Barbara Pompili: an ecologist charged with greening the action of the government

She will be number 3 in protocol order, just behind Prime Minister Jean Castex and the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Jean-Yves Le Drian: Barbara Pompili, 45, was appointed Monday July 6 Minister of Ecology and Ecological transition. The deputy LREM of the Somme and former secretary of state is a "reformist" ecologist, former of EELV, who tries to make hear an ecological sensitivity in "walkers" not always converted.

At work !

Secretary of State under Holland

Barbara Pompili has chaired the National Assembly's Sustainable Development Commission since 2017, capitalizing on her experience as Secretary of State for Biodiversity between February 2016 and May 2017. Quite discreet, even retreating at the start, as if to give way to better "new world" at the Palais Bourbon, she has developed a pro-environment network within her commission and beyond.

To try to weigh more, after a first part of five-year period below its expectations, it has also recently created, with the ex-Chiraquien Hugues Renson, the association "En Commun" which brings together fifty LREM deputies from social and ecological sensitivity.

"She's a hard worker, someone who always aims to bring people together around projects," said a former collaborator. And if "she is not a rebellious" in the soul, she is not "blessed yes-yes" either. For example, it abstained in early 2019 on the controversial anti-cracker text.

For the municipal elections in Amiens, she was on the list of Christophe Porquier, her ex-EELV companion, even if it means facing the UDI candidate supported by LREM.

Between "freedom of speech and authority".

Mixed on the results of the Citizen's Climate Convention at the end of June, she warned that its success "will depend on the way in which we all collectively succeed in transforming the test, on political will".

According to LREM MP Sonia Krimi, herself sometimes rebellious, Barbara Pompili "reconciles freedom of speech and authority".

After a childhood in Liévin (Pas-de-Calais) and in the mining area, this daughter of a teacher with disabled children studied at the IEP in Lille and joined the Greens in 2000.

She becomes the parliamentary collaborator of the deputy Yves Cochet, whom she defines as her "mentor". In 2002, she took care of press relations during Noël Mamère's presidential campaign.

"Recycled green" for some

In 2012, she was herself elected deputy of the Somme in the constituency including Amiens. With François de Rugy, elected member of Loire-Atlantique, she established an unprecedented co-presidency for the new environmental group.

"She has a lot of ideas while keeping a great freshness and remaining frank and direct," recognized François de Rugy.

"It is not because I am a young woman, environmentalist, 'blonde, with large breasts' as some would say, that I must be silent," declared in 2012 to the Courier Picard that sometimes nicknamed "Barbie" by her own colleagues. "Politics is a job where you have to arm yourself," also says this woman who is against sexism in politics, divorced and mother of a girl.

In May 2016, however, she denounced the "injunction to be a victim" of Denis Baupin, who was at the time accused of sexual assault on environmental colleagues, before the case was dismissed.

During the previous legislature, it sometimes hit the government, notably due to certain budgetary choices or to the detriment of the environment, and more and more on its comrades in EELV. The rupture was completed at the end of September 2015 when Barbara Pompili, after François de Rugy and Jean-Vincent Placé, left the party in which she no longer recognized herself.

Good luck to #Pompili Minister of Ecology.
A simple roadmap, that of the #conventioncitoyenne #climat.
Let us hope that it does better than during its passage as Secretary of State for biodiversity under Hollande.
Enough of speeches, deeds. # Ministerial reshuffle

From 2016, placed in government alongside Ségolène Royal, Barbara Pompili had the law definitively adopted for the recovery of biodiversity.

In March 2017, despite the instructions from Prime Minister Bernard Cazeneuve to the government team, she was the first to publicly support Emmanuel Macron for the presidential election and presented himself under the LREM label at his re-election in the Somme.

Barbara Pompili is "a recycled eco-friendly", mocks a walking colleague. While she is not close to Emmanuel Macron, some fear that she lacks political clout. In September 2018, she dared to challenge Richard Ferrand in the race for the Assembly's perch, promoting the accession of a first woman to this function and collecting almost 30% of LREM votes.

With AFP

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