2024-03-31 06:00:04
Tuesday January 30, in front of the national representation, the Prime Minister, Gabriel Attal, pronounces his general policy speech and announces the filing of a second “green industry” bill, adding that it “will propose in particular to concentrate the work of the CNDP [Commission nationale du débat public] only on projects of national scope. That’s six months saved in procedures on other projects.”
In the unfortunately almost general silence, we are witnessing a new attack on democracy and the rights to information and participation guaranteed by the Constitution.
The new victim of this reduction in democratic space has a face and a name: the National Commission for Public Debate. This announcement draws its source from a report submitted to Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne in December 2023, much more explicit: “The referral to the CNDP therefore constitutes a major factor in complexity and extension of deadlines for the investor, without the State being able to intervene to accelerate the consultation and debate procedures” (Charles Rodwell, « For a policy of “attack” attractiveness in the service of the independence and economic security of France »).
With conviction and professionalism
All shame drunk, it is therefore proposed to remove the compulsory referral to the CNDP for local projects relating to “green industry”. However, the CNDP is not an administrative authority like any other or yet another committee of experts. For twenty years, its mission has been to defend the constitutional rights of information and public participation in decisions having a strong environmental impact (as provided for in article 7 of the Environmental charter).
Read the column (2019): Article reserved for our CNDP subscribers: who wants to “get rid of an institution that is reluctant to be exploited by power”?
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These are women and men who carry out with conviction and professionalism an essential mission: ensuring that citizens impacted by the implementation of a project in the territory where they live can have knowledge of it and debate it. Environmental democracy is intertwined here with local democracy and the quality of public debate.
Also read an article: Article reserved for our subscribers “Let’s give citizens a real place in our political system”
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The temptation to save a few months is not worth the cost it entails: the reduction of our constitutional rights and the risk of environmental damage hidden from view. Assuming that the success of the ecological transition is only a matter of new, greener industries, the government is going the wrong way.
Preventing ourselves from the collapse of biodiversity
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