On BFMTV this Tuesday, the president of the Hauts-de-France region, Xavier Bertrand, spoke about the mobilization against the pension reform, while a new day of renewable demonstrations and strikes is coming up on March 7.
Convinced that a reform is necessary and that “we must agree to work for two more years (…) but not for everyone”, Nicolás Sarkozy’s former Health Minister estimated that the French did not want to blockade the country, while several The unions have called a renewable strike in their ranks as of March 7.
“Who can want the country to be blocked? Who can want those who need to work to be blocked? Nobody,” said Xavier Bertand.
Statements that come to oppose the poll by Elabe “L’Opinion en direct” for BFMTV published on February 1, in which 60% of the French polled indicated that they understood that the unions were blockading the country to push back the government .
call to dialogue
Xavier Bertrand, however, criticized the immobility of the executive in dialogue with opponents of the reform, and in particular with Laurent Berger’s CFDT, a reformist union.
“The fact of not establishing a dialogue with these people is not responsible on the part of the government,” he judged, before warning against any resort to violence:
“Violence can never be accepted in a society like ours. We must be able to listen without there being violence, there can be no balance of power through violence.”
“The government does not want to hear”
Xavier Bertrand took advantage of this speech to recall the three conditions that, according to him, would make the reform “a little more acceptable”: automatic retirement at full salary after having worked 43 years, the end of special regimes directly, without a “clause of grandfather,” and allowing women who do not have a full career to leave two years before the normally expected age of 67.
“Today I have the feeling of having allowed others to advance in the debate. But the government does not want to hear until the end”, concluded Xavier Bertrand.
Source: BFM TV
