This is a new twist in the already long parliamentary process of the government’s immigration bill (PJL): The Republicans (LR), headstrong against the project, have found an agreement on the basis of a compromise with the centrists of the Senate on the regularization of undocumented workers in professions in shortage. LR found the project too lax, particularly this measure, in article 3, and did not want to hear about regularizations in any way. But LR does not have the majority alone in the Senate, the majority in the upper house also includes the centrists who are in favor of the measure.
What is it about ? The possibilities for regulating people in an irregular situation through work are drastically reduced compared to the government’s project, but also compared to the current situation. However, the possibility still exists, by engraving in the law that it is a discretionary decision of the prefects. Among the centrists, we insist on the fact that this possibility of regularization is saved and simplified since the authorization of the employer is no longer necessary. Among the LR, we insist on the fact that this measure amounts to toughening current law. The government hastened to step into the breach. Gérald Darmanin “welcomed” this agreement. Olivier Dussopt, the Minister of Labor, even said on Public Senate that he thought that the presidential camp could support this rewriting of the famous article 3.
True and false winner
Anxious to appear as the winner in a very technical battle where it is not easy to count the points, Bruno Retailleau, the president of the LR group in the Senate, wanted to take up Olivier Dussopt on Twitter: “What you say is false, Mr. Minister, and you know it very well: your project was to make the regularization of illegal immigrants who work automatic. Our text prohibits this automaticity and considerably tightens the regularization criteria on a case-by-case basis (…). »
Gérald Darmanin, who had rather stroked the LR senators up until then, continued brilliantly, it must be admitted, the controversy in the hemicycle. He assured that the compromise found was “acceptable for the government even if it will undoubtedly be necessary to rewrite certain expressions in the Assembly which go further than the government wanted”. Understood: in the haste of the editorial, LR was more generous than expected. “You’re not short of air!” You have some nerve! But in politics it’s often a quality, I recognize it,” replied Bruno Retailleau, who swayed a little too much in his chair during the minister’s speech to appear completely at ease.
The left relies on Renaissance
Because what is certain is that this agreement at least temporarily makes life easier for the government. It opens the way to a vote on PJL immigration by the Senate in a version that the LRs of the National Assembly will have difficulty refusing. And therefore to a joint joint commission (meeting of six senators and six deputies to reach agreement, or not, after reading in each chamber) at the end of the race, where LR, the majority in the body, would be held by its senatorial agreement. The prospect of an article 49.3 on the immigration PJL, refused by Gérald Darmanin, would therefore recede?
It is temporary. The government still needs to make the left wing of the majority and the president of the Assembly’s law committee, Sacha Houlié, swallow the snake, who holds firm to the original article 3. The same people who signed, in September, a forum in Release with part of the left to put pressure on a government which has sometimes wavered in its desire to maintain the “balance” of a text that is “bad to the bad, nice to the good”, to use Gérald Darmanin’s formula and Olivier Dussopt during the presentation of the text, already a year ago.
The left, which never held out a vote on the text even if article 3 was retained, had very harsh words against the rewriting of the famous article. “It’s a darmanization of the bill, a recomposition of the right around Gérald Darmanin! “, thundered Patrick Kanner, the president of the socialist group. “The government prefers to lose honor to keep a law than to lose a vote and keep face,” for environmentalist Mélanie Vogel. Beyond the question of Article 3, left-wing senators denounce the overall toughening of the text, “a museum of horrors” some say, particularly with the abolition of state medical aid. “We often talk about the moderation of the Senate… but on immigration, the LRs are drooling on their lips,” notes a socialist. During a press point, the Socialists appealed to the Renaissance deputies: “We wish them a lot of courage,” said Senator Corinne Narassiguin.