Presidential: Anne Hidalgo hampered by her costume as mayor of Paris

Nicolas Beytout 8:01 am, October 29, 2021

Bad news for Anne Hidalgo: her project on working time at the Paris City Hall has been canceled by the courts.

When it doesn't want it, it doesn't. Anne Hidalgo may accelerate the movement, deploy her device in regions, multiply interventions in the media, nothing helps: she is constantly confronted with 2 problems (for the moment insoluble): her highly contested record as mayor of Paris, and the lack of success of his proposals for official candidate of the Socialist Party in the presidential election. His idea of ​​doubling the salary of teachers and all those who, in the school environment, are in contact with children, had the opposite effect from that which was sought: the unions considered the subject not serious and far from their expectations. . Same flop with 110 km / h on the motorway, a clumsy way to reinforce its anti-car image. As for the promise to create a climate ISF,it had already been preempted by the Greens.

Anne Hidalgo also promised, if she is elected, to regulate rents in all metropolises and medium-sized towns where the housing situation is tense.

Yes, because she says, "it works". Well actually, no, it doesn't. The example of Paris is quite enlightening. Less than one in two rents is effectively regulated, and for the rest, if the increases have been moderate for a year, it is more because many Parisians have decided to leave the capital (this is the Covid effect) , which, for a while, lowered real estate pressure a little. The city is emptying a little every year, the schools are losing staff, it is a slow but worrying movement of erosion. And you see, this Paris housing puzzle is symptomatic of Anne Hidalgo's more general problem. Her record as mayor and her image plead against her in the rest of the country. The latest example, precisely, the muddle on the working time of officials of the City of Paris.

In fact, a 2019 law required all local authorities to apply the 35 hours by January 1, 2022.

So there you are, in two months. And Paris will not be in order. Civil servants, who currently work 32 hours a week, refuse to go to 35 hours. You remember Strauss-Kahn, when he was Minister of Finance, who explained with humor that officials were going to move gradually to the 35 hours: 32, 33, 34, etc ... Well this gag has become reality everywhere in France, except in Paris. Not wanting to get angry with the unions, Anne Hidalgo had the somewhat tricky idea of ​​raising working time, but to grant compensation for three more days of leave. Illegal, has just said the Administrative Tribunal of Paris. Hence the dilemma for the socialist candidate: either she points at the unions and she appears anti-social, or she circumvents the law which is not very republican. In both cases,not great as a picture. She is clearly paying for her choice to remain in charge of the city, not to have handed over to her trusted man, Emmanuel Grégoire. All the conflicts with the ecologists, in the municipal majority, have repercussions at the national level, and the atmosphere is tense. Because, in addition, the polls are not moving.

It is always given between 4 and 7% of the voting intentions.

Behind, Yannick Jadot and behind Jean-Luc Mélenchon.

And it's starting to weigh on morale.

On several occasions for two or three days, Anne Hidalgo has got angry, sending back to the ropes those who question her about her campaign difficulties.

Yet that's the only thing she should avoid: she already has a very harsh image.

A poll (Odoxa for La Dépêche) has just measured that the French mostly only attribute faults, which denotes an exceptional severity.

More seriously, since the start of the campaign, the evolution has been negative.

When it doesn't, it doesn't ...