Anarchists and some Gilets Jaunes (Yellow Vest) protesters promised to clash with police on the 2019 May Day demonstrations. And they did. The unions accused police of attacking some of their members, even though they were clearly identified.

As usual, France’s trade unions failed to march together on May Day, the self-styled “reformist” unions marching in the morning, the more militant CGT, FO and other smaller organisations in the afternoon.

Neither the unions nor the Gilets Jaunes are satisfied with President Emmanuel Macron’s response to the social unrest in the country. He organised a national debate to try to head it off and, like so many people these days, heard what he wanted to hear. Along with several other far from revolutionary measures, he has promised tax cuts, ignoring calls to restore a wealth tax that he axed early in his term of office.

The big political question of the day was whether the CGT, which belatedly declared its support for the Gilets Jaunes, in their anti-inequality guise at least, would manage to seal a solidarity pact with the diverse and poorly defined movement.

There were plenty of high-vis jackets on the Paris demo, although the turnout was not as high as the early Yellow Vest protests in Paris.

Perhaps influenced by the fact that the government only paid serious attention to their protests after shop windows were shattered on the Champs Elyées, some Gilets Jaunes joined anarchist groups in threatening to turn Paris into the riot capital of the world, a declaration that was seized on with relish by France’s macho interior minister, Christophe Castaner.

Some 7,4000 cops were put on the city’s streets, armed with water cannon, teargas and the controversial flashballs. Metro stations along the route of the demonstration and at other potential hot spots were closed.

Police weaponry has deprived 22 people of an eye on Gilets Jaunes demonstrations. Ten people died on their demos last year, some as a result of road accidents at roadblocks.

There has also been violence on both sides on trade union demonstrations, such as the protests against the last government’s changes to labour law.

The government has angrily dismissed charges by a UN committee that excessive force has been used against demonstrations. Patriotic media pundits were indignant that their country was treated as if it was Venezuela or Iran or somewhere.

The government has introduced a law extending the authorities’ powers to police demonstrations, although its key proposal – giving wider powers to ban individuals deemed a danger to public order from attending – was struck down by the Constitutional Council.

The French police reportedly don’t bother to go to European Union meetings on developing crowd control methods.

Even if organisers call for calm, the battle lines are drawn, so far as many demonstrators are concerned. “Everybody hates the police!” is a popular chant in some sections of the May Day demo.

Not many people were shouting “Commit suicide!” this time, though. A 49-year-old unemployed cook was recently given an eight-month suspended prison sentence, ordered to do 180 hours community service and to pay 500 euros to two cops who had filed a case against him for shouting that on a Gilets Jaunes demo last month.

With Gilets Jaunes protests every weekend, frequent union demos, and social unrest in deprived areas, the police are overstretched. There have been 28 suicides in their ranks this year, the continuation of an upward trend.

Independent journalist Gaspard Glanz, who specialises in covering police violence, also appeared in court recently for giving the finger to a police officer. It is an alleged breach of France’s a law against “outrage“, broadly translatable as insulting behaviour, against a police officer.

At first Glanz was banned from attending demonstrations until his trial several months away. After an outcry, another court overturned the ban but the case against him is still pending.

Many reporters now go to demos in body armour, helmets and gas masks. Journalists’ organisations have complained that both police and protesters abuse them and prevent them doing their jobs, the cops sometimes confiscating equipment.

According to reports, there were clashes at the start of the CGT May Day march.

As it approaches its destination, Place d’Italie, groups of youths become agitated, some throwing objects at the police line.

That’s when it kicks off. Police respond with teargas. Groups of black-clad youths – real or aspiring members of the infamous Black Bloc – run towards the trouble.

A group of men set about a rubbish bin, tearing it off the ground, presumably with the intention of hurling at the police lines.

As the teargas thickens, coughing and spluttering protesters rush away from the scene. Self-appointed “street medics” spray water in our faces and help a person who has crouched on the ground.

Further down the boulevard, riot police stop another part of the demonstration from advancing towards the trouble. Young protesters ask, “Shall we force our way through?”

At the end of the day the government says 38 people have been injured, 14 of them police officers, 33 of them in Paris.

The government says 151,000 people demonstrated across France, the CGT says 310,000. There were 16,000 on the Paris demonstration, according to the government; 80,000, according to the CGT; 40,000, according to a study commissioned by several news media outlests. At the time of writing, there have been 380 arrests, 330 in Paris.

To read a short history of May Day, written a while ago, click here