Roubaix (AFP)

Place to "a smiling ecology" that would not be that a "thing of bobo": Edouard Philippe tinted green his political return, as promised for the act II of the quinquennium, reserving his first trip to Roubaix, ground d zero waste experimentation.

Half-puzzled, half-amused, the Prime Minister observes a pinch of eggshell powder poured into the palm of his palm and spreads it with his thumb. "Well, I learned something," he says, speaking to Magdalene Deleporte, a resident of Roubaix, who has just explained that she scrubbed the bottom of her fruit bowl efficiently and inexpensively thanks to trick.

At a time when the executive has chosen to insist on the environmental issue, this visit to the northern city, hit by a high rate of poverty (44.3% in 2016 according to INSEE), should illustrate the possibility of a daily ecology beneficial to the population. "A smiling ecology", even launched Edouard Philippe, taking over an expression of the mayor (DVD) Guillaume Delbar.

"What interested us is to try to defeat a slightly annoying idea that everything that is circular economy, reuse, recycling, it would be a thing of bobo", develops Edouard Philippe

"It's good economically and ecologically good," he still testifies to the press, taking as proof the calculations of Mrs. Deleporte, which is part of the 500 zero waste families of the city: 1500 euros saved per year by manufacturing laundry, shampoo or sponges, "two weeks of vacation" with her husband and two daughters.

"This is not to say that everyone has to live like this, but it is to say that it is possible and that we can, with a number of texts, with a certain number of the part of the government, favor those who make this choice, "he pleaded again.

Accompanied by the new Minister for the Ecological Transition Elisabeth Borne, the Secretary of State Brune Poirson, or the head of the Agency for the Environment and Control of Energy (Ademe) Arnaud Leroy, Prime Minister listened at length to Roubaisian entrepreneurs specialized in the circular economy. It came out with "a lot of fishing" and the conviction that the anti-waste bill, which will be debated in Parliament at the end of September, "goes in the right direction".

- "Let things move" -

He who claims "not at all to be the most virtuous nor the most exemplary" in the matter assures: "I understood that the subject is important". At the bottom of the kitchen of Mrs. Deleporte, it engages: "what I retain at the end of the Grand debate is that the French want something to happen, not a tax, but that things move" .

The executive thus seized the ball, like the green activism Emmanuel Macron during the G7, prompt to defend the Amazon and denounce the EU-Mercosur free trade agreement. "I changed in recent months, very deeply," hammered the head of state.

Ditto to the government where "we want to show that we do not give up the ball, we understood the problem and it is not just a pre-election European subject," warns a close Prime Minister.

To those who correlate this acceleration to the important score obtained by the list of Greens to European (13.5%), Edouard Philippe retorts that this desire to "engage more" in the field of ecology is "not a choice of circumstance".

"I observe that some time ago, they told us that we were not doing enough and now I hear that they say we're doing too much," he rasps, recalling that Emmanuel Macron had "placed this theme at the heart of Act II" of the quinquennium.

Nevertheless, the gradual recovery of the executive's popularity rating after the "yellow vests" crisis seems to be partly due to the success registered with the voters. Europe Ecology The Greens: 41% satisfied in August , +14 points compared to July according to an Ifop survey for the JDD. Not insignificant to seven months of municipal.

© 2019 AFP