France is preparing for intense demonstrations, the government due to unveil its pension reform on Tuesday, for which the retirement age will probably be pushed back to 64, a will of President Macron being unanimous against it in the trade union world.
“If Emmanuel Macron wants to make it his mother of reforms (…) for us, it will be the mother of battles”, warns the boss of the Force Ouvrière (FO) union Frédéric Souillot, opposed to this reform like all the organizations unions and political opposition, apart from the more conciliatory right.
AFP
Frédéric Souillot of the FO union
France has experienced a series of major reforms of its pension systems over the past thirty years to respond to the aging of the population and the financial deterioration of its funds.
Almost every time, the announced extension of working hours had provoked social unrest, in a country where the employment rate for seniors is also particularly low.
“The only lever we have is to work longer,” insisted the French president, however.
Prime Minister Élisabeth Borne will present the reform to Parliament on Tuesday at 5:30 p.m. local time, after questions to the government.
It could, according to several of its interlocutors, propose a postponement of the legal age of departure to 64 years, instead of 62 currently, after having considered 65 years.
This postponement would be associated with an acceleration of the extension of the contribution period, which would increase to 43 years, before the 2035 horizon set by a previous reform.
The executive hopes to reduce spending by 2030. He would be ready to raise the minimum pension to 1200 euros for all retirees.
Measuring the retirement age remains highly unpopular in France, one of the European countries where the retirement age remains the lowest, compared in particular to its German, Italian or Spanish neighbours.
More than two thirds of French people (68%) are against the postponement to 64, according to an Ifop-Fiducial poll.
It is in the street that “the debate will take place”, facing an “ideological” “anti-social” reform and the “service of a favored class”, affirms the new boss of the Greens, Marine Tondelier.
For the boss of the powerful CGT union, Philippe Martinez, with this reform, “we return to what our elders knew, that is to say that after work it is the cemetery”.
On the political spectrum, the oppositions of the left, the radical left and the extreme right have all already expressed their opposition to a reform described as “unfair”.
The French government therefore hopes to rally the elected representatives of the moderate right (Les Républicains-LR), whose boss Éric Ciotti has on the contrary already said he is ready to “vote a fair reform”.
AFP
Éric Ciotti of the Republicans party
An LR vote could avoid the use of 49.3, this device accused of being undemocratic, already used a dozen times under the second term of Emmanuel Macron since his party lost the majority in the National Assembly, which allows executive to pass a bill without a vote.
The text will be examined by the Council of Ministers on January 23, but the unions, which meet on Tuesday evening, plan to mobilize before, while the left-wing coalition NUPES is holding rallies on January 10 and 17 and LFI (radical left) is demonstrating. the 21.
The bill must pass in committee at the National Assembly from January 30, and in the hemicycle on February 6.
The boss of the CGT Philippe Martinez is ironic about the “feat” of the executive which brings the unions together in action for the first time in twelve years.
“The trade union and political front will be totally united in this battle,” LFI coordinator Manuel Bompard promised on the BFMTV channel.
Saturday, the “yellow vests” – whose rallies for more than a year had been contested in the rue Emmanuel Macron during his first term – hit the pavement again.
Only 4,700 people, including 2,000 in Paris, according to the Ministry of the Interior, were present for this first meeting.