French threat to switch off UK power

FRENCH power workers are threatening to switch off the cross-Channel electricity supply to Britain, raising the threat of blackouts across the country.

The move comes as a row intensifies over privatisation plans.

Unions have launched wildcat actions in protest at the French government's decision to partly sell Electricite de France, the State utility that owns London Electricity, Seeboard and SWEB.

Protesters have already shut down the export cable that delivers electricity over the Pyrenees to Spain.

And last week they targeted the British Embassy in Paris and switched off the lights at the Eiffel Tower and the Elysee Palace, President Jacques Chirac's official residence.

Now a spokesman for the Communist-led CGT union is warning that Britain could be next.

'This is no empty threat,' he said. 'We have only to throw a switch and the lights will go out over a chunk of England. We will choose a time when demand is high so consumers suffer most and we will get more publicity for our cause.'

France is a net supplier of power to Britain via the so-called interconnector. Stewart Larque, an external relations adviser at National Grid Transco, said: 'If the French workers shut down supplies at a vital moment, it would be equivalent to the closure of a big nuclear power station in Britain.'

A debate in the French Parliament is paving the way for France to transform EDF and Gaz de France, the power group's partner in the gas sector, into limited companies, the first step towards privatisation. The CGT union fears huge job losses.