Hot file in sight. The President of the National Assembly Yaël Braun-Pivet assured Sunday that “the game is not done” on a legal retirement age of 65, while Elisabeth Borne must present her reform project Thursday and the Parliament seize it at the start of 2023.
65 years old, as Emmanuel Macron announced, or 64 years old? “It could, I think, move if the Assembly wants to go in that direction and that the government is ready for it”, declared the Renaissance deputy to France Inter-franceinfo-The world. “I am completely open to ‘moves’ as long as the objectives of the reform can be achieved, that is to say a financial balance and social justice”, she added.
The postponement to 65 years is however the privileged track of the government
Emmanuel Macron had defended during the presidential campaign a postponement of the legal age from 62 to 65, before evoking once re-elected a decline to 64 years coupled with an increase in the contribution period. Postponement to 65 is now the preferred track, according to majority officials who participated in a dinner at the Elysée on Wednesday evening. Yaël Braun-Pivet did not participate because she was celebrating her birthday with her family.
“We campaigned for weeks around the age of 65, so it would not be surprising if we entered the fray with an age of 65,” said government spokesman Olivier Véran, Sunday with RTL-Le Figaro-LCI. But “we are in permanent consultation,” he said.
Will 49.3 be used?
The Prime Minister must receive the bosses of the parliamentary groups until the middle of next week, before presenting the outlines of the reform project on Thursday, a date confirmed by Olivier Véran. If no majority emerges at the start of 2023 in the National Assembly in favor of the reform, the government can always resort to the constitutional weapon of 49.3 to pass it without a vote.
Yaël Braun-Pivet said she was “convinced that there is a way, but the way is not found in advance” to avoid this recourse to 49.3 and achieve “a consensual reform”: “it is what consultation and parliamentary debate are for”. “The National Assembly is able to be the place par excellence of democratic debate”, which is “likely to appease the social climate”, she wants to believe.
The general secretaries of the CFDT and the CGT, Laurent Berger and Philippe Martinez, have already promised “determined” social mobilization in the event of a postponement of the retirement age.