At the end of the Council of Ministers, on Wednesday, January 11, Olivier Véran committed himself to a kind of forecast. The strikes and demonstrations against the pension reform scheduled for next week? “We do not project ourselves into the idea of a massive mobilization,” said the government spokesman. Omitted.
Between 1.12 and 2 million French people took to the sidewalk this Thursday, according to the respective figures from the Ministry of the Interior and the CGT. “The mobilization is important, it is undeniable, it is useless to deny things,” Labor Minister Olivier Dussopt admitted in the evening on BFMTV.
“Public Support”
For the executive, the situation seems increasingly delicate. Difficult, if not impossible, for him, in the state, to play the opinion. Emmanuel Macron called demonstrations “without excesses, violence or damage”: those on Thursday took place without notable incidents.
“It is essential for the unions” to “continue to have the support of public opinion”, comments Matthieu Croissandeau, a political columnist for BFMTV.
Surtout, the rejection of the reform by the majority of the French is more pregnant: 66% of those who dissented were opposed to the project of the government according to an Elabe poll by BFMTV, published by the merits – soit has an increase of 7 points in one week. Present at the processions in Marseille, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, leader of the Insubordinate France (LFI), pounced on the gap, declaring:
“The government has lost the first battle, that of convincing.”
Some right-wing deputies and the majority are still not convinced
Another battle promises to be just as tough: that of the Palais Bourbon. The presidential camp, in a relative majority position in the National Assembly, has been flirting with the right for weeks. Éric Ciotti, Olivier Marleix, Bruno Retailleau, Gérard Larcher, among others, widely approve the text, not without showing their greed before an executive who picks up some of their proposals.
However, the games are not over. In LR, several deputies – at least 13 according to a count of the JDD, including in particular Aurélien Pradié – are opposed, for the moment, to the road map presented by the government. In his sights: the long-term devices that could lead people who started working early to contribute 44 annuities and not 43 as initially foreseen by the Touraine reform.
Even within it, the majority is still not completely homogeneous. On Monday, Barbara Pompili, former minister for the ecological transition of Jean Castex and now deputy for the Somme, threw a stone into the water.
“At this point, if I had to vote now, I couldn’t vote for” pension reform, he told BFMTV.com.
the shadow of 49.3
She is not alone: three other deputies from In Common – a satellite party of the majority of which Barbara Pompili is a part and which distanced itself from Renaissance last summer – follow her in her wake. There are other loathers here and there, like Patrick VignalRenaissance deputy for Hérault, or Yannick Favennecdeputy Horizons de Mayenne.
A shadow over the executive: a 49.3 that would give even more grain to the opposition and would not help the social anger that this reform causes. For your text to be adopted, a relative majority needs at least 39 votes. There’s no question that calculators are likely to get hot.
The government continues with the same strategy
For the moment, the executive continues in his line. That of “pedagogy”. On Thursday afternoon, Elisabeth Borne hosted a demonstration that took place “in good conditions”. Then, she concluded in this way: “Let’s keep debating and convincing.”
In this sense, Gabriel Attal, Delegate Minister of Public Accounts, was in Orleans that same afternoon to talk with the French. The day before, Olivier Dussopt and Élisabeth Borne had done the same, attending a public meeting in Nogent-sur-Marne (Val-de-Marne).
“Emmanuel Macron believes that it is perfectly legitimate”
For his part, Emmanuel Macron defended his bill tooth and nail from Spain, where he went on Thursday with 11 ministers to sign a friendship treaty with Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez. The president once again described this reform as “fair and responsible.” It will be done with respect, a spirit of dialogue, but with determination and a spirit of responsibility, ”he insisted.
“Emmanuel Macron believes that it is perfectly legitimate to approve this reform, to the extent that he says that he had announced it to the French during his presidential campaign,” analyzes Amandine Atalaya, a political columnist for BFMTV.
The left responded that it was not because of this campaign promise that he was elected, but thanks to the votes of those who wanted to prevent the extreme right from taking power in France.
Waiting for the debates in the National Assembly to make concessions
Weakened, the executive must make concessions. “If we can continue to improve the reform, as we did after the consultations, on the issues of hardships, long careers, we will continue to improve it,” explained Olivier Dussopt on BFMTV, thus opening the door to modifications to the version presented. by Élisabeth Borne to the French on January 10.
“The whole debate in the executive is: if we drop the ballast when the text arrives in the Assembly (February 6, editor’s note) or a little before”, analyzes Matthieu Croissandeau.
In sight, January 31, the date announced by the unions on Thursday night, to mobilize again the French who oppose the pension reform.
“Obviously”, it would be more about “debating in Parliament than letting go before the demonstration”, according to Mathieu Croissandeau. “Giving pledges to the street, about the hardships, the employment of the elderly, the long careers, would be intelligent but it would not work because in the street they demand retirement at 64 years of age,” he continues. “On the other hand, giving promises to the right in Parliament […] that can be useful for the government.
Source: BFM TV
