French police fire tear gas at Labour Day protesters as pension reform anger festers

Up to a million demonstrators expected in towns and cities across the country

A protester throws a missile during a demonstration in Toulouse on Monday. AFP

Nationwide protests were held across France on Labour Day on Monday as President Emmanuel Macron's retirement age reforms continued to unleash a wave of social unrest.

Up to a million people were expected to stage demonstrations in towns and cities, with widespread disruption on France's transport networks.

Police fired tear gas in Paris and the western city of Nantes to disperse the gathered demonstrators.

In Paris, Extinction Rebellion activists threw paint over the glass-fronted facade of the Louis Vuitton Foundation and paving stones outside the Ritz Hotel.

"This May 1 will be a milestone," said Sophie Binet, leader of the hard-left CGT union. "It will serve to say that we will not move on until this [pension] reform is withdrawn."

Citing a “revenge spirit” from protesters, Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin said 12,000 police across France, almost half of them in Paris, would be on hand to tackle potentially violent incidents.

“We are giving ourselves all the resources so that demonstrations happen in the best possible way,” he said.

A months-long wave of protests and strikes has waned in recent weeks but labour unions and left-wing parties are banking on popular resentment against the reform to revive the movement.

About 60 per cent of French voters supported the call to demonstrate on May 1, with backing especially strong among those who say they are close to left-wing parties and the far-right movement of Marine Le Pen’s National Rally party, according to an Ifop poll for Sud radio.

Mr Macron's popularity has plunged to near record lows hit during the "Yellow Vest" crisis, after he stared down trade unions and multi-sector strikes and lifted the retirement age by two years to 64.

Laurent Berger, head of the reform-minded CFDT trade union, said Mr Macron's government was deaf to the demands of one of the most powerful social movements in decades. Even so, he said on Sunday that did not mean an end to talks with the government.

Mr Macron says the reform is needed to keep one of the industrialised world's most generous pension systems in the black.

French pension payments as a share of pre-retirement earnings are comfortably higher than elsewhere and a French worker typically spends longer in retirement than those in other Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development nations.

But trade unions say the money can be found elsewhere.

Mr Macron's government, which lacks a working majority in parliament, fast-tracked the pension legislation through without a final vote due to a lack of cross-party support.

A hardening of the political opposition could complicate the rest of the President's reform agenda, including an employment bill that would require those receiving the minimum welfare benefit to work or receive training for 15-20 hours per week.

Fitch cut France's sovereign credit rating on Friday by one notch to 'AA-' and said a potential political deadlock and social unrest could scupper Macron's agenda.