“I’m afraid of the future with you”: in Brittany, Macron questioned about his “climate inaction”

2023-11-03 19:14:57

While traveling in Brittany after the passage of storm Ciaran, Emmanuel Macron was questioned by a young person who criticized him for his “climate inaction”. “Thank you for the future that you offer us with your climate inaction,” said this young man to the president, who came to meet the crowd in Plougastel-Daoulas (Finistère).

“Don’t say excessive things,” retorted the head of state, in a brief exchange, broadcast in particular on BFMTV. To this young person, who criticized him in particular for having gone to Brittany by plane, Emmanuel Macron replied that “we will continue, and your children will continue to take the plane”. “What we are doing is the transition to move towards sustainable fuel,” he defended.

Then questioned about “green growth”, which “does not exist”, the president estimated that “if there is no growth, we cannot pay for pensions”, “the hospital” and “ education”. “We can consume less,” replied the young man. “One day without electricity, we will soon have worse,” he added, referring to the hundreds of thousands of homes without power after the storm passed. “I’m afraid of the future with you,” he also said.

“Get out of face-to-face”

“The future has worrying sides, the war, the climate,” admitted the president. “But we can take it up,” he maintained, praising the “very big work” carried out by the general secretariat for ecological planning. “It’s not easy (…), but we have to get out of face-to-face situations,” added Emmanuel Macron.

“You have to put yourself in a position (to tell yourself) that it’s possible. We must change habits, we must continue innovation, but we must not be pessimistic because it leads to inaction,” concluded the president.

“Excessive talk, either we do nothing and we will all go through it, or we should do nothing because it is too hard and we are not going to change, are two dead ends,” he also said. a little later during a press briefing. “It’s a transition and we must all approach it in a reasonable manner,” stressed the president.

The Head of State returned to this incident during a press briefing late in the afternoon, affirming that “we are continuing our efforts”. “We have just put in place ecological planning, now we are getting into implementation,” he said.

“It’s not done idly by saying you’re not doing anything. This is not true. Sector by sector it is a very big job and we ask for a lot of commitment from everyone,” he insisted.

The head of state is regularly questioned during his travels about his record on climate matters. He was apostrophized in February at the Agricultural Show by young activists who wore “What are you for?” t-shirts. “.