While at the same time the mobilization was strong in the street against the pension reform, the debates continued on the text in the National Assembly. In the evening, the deputies approved in committee the creation of a “senior index” in companies to improve “the place of employees at the end of their career”.
More than 5,100 amendments are also still on the menu of the Social Affairs Committee on Wednesday, a number that leaves no chance for parliamentarians to overcome them by the cutoff time of 8 p.m. The bill will then be discussed in the hemicycle from next Monday.
An “empty shell” according to an environmental MP
Qualified as useless by the left and the RN, this “index” device, listed in article 2, would be compulsory from 2023 for companies with more than 1,000 employees, and for those with more than 300 employees from 2024. Employers would be liable to financial penalties in the event of non-publication of this index, but no obligation of result is set in terms of employment of seniors.
An “empty shell” for the ecologist deputy Sébastien Peytavie. “Why not a toll-free number while we’re at it?” “, mocked the communist deputy Sébastien Jumel. The deputies on the left have therefore tried at will to obtain more coercive measures against companies, without success. The commission also rejected a series of amendments aimed at lowering the threshold of 300 employees, coming from the left but also from the presidential camp.
The initial copy on this index has been slightly retouched. Against the opinion of the Renaissance rapporteur, the deputies adopted on Tuesday evening an amendment by her colleague Astrid Panosyan aimed at making the employment of seniors a subject of social dialogue in the mandatory annual negotiations.
The Nupes deputies also took advantage of the hours in committee to echo the national mobilization on Tuesday of opponents of the reform. “While RN and Renaissance paraded together at the refreshment bar (of the Palais-Bourbon), 500,000 people demonstrated in Paris”, welcomed Jean-François Coulomme (LFI), under the protests of those concerned. While the presidential majority called for “a minimum of responsibility”, the ecologist Sandrine Rousseau assured that “the French men and women understand very well why we are obstructing a bill which is the object of the obstruction in the street “.
Also opposed to the reform project, RN deputies criticized the delay, while a “majority of rejection” of the text is possible. “We have to change gear” and “we are not in Tolbiac in an AG”, launched Laure Lavalette to elected officials on the left. “Please, the French are watching us,” commission president Fadila Khattabi repeatedly pleaded in the face of the heckling.