2023-07-22 07:31:00
On March 31, Sophie Binet took over as head of the General Confederation of Labour. Since then, the latter has been effective by adopting a line close to Philippe Martinez while moving away, for example, from the collective Never Again, the latter being the “ecologist guarantee” of the previous direction.
Appointed at the end of a stormy congress, after the renunciation of the candidate chosen by Mr. Martinez, the new secretary general wanted to bring people together by integrating some of the fiercest opponents of her predecessor into the leadership.
“She is a good communicator”, recognizes the deputy of the majority Marc Ferracci. “A very good spokesperson”, welcomes the secretary general of the Departmental Union of Paris, Benoît Martin, who nevertheless supported Marie Buisson, the candidate of Philippe Martinez. “She is very calm, she knows her files, (…) is very consistent, she has a sense of repartee”, continues the Parisian manager.
The 41-year-old leader, trained in her youth at Unef and the PS, is comfortable in the media and on the steps of Matignon, chaining punchlines, as when she believes that such a presidential address “could have been made by ChatGPT”.
During her first demonstration as secretary general, on April 6, she distinguished herself by refusing to answer questions from the CNews channel, reproaching her for her lack of “pluralism”. And after the death of Nahel, killed on June 27 by a police officer during a road check in Nanterre, she openly denounces “systemic racism” in the police.
On the merits, in the relations of the central with employers or the government, the line of Sophie Binet hardly differs from that of her predecessor. For example, it refused to sign the social agenda negotiated between trade unions and employers’ organisations, but should take part in the negotiation meetings that will result from it. “As soon as there are things that affect the interests of employees, we go there,” she justifies.
“In the same logic as Philippe Martinez”
An employer official judges on condition of anonymity that it “fits exactly the same logic as Philippe Martinez”, who only rarely affixed his signature to the national interprofessional agreements negotiated by the social partners.
“The rise of Denis Gravouil”, a “negotiator who just says + no + to everything”, is a “signal of radicalism”, he analyzes, before inviting Ms. Binet to more moderation. “She will have to pass a few milestones. Having the knife between your teeth is good”, but “on the shoulder strap, that’s fine too”, he smiles.
A minister judges that Sophie Binet is “very, very tough”, “dogmatic”, because “she must give pledges to those who brought her to where she is”, in particular the bosses of the powerful federations of Railway Workers and Energy, Laurent Brun and Sébastien Ménesplier.
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“The hardest at home have taken power,” said a reformist union official, who assures that the new general secretary had to “struggle” internally to go see the Prime Minister in mid-May.
The clearest sign of a change of line, in the wake of the decisions of the Clermont-Ferrand Congress: the CGT confirmed in early July to the members of “Never again” (renamed the Social and Ecological Alliance) its departure from the collective, to the chagrin of the organizations that make it up, Greenpeace, Oxfam, Solidaires, the FSU, the Peasant Confederation… the CGT.
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Sophie Binet highlights the intact environmental convictions of the CGT, and its desire to launch a “union plan for the environment” by declining this issue in federations and companies.
“She is obliged to take internal balances into account, which means that her mandate is not going to be a long calm river”, notes Benoît Martin (UD 75). On environmental issues, “not everyone agrees on how to combine the issues of industry, ecology and energy. There will necessarily be internal debates to settle these questions, Congress has not settled everything”. »
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