This is a question that arises like a discreet refrain in the debate on the pension reform: is the government pushing the text, at least in part, to satisfy Brussels? If the European Union denies this and has never officially forced France to reform its system, it has recommended it.
2017. Emmanuel Macron had made no secret of his desire to reform the pension system since his first presidential campaign. So the project, which has since evolved, was in his drawers for a long time before the president made it a priority project during his re-election last year.
2019. The Council of the European Union -one of the main decision-making bodies of the bloc that brings together the ministers of the member states- published recommendations among which it recommends that France should, in 2019 and 2020, “reform the pension system to gradually standardize the rules of the various pension plans, with a view to strengthening the equity and sustainability of these plans.”
The reform, whose implementation the EU believed close at the time but whose agenda has been disrupted by the global pandemic, could “help alleviate public debt in the medium term and thus reduce the risks that weigh on its sustainability.” said the EU.
Standardization of the plans and therefore help to return to a balanced budget. For some, Brussels dictates its agenda to France. This is the opinion of the members of the National Rally but also of other personalities such as the professor at the University of Paris-1 and regular in the media Michaël Zemmour.
It is with exclamation points that the EU defends itself, among other things, in an article published at the end of 2022: “No, the European Commission does not impose To France its pension reform! She specifies, on the other hand, that she encourages him to do it.
Thierry Breton, European Commissioner for the Internal Market, recently added in this regard on the BFMTV microphone. And he too, to add that if nothing is required, it would be good, however, for this reform to be carried out. The text would help “ensure that the global system is in balance”, he says while reminding himself that the country is heavily indebted.
To demonstrate this lack of obligation, the EU points out that the payment of 40,000 million euros from the recovery plan to France is not conditional on any pension reform, unlike Spain. According to an article on the EURACTIV news site, the spanish case, in fact, it differs from that of France. In fact, the Hispanic government has recently reached an agreement with the EU on a reform of its system. Without this agreement, Spain would not have had access to the next EU payment. The EU recovery plan, called Next Generation EU, was adopted in July 2020 to revive the economies of the bloc that had been hit by Covid. It includes 750,000 million euros distributed to the States according to certain criteria. But the reorganization of the French pension system is not one of them.
Therefore, the European Union does not oblige France to modify its system. But is she trying to please him? The government aims to reduce its deficit to 3% of its GDP by the end of Emmanuel Macron’s term and rebalancing the finances of the pension system would help, according to Jean-Claude Mailly, former secretary general of Force Ouvrière.
At RMC at the beginning of the year, he explained that with this reform, France wants to show that it is taking steps to effectively reduce its deficit.
Not only under the current government but also under previous ones, he points out. “But we don’t necessarily do it,” she adds.
Source: BFM TV
