“Ecology is the great sacrifice”, laments Marie Toussaint

“Ecology is the great sacrifice in this president’s speech who calls, in barely veiled words, for a weakening of social and environmental standards to compensate for a supposed economic decline”laments on franceinfo Thursday April 25, Marie Toussaint, head of the EELV list in the European elections, in reaction to Emmanuel Macron’s speech on Europe at La Sorbonne.

For Marie Toussaint, this “supposed economic decline” “occurred before the green pact, has been occurring for several years already and is in no way due to social and environmental standards”. For the ecologist, the “new paradigm of growth and prosperity” proposed by Emmanuel Macron “does not take into account a reality which is the finiteness of the planet and climate change”. According to her, this theme is “really what’s at stake in the upcoming European elections.” Marie Toussaint therefore asks a question: “Are we weakening the green pact by giving in to the sirens of populism or are we practicing eco-realism by facing environmental reality?”

“The exact opposite” of what environmentalists are asking for

Marie Toussaint recalls that among the proposals of ecologists there is the fact that “the ECB’s policy is indexed to several priorities: inflation, full employment and decarbonization and the ecological transition”. However, she asserts that “that’s not what the President of the Republic said” : “He said, she continues, ‘First the search for growth and perhaps then why not climate change'”. Marie Toussaint review “the way in which Emmanuel Macron approaches these issues”. The fact of saying “that we must sacrifice social and environmental ambitions in the name of the search for growth” East “the exact opposite” of what environmentalists are asking for.

In conclusion, the candidate for the European elections believes that Emmanuel Macron’s speech at the Sorbonne was “of course a campaign speech on a double level because there are the European elections of June 9 and then just after, in the process, the establishment of the European Commission in which Emmanuel Macron tries to defend an important place for France”. She finally affirms that this speech “don’t overshadow” to environmentalists for the Europeans because the project of the Head of State and theirs “are two different projects”.