For the Minister of Labor Olivier Dussopt, it is no less than a “major text for our country”. The “full employment” bill was definitively adopted on Tuesday by Parliament, where its controversial new requirements for RSA beneficiaries pitted the left head-on against a presidential camp supported by the right.
Like the senators last Thursday, the deputies validated, by 190 votes to 147, the compromise reached between representatives of the two chambers. The text sets the emblematic milestone of an unemployment rate of 5% by 2027, to be achieved through increased support for people furthest from employment.
Pôle emploi becomes “France Travail”
With this reform, the executive is banking in particular on better coordination of actors in the public employment service, reorganized into a network around a Pôle emploi renamed “France Travail”.
The debates mainly focused on the new obligations imposed on those registered with an expanded list of job seekers, which will now include all RSA beneficiaries. On this aspect, the presidential camp ended up acquiescing to an insistent request from the right: the explicit mention of a minimum of 15 hours of weekly activities for those registered on this list. Some may be completely exempt, particularly in the event of health problems.
Among the most debated measures, the text establishes a new type of sanctions for RSA beneficiaries who do not respect their obligations. Their allowance may be suspended, but recoverable in the event of “remobilization”, within the limit of three months of payment.
“You choose to impoverish the unemployed”, tackles the Liot group
The Les Républicains group was the only one in opposition to vote in favor of the bill. “We think that part of our social system is misguided, because it disincentivizes people to work,” said LR deputy Philippe Juvin, considering it legitimate to ask for compensation from RSA beneficiaries.
The RN, which had alternated during the debates between votes against the 3 p.m. and an abstention on the new sanction, opposed the final text. “In the absence of enriching workers, you choose to impoverish the unemployed,” said Benjamin Saint-Huile, of the independent Liot group. The left-wing groups jointly recalled their grievances. “The problem of unemployment is the question of the shortage of jobs,” judged LFI deputy Louis Boyard.
In another aspect aimed at tackling “peripheral obstacles to employment”, the compromise validated on Tuesday reintroduces an article on early childhood care, granting municipalities the status of organizing authorities. In the final text, “only municipalities with more than 10,000 inhabitants will be required to develop a multi-annual plan for the provision of care for young children, as well as to set up an early childhood relay”, underlined the rapporteur Paul Christophe (Horizons).