This could be the first test of the will of the government of Elisabeth Borne to find majorities of compromise, in particular with the left. Communist MP Stéphane Peu tabled a bill on March 21 to postpone the date of the opening to competition of buses in Paris and its inner suburbs to December 31, 2028.
Legislation currently provides for the RATP’s monopoly to cease on December 31, 2024. Problem: if this timetable is applied, the allocation of twelve batches of bus lines to new operators, and the transfer of employees who currently operate the buses to their new employer, will take place in parallel with the 2024 Olympic (OG) and Paralympic Games. However, at that time, the quality of public transport will have to be impeccable to transport the 10 million visitors expected. However, the risk of disorganization is real.
Despite this, Valérie Pécresse, the president (LR) of the Ile-de-France region, who also heads the transport organizing authority Ile-de-France Mobilités, does not budge: we must keep the calendar of the opening up to competition. And this, against the advice of the left-wing opposition to the region and of certain Renaissance elected officials. They judge the date “untenable”in the words of Stéphane Peu.
A major concession
Not only because of the organization of the Games, which this elected official from Seine-Saint-Denis follows closely, but also because the regulatory framework is not completely ready: certain decrees which govern the conditions for the transfer of employees have not yet been taken, and the management of passenger information and ticketing, at this stage, has not been organised. Jean Castex, the CEO of the RATP, regularly alerts on these points.
Supported by several Renaissance deputies who worked, like him, on the latest Olympic law, Stéphane Peu tabled a bill, signed by many Nupes deputies, but also by the macronist Sacha Houlié, president (Renaissance) of the Assembly Law Committee. The deputies (Renaissance) Guillaume Gouffier-Valente (Val-de-Marne) and Guillaume Vuilletet (Val-d’Oise) also support this text, as does Bruno Millienne, elected MoDem from Yvelines.
In this bill, the most left-leaning elected officials have made a major concession: they are not completely opposed to opening up to competition, which they still described at the beginning of the year as « privatisation ». Under pressure from Renaissance elected officials, they also accepted that the new deadline be set in 2028, and not in 2030 or even in 2035.
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