What does Ugo Bernalicis risk, already deprived of a quarter of his compensation after an altercation?

The LFI deputy from the North violently challenged several of his colleagues in the law committee. Many voices are being raised, in the majority and the opposition, to demand severe sanctions against him.

New incident at the National Assembly. MP Ugo Bernalicis was sanctioned on Friday, December 1, for having caused an incident by insulting several members of the law committee. For around twenty minutes, according to video documents relayed on social networks, the parliamentarian from La France insoumise multiplied cries and threats to demand the suspension of the examination of the immigration bill.

During this evening, Ugo Bernalicis also tried to physically prevent his colleague Christophe Naegelen, from the Liot group, from defending an amendment. “I finally managed to defend my amendment in a crazy hubbub”explained Christophe Naegelen to Figaro. “He physically threatened Estelle Youssouffa”MP Liot from Mayotte, denounced Europe 1 Sylvain Maillard, president of the Renaissance group.

Ugo Bernalicis vehemently requested the suspension of the examination of the text in committee to go to the hemicycle, in order to follow the debates and vote on the legislative proposals from La France insoumise, which set the agenda, THURSDAY. “You suspend the law commission! (…) You will have to use physical force if you want to fire me! I will stay here until it is suspended”, he thundered, sparking recriminations from parliamentarians from other political groups. It’s necessary “dedramatize” the facts, according to LFI MP Clémence Guetté, on franceinfo. “Yes, the tone has risen”but “there was no physical violence”she defended.

A “quick fix”

Following these incidents, the President of the National Assembly, Yaël Braun-Pivet, decided to sanction Ugo Bernalicis with a call to order with entry in the minutes, Friday afternoon. The immediate consequence of this sanction is the withdrawal of a quarter of his parliamentary allowance for one month. The president of the law committee, Sacha Houlié, who had requested a sanction from Yaël Braun-Pivet, thanked her on for this decision. “It’s a quick solution that allows the office [de l’Assemblée], possibly, to increase the sanction”defends a parliamentary source within the office.

The matter will not necessarily end there for the LFI deputy: “It will be up to the office of the National Assembly, at its next meeting on December 13, 2023, to examine, if necessary, whether a more severe sanction should be pronounced”, it is written in the press release from Yaël Braun-Pivet. For more serious sanctions, the office of the National Assembly must consult together. This meets approximately every two months to discuss the status of deputies, the organization of parliamentary life and therefore, where applicable, incidents which may mar the examination of texts. It can sometimes meet urgently, as was the case after the racist exit of an RN deputy in the National Assembly, in November 2022.

A heavier sanction remains possible

What will the National Assembly office decide on December 13? There are four types of sanctions, the most serious being censorship with temporary exclusion. For this sanction to be implemented, the office must decide on it and then submit it to the National Assembly for a vote. The deputies of each group should then position themselves, by standing up or remaining seated in the hemicycle to say whether they agree or not with the sanction, according to article 72 of the regulations of the National Assembly. Many deputies from the majority groups, the Republicans and the National Rally, who requested a severe sanction against Ugo Bernalicis, could then vote in this direction.

In this scenario, the sanctioned deputy would not be able to take part in the work of the National Assembly for two weeks and would be deprived of half of his parliamentary allowance for two months. This was the case for his LFI colleague Thomas Portes, at the beginning of the year, who placed his foot on a balloon bearing the image of Minister Olivier Dussopt, which caused chaos within the National Assembly. . In 2011, this sanction was also inflicted on the communist Maxime Gremetz, who burst into a committee meeting by insulting ministers over a question of ministerial vehicles.