrap other changes they fear will force scores of people to work longer for a smaller pension.
M Macron is also facing a barrage of criticism from his opponents, some of whom have joined union calls to drop the pension plan.
Conservative François-Xavier Bellamy, a member of the opposition Les Républicains party, slammed the reform as “absurd” in an interview with France Info radio on Sunday, adding the government “bears a high degree of responsibility” for the sometimes violent strike action.
His remarks echoed those made by Les Républicains party leader Christian Jacob earlier on Sunday.
In an interview with daily Le Figaro, M Jacob warned of a France “under high tension” and described the current social climate as “worrying”.
But the centrist government has so far refused to cave in to the pressure and pledged to press ahead with the overhaul.
M Macron called last week for “calm and clarity” and promised a better explanation of what the changes will mean for different French workers.
The weeks of strikes and protests have hobbled public transportation and disrupted schools, hospitals, courthouses and even opera houses.
But at a sixth nationwide protest demonstration organised by unions on Thursday, the Interior Ministry tallied only 187,000 people nationwide, including 23,000 in Paris; compared to 452,000, including 56,000 in Paris, the previous week.
The first major anti-pension reform demonstrations in early December drew more than 800,000 people nationwide.
Train traffic was close to normal Monday and the Paris metro was only slightly disrupted after the moderate CFDT union called on Saturday to suspend the strikes. But hardline union leaders said they would keep fighting until the government withdraws the reform.
Legislation incorporating other parts of the pension plan is to be presented at a Cabinet meeting later this week. After that, there will be a three-month discussion with unions about financing the new pension system, including potential measures to raise taxes or the retirement age.
• The Ifop poll of 1,006 people aged 18 and over was carried out online between January 16-17.