Elisabeth Borne multiplies, from Monday, meetings to try to ease tensions, consultations boycotted by a large part of the left and which could turn into a dialogue of the deaf with the inter-union given the inflexibility of the executive on 64 year olds.
After Emmanuel Macron entrusted her with the mission of “widening the majority”, the Prime Minister invited the leaders of parties and parliamentary groups to Matignon this week and next week.
A “necessary” reform
She must receive the employers’ and trade union organizations on Wednesday, the eve of a new day of mobilization. This meeting, the first since the presentation of the pension reform on January 10, could be short-lived as the differences are strong. The executive remains intransigent on the postponement to 64 of the legal age of departure, refusing to pause a “necessary” reform. This text “is essential for our public accounts, for the pension system, for the future reforms that our country needs”, hammered in the Sunday newspaper the Minister of the Interior Gérald Darmanin.
The government is also trying to gain time while waiting for the decisions of the Constitutional Council on April 14, betting on the weariness of the demonstrators. Blockades persist in certain refineries and a few thousand people demonstrated on Saturday in Vire (Calvados), political land of Elisabeth Borne, who had been elected there during the last legislative elections. The Prime Minister made a surprise visit to this town on Sunday, according to the local press.
Dead end
On the side of the unions, we threaten to slam the door on Wednesday. If the Prime Minister refuses to talk about the 64 years, “we will leave”, warned the leader of the CFDT Laurent Berger. “It can last five minutes,” added the new boss of the CGT Sophie Binet. The meeting “is already written”, estimates a leading minister, who expects an impasse. As for consultations with political leaders, the situation also remains very complicated. Elisabeth Borne has a lot to do to try to restore calm with the right after a third of the Republican deputies voted for a motion of censure to overthrow her government.
And, if the representatives RN, LR and the independent group LIOT planned to meet the head of government, the invitation was rejected by a large part of the Nupes (EELV, PCF, LFI). “We will not enter into this anachronistic consultation”, repeated the patron saint of ecologists, Marine Tondelier, guest Sunday of the Grand Jury RTL / LCI / Le Figaro. The leader of the Insoumis, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, disappointed that the social partners have agreed to go to Matignon contrary to his movement, called on France 3 for better “coordination” between political parties and unions to “throw all our forces” in battle. At the initiative of the Communists, left-wing parliamentarians will gather on Tuesday in front of the Elysee Palace to deliver a letter to Emmanuel Macron. As for the Socialists, they have not yet made known their position on their arrival at Matignon.
the after
If the government does not intend to reconsider the heart of its reform, discussions are still possible on its methods of implementation, before its entry into force scheduled for September. “The planned operational implementation of the law” involves “a lot of points of discussion and exchanges”, recently recalled the government spokesperson, Olivier Véran. In the boxes of the executive, there is also a new law on employment, which the Minister of Labor Olivier Dussopt wants to see debated in Parliament at least once “by the summer”. But are the opponents ready to tackle subjects other than pensions?
In the absence of an improbable total censorship of the text by the Constitutional Council, the unions are counting on the request for a referendum of shared initiative made by the left. An ultimate “top exit door” which would allow the social movement to be extended, according to them. Invited on Sunday on BFMTV, the president of RN Jordan Bardella describes this procedure as “smoking out”, which has almost no chance of succeeding. As for Emmanuel Macron, whose television interview on March 22 served as a red flag for the demonstrators, he will not be on the front line this week to defend the flagship project of his second five-year term. On Monday, he receives the members of the citizens’ convention on the end of life before flying off to China on Wednesday.