MEPs adopted the organic part of the pension reform on Thursday, marking the end of a fierce first parliamentary marathon. The session ended with an honorable visit from the left and the right, who jointly denounced a “masquerade”.
Two days after the adoption of the main component at first reading via the use of the criticized weapon of 49-3, the deputies voted for the organic bill by 98 votes to 1. The oppositions on the left and LR, for lack of vote solemn, had left the hemicycle before the ballot.
"A social pact" with the nation
After the vote, Secretary of State Laurent Pietraszewski praised a project "which rewrites the social pact we want to make with the nation", the LREM group referring to "a fundamental text for the future universal pension system". The deputies were mobilized for a month on this emblematic reform and had started Wednesday the examination of the organic text.
It notably fixes a “golden rule” on the financial balance of the future system and provides for an early application of the reform from 2022 for parliamentarians. Final adjustments were made during the session on the pensions of the members of the Constitutional Council or the governance of the system.
"Lack of heart" and fiasco
The oppositions, mobilized since the start of committee work on February 3, have not released the pressure criticizing over and over again a reform that "lacks heart" according to the left, and which is not funded according to the right . The same accusations more or less than on the first part, interrupted after 13 days of an extraordinary debate, denounced on the right as on the left as a "fiasco".
But while the deputies had to sit for a third consecutive weekend with 1,800 amendments to the menu, the pace accelerated considerably, in a fairly thin hemicycle. From the outset, the rapporteur Cendra Motin (LREM) had indicated that she would not comment on the formal amendments, the Secretary of State often being content with a simple unfavorable opinion. Enough to provoke recurrent protests on the left on a debate in the process of "withering", the Insubmissive Jean-Luc Mélenchon, castigating the "moral rout" of a majority "not even capable" of defending his "business".
The opposition “stands up and leaves”
At midday, the elected representatives PS, PCF and LFI left the hemicycle of a block Thursday, denouncing a "masquerade of debate" and a "sad comedy". For the communist Sébastien Jumel, "things will be played elsewhere". He promised a “monumental beating” for the majority during the municipal elections of March 15 and 22.
“To use the words of the writer Virginie Despentes, we too get up and get out! “, Continued Clémentine Autain (LFI). Same decision for Valérie Rabault (PS). The leader of the elected LREM Gilles Le Gendre denounced after the departure of the left a maneuver "mounted in a hurry", the MoDem Bruno Millienne regretting on Twitter this "empty chair policy". The battle continued in the corridors of the Assembly where Gilles Le Gendre mocked the “bad actors in a bad play”, while Jean-Luc Mélenchon invited the majority to “speak with the walls”
New mobilization on March 31
Just before the vote, the LR deputies left in turn, denouncing the absence of a solemn ballot. The leader of the right-wing group Damien Abad stressed to AFP that the elected members of his party had "played the game to the end", without obstruction, but could not accept "this masquerade of voting", "in hidden ".
The battle is far from over. On the street side, a new day of mobilization is announced on March 31. On the Parliament side, the reform is expected in the Senate at the end of April, where the communist elected officials have already promised "a long debate". The government, already under tension between coronavirus and municipal elections, has not closed the door to a possible postponement of 15 days to await the conclusions of the "funding conference". The reform will then come back to the Assembly, the government expecting a final adoption before the summer.
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Society
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- Opposition
- 49-3
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- Pension reform