It only took nine votes for the government of Elisabeth Borne to be dissolved and for the pension law which has divided France for months to be postponed indefinitely. It is in a city center squared by the police that the parliamentary debate ended Monday evening with the tight rejection of a motion of censure which targeted the government.
But the adoption of the law postponing the retirement age from 62 to 64 does not mean that the confrontation is over, far from it. Not only could the challenge continue, but this vote appears to be a real disavowal of the Prime Minister, Élisabeth Borne, whose survival seems far from certain.
In the absence of a majority in the National Assembly, the bill had to be adopted last week by the extraordinary procedure known as “49.3”. This article of the French Constitution makes it possible to do without the vote of the deputies, but obliges the government to submit to a vote of confidence. The motion of censure presented by the small centrist group Libertés, Indépendants, Outre-Mer et Territoires (LIOT) having received only 278 votes out of the 287 necessary, the deputies therefore narrowly confirmed the final adoption of the bill and the Prime Minister’s survival, at least for now.
As soon as the result was announced, fires were lit and the first tear gas rang out in Paris.
Mobilization continues
But is that the end of the game? Not according to the inter-union common front which, with the support of two out of three French people, has scheduled a ninth day of protest next Thursday.
Even if the mobilization is declining and the country is far from being blocked, we expect disruptions in rail and air traffic as of Tuesday. Disturbances described as “modest” by the Minister of Transport, Clément Beaune, but which are not so for these Parisians who have, for example, been deprived of garbage collection for two weeks. Blockages should also continue in front of refineries and on many roundabouts.
Encouraged by unwavering public opinion, the inter-union common front is betting on a mobilization of the type that, in 2006, forced the government to withdraw the first job contract despite its adoption by the National Assembly. To the surprise of Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin, the mobilization and blocking of universities had then thrown up to three million people into the streets.
The opposition also intends to appeal on Tuesday to the Constitutional Council in order to invalidate the law. There are “strong risks of unconstitutionality of this law, not so much on the merits”, declared Friday on France Info the professor of constitutional law Dominique Rousseau. The deputies invoke the exceptional measures which limited the debates, but also the inclusion of the law in a “Social Security financing bill”. A procedure contested by many constitutional experts.
The most stubborn opponents will demand a shared initiative referendum from the Constitutional Council on Tuesday. This procedure would make it possible to suspend the application of the law for nine months, the time to collect the 4.7 million signatures required for the holding of a referendum. A huge figure, but which does not seem entirely impossible to achieve as the anger seems to be great in the population.
Elisabeth Borne on probation
“You have failed to gather”, launched in the hemicycle the deputy Charles de Courson to Élisabeth Borne. Even if she narrowly escapes, the Prime Minister comes out of this confrontation more than weakened. The entire political class believes that its days are numbered since it failed to rally a majority of deputies from the Les Républicains party (LR, traditional right) around the bill. And this, despite a pact with their main leaders and concessions amounting to several billion euros.
While the leader of La France insoumise (LFI, radical left), Jean-Luc Mélenchon, called for “popular censorship”, the president of the National Rally (RN, populist right), Marine Le Pen, affirmed that the president of the Republic was to “replace Mr.me Terminal, it’s the least of things […] and present a new government to the French”.
The reshuffle rumors are such that some observers wonder if Elisabeth Borne will not have to leave her post before April 4. It is on this date that she will exceed the 323 days of the government of Edith Cresson, the only other woman to have been Prime Minister under the Ve Republic.
“Chiche, Mr. Macron, let’s go to the dissolution and tomorrow we will come back in greater numbers. Because more than ever, I am convinced that we are the real alternation, ”launched the RN spokesperson from the top of the assembly platform.
What end of the quinquennium?
Without a majority in Parliament, it is the whole continuation of Emmanuel Macron’s five-year term which today seems to be in question. Even the prospect of a pact with LR, long proposed by former Prime Minister Nicolas Sarkozy, appears increasingly hypothetical as this party seems to be having difficulty gathering its troops, nearly half of whom voted for the motion. of censorship despite instructions to the contrary.
After the psychodrama of pensions, it is difficult to see how the president could pass the reforms that are on the program for the next few months. Among them, a bill on the delicate issue of asylum and immigration promises more than heated debates. As for the prospect of reforming the institutions of the Ve Republic mentioned by the president, it seems totally out of reach since it would require either adoption by referendum, or a three-fifths majority of the votes cast in both chambers.
After such a sequence, “the Head of State will be summoned to change policy […] or to change the prime minister, or to return to the polls, via a referendum or a dissolution”, wrote the editorialist of the Figaro Guillaume Tabard.
Political distrust has never been so high in France, according to political scientist Pascal Perrineau, who cites a recent study by CEVIPOF revealing that nearly two-thirds of French people consider that democracy does not work well in the country. A figure that has increased by nine points in just two years.
With the support of barely 28% of the population, Emmanuel Macron returns to the worst popularity scores of the year 2019, during the revolt of the Yellow Vests. In the corridors of the Elysée Palace, the possibility of an address to the nation in just a few days was mentioned Monday evening.