Tick, tock, tick, tock. Saturday morning, senators resumed consideration of the pension reform. More than 700 amendments must still be studied before the ax of the end of the debates, Sunday at midnight.
The government deployed major means on Friday to speed up the debates and ensure the holding of a vote, by drawing article 44.3 of the Constitution. The latter allows a single vote on the whole of the bill, without putting to the vote the amendments to which the government is unfavorable.
If the amendments cannot be debated or voted on, they can however simply be presented by their authors. The left shouted “coup de force” and “scuttling the Senate”, but said its intention not to lower its arms and to continue to present its numerous proposals, within the framework of the two minutes allotted.
“I regret that there is no longer any real debate,” said Socialist Senator Corinne Féret on Saturday morning, believing that the Senate was “gagged”. “You have chosen to devitalize the parliamentary function, we will not let it happen”, added Senator Marie-Noëlle Lienemann (CRCE, with a communist majority).