Can a government play the game of filibuster? Confined until now to muffled debates between amateurs of constitutional law, this rhetorical question has burst into the most heated discussions of the National Assembly since the executive has used maneuvers to slow down, or even prevent, the holding of votes on opposition bills.
Twice, on texts carried by La France insoumise (LFI) on November 24 then by Les Républicains (LR) on November 1is December, during their days of private members’ initiative, the government, with the support of its relative majority, used methods usually devolved to Members by tabling amendments, by multiplying the number of speeches or suspensions of sittings to drag out the debates. A strategy that worked on the LFI text aimed at reintegrating non-vaccinated caregivers with Covid-19 where the macronists, little mobilized during this session, managed to avoid a vote.
Excluding the idea of being repudiated on their health policy, the latter assume the fact of having opposed a text, which legitimized, according to them, a speech « antivaccins ». “It was not possible for us to let this text pass, which was not based on any scientific opinion”, defends the President (Renaissance) of the European Affairs Committee, Pieyre-Alexandre Anglade.
Far from being an anecdote at the end of a heated session, this episode reinforced the mistrust between the presidential camp and the opposition. The latter do not hesitate to join forces to make their proposals prosper to the detriment of macronists still disconcerted by the loss of their absolute majority and caught off guard by the unfolding of these parliamentary niches.
In unison, the deputy (LFI) of Meurthe-et-Moselle Caroline Fiat, and the leader of the LR, Olivier Marleix, then denounced “a denial of democracy” and one “contempt for parliamentary work never seen under the Ve Republic “. “Parliamentary obstruction is the prerogative of the weak, of opposition groups who try to slow down the work of the majority”had then pointed Mr. Marleix.
“Pride of the Government”
The elected representatives of the presidential camp also regularly accuse the opposition « d’abuser » their right to amend, taking as an example the LFI which had taken the habit, during the last legislature, of filing thousands and of multiplying the interventions in session to hinder the examination of government texts. Although they have since moderated this practice, under the impetus of their partners in the New People’s, Ecological and Social Union (Nupes), the “rebellious” have already threatened to file tens of thousands of amendments on pension reform.
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