Trains on strike, shops closed, traffic jams over hundreds of kilometers and demonstrations in the capital: the memory of this month of December 2019 and this Christmas ruined for thousands of families is enough to freeze Elisabeth’s blood Thick headed. Three years ago, the pension reform ignited the streets, when Edouard Philippe, his predecessor, remained straight in his boots. Would the juppeist be an anti-model for the one who made her political classes with Lionel Jospin? The first has failed to make the French work until 64, the second wants to go “at the end of the end” dialogue, says those around him.
As the frosts of winter spread over the country, the tenant of Matignon plays the clock to, she hopes, pass the cursed reform of Emmanuel Macron without triggering a social storm. A look across the Channel, where the United Kingdom is mired in monster strikes, is enough to convince her of the explosive climate that reigns in Europe. Sunday evening, after three days of intense discussions with the President of the Republic, Elisabeth Borne obtained from the Head of State “a few short weeks” suspension, shifting the presentation of the reform to January 10, 2023, and no longer to Thursday, December 15, as initially planned. A favor snatched from one condition: that this postponement does not postpone the implementation of the future law, desired for the summer of 2023, after a passage in the Council of Ministers on January 23.
There are still unexplored corners, pleaded the Prime Minister, taking over the file from the hands of the Minister of Labor, Olivier Dussopt. At the top of the government, we know very well that there will be “never deal” with Laurent Berger’s CFDT. But hope is allowed from one ” a pact of non-agression “, in return for agreements on hardship and long careers. A discussion that the Elysée says ” on the right track “ behind closed doors.
“Accelerate Touraine”
The calendar maneuver also aims to put pressure on Eric Ciotti, the new president elected in extremis at the head of the Les Républicains (LR) party. “We will see if the chef chef”, they murmur at the Palace. The line of the right is no longer obvious. The boss of the LR deputies in the National Assembly, Olivier Marleix, now pleads for a departure at 63 in 2027. Senator (LR) from Vendée Bruno Retailleau told Elisabeth Borne on Friday that he was defending the 65-year-old but noticed “even though it was unfavorable for the most modest, and that Touraine must be accelerated”reference to the reform which extends the contribution period to 43 annual installments by 2035.
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