Four days before the first round of the presidential election, Emmanuel Macron returned at length to his campaign and his program in an interview with the Figaro, published Wednesday, April 6. The candidate of La République en Marche and outgoing president specifies in particular what will be his first reforms.
While his competitors criticize his desire not to participate in any debate, Mr. Macron defends a presidential campaign where “The issues discussed are far from being minor or petty! ». “Debating war, geopolitics, energy, purchasing power or labor is neither a sub-campaign nor a non-campaign”he believes.
- The pension reform launched “from next fall”
In this river interview at FigaroMr. Macron reveals in particular the contours of his first reforms if he is re-elected on April 24. “I want to launch major school, health, retirement, autonomy, justice projects from the first year”, he explains. For his pension reform, where he intends in particular to extend the legal retirement age to 65, Emmanuel Macron announces that“there will be a consultation phase with the social partners”but he wants to launch it as soon as “next fall” without resorting to prescriptions. “But the mandate is clear, I put it in all its transparency”he believes.
The outgoing president also returned to his desire to pay the allowances at source. “It will bring together the RSA, the APL and most solidarity allowances such as family allowances, which are very heterogeneous today”, he suggests. Mr. Macron wishe “clarify the system so that it is more readable for everyone”. Its objective is to “fight against this injustice that is ‘non-recourse’: people who are entitled to aid but who do not ask for it. »
On the school, Mr. Macron announces that, “in the first months of the quinquennium”, He counts “lay the national framework with intangible milestones: half an hour of daily sport in primary school, put mathematics back to the baccalaureate in the common core…” But the LRM candidate wants “make a pact with the teachers”. “I want to respond to the syndrome of the teacher’s room where the one who struggles is sometimes mocked by the one who does the union minimum. Homework done at home, involvement with extracurricular activities, more individualized support at college, replacement of absent colleagues… All of this must be remunerated”, he explains. He pleads again for “give more freedom to school directors” and more “freedom of assignment”.
- Emmanuel Macron defends the use of consulting firms
This is the case that has polluted his campaign in recent weeks. Since the publication of a Senate report on the “sprawling phenomenon” of the use of consulting firms, Emmanuel Macron is forced to respond to his opponents who denounce a “state scandal”.
In addition to this massive appeal, the Senate commission of inquiry had revealed that the American firm McKinsey had not paid corporate taxes between 2011 and 2020, while it achieves in France an annual turnover of several hundreds of millions of euros (329 million in 2020). The National Financial Prosecutor’s Office (PNF) announced on Wednesday that it had opened a preliminary investigation for aggravated laundering of tax evasion against McKinsey.
An opening of an investigation which Emmanuel Macron welcomes. “That’s good, because we will know at the end of this work of justice if there is a tax evasion on the part of this company or not.he explained in this interview to the Figaro. If so, she will obviously be condemned and will have to pay. Otherwise, it is no less shocking that such a company does not pay taxes, and that is why I have taken the minimum corporate tax internationally, which is about to be implemented. »
While denouncing in particular a “primary anti-Americanism” Regarding the attacks against McKinsey, the Head of State defends, in this interview, the use by the State of such consulting firms. “Take the example of vaccination: using a consulting firm that has implemented an effective procedure in a country and importing its practice is useful.he believes. Having firms that have technical skills that you don’t have and that allow you to train your agents is relevant. »
- The outgoing president “finds himself in what President Sarkozy defended”
Will Nicolas Sarkozy support Emmanuel Macron? While the question has been agitating the right for several weeks, the outgoing president says to himself “ready to work with anyone who believes in [s]we plan and want [l]‘help implement it’in an interview with Figaro published this Wednesday evening. “On the question of work and merit, to take just one example, I find myself in what President Sarkozy defended”, he continued. According to our information, Mr. Sarkozy had affirmed in front of an elected LR that he had « posed [ses] conditions to Macron. I want to choose the Prime Minister and I want a group of 50 deputies. »
The outgoing President then returned to the “overcoming divisions and bringing them together” which he has been advocating since 2017. “The two former major Republican parties have become parties of local elected officials. If I had to give a form of matrix or translation of what we have been doing since 2017, it is the regrouping of social democracy, the ecology of progress which refuses degrowth, the political center, the radicals, the Orleanist right and part of the liberal and Bonapartist right”he analyzes.
In this interview, Mr. Macron also attacks the far right as Marine Le Pen enjoys the best momentum in voting intentions in recent weeks. “The current fundamentals of the far right are still the same: attacks and rejection of the Republic, a base of anti-Semitism – if not claimed at least cultivated -, a very clear xenophobia and a desire for ultra-conservatism”he complains.
- Emmanuel Macron rejects the idea of dissolving the National Assembly to bring the presidential election closer to the legislative ones
The temptation of a dissolution the day after the presidential election was sometimes mentioned by the majority. But the outgoing Head of State rejects this idea in his interview given to the Figaro. evoking “The War in Ukraine” and the « situation international »Mr. Macron estimates that “Being able to convene Parliament in an emergency seems important to me, which would not be possible in the event of dissolution”.
“In addition, we must not give our compatriots the feeling that we are playing with the electoral calendar”he believes, recalling that a dissolution after a possible victory in the presidential election “would only advance the ballot by barely fifteen days”.