Paris (AFP)

The former socialist minister Arnaud Montebourg, presidential candidate, proposed Wednesday to increase the minimum wage by at least 10% if elected, and to organize a "Grenelle" on wages with a view to a general increase.

Faced with "a situation of serious poverty for working people", a situation he deemed "almost explosive", the question is "first of all wages", and "we must take a radical decision on the minimum wage" , with a "significant" increase, he explained on LCI.

"We cannot do less than 10%, because we have to catch up," he added, estimating that the increase via "the automatic systems absolutely do not work".

"We must then negotiate it and distribute it in all the wage chains", he continued.

"It will be necessary to address all those in the lower half of the wages and for me that passes by a negotiation, a kind of Grenelle in the manner of May 1968 which had seen an increase of 10% of all the wages", a he added, calling for a differentiation of increases "according to the branches".

"We will not be able to escape that", he concluded by recalling that the president of Medef Geoffroy Roux de Bézieux had said at the end of August to foresee "necessarily" salary increases in early 2022 given the difficulties of recruitment.

The Minister of the Economy Bruno Le Maire had for his part invited to "re-examine the question of the best remuneration" so that the growth "benefits everyone, without exception, even the weakest, even the least qualified, all those who were at the forefront of the crisis ".

Because of the inflation figures, the minimum wage will see an automatic increase of 2.2% on October 1, or nearly 35 euros gross per month, to around 1,589 euros, according to AFP calculations.

Such an increase during the year has been unprecedented since 2012, the minimum wage benefiting each year from a mechanical increase calculated according to two criteria: the inflation observed for the 20% of households with the lowest incomes and half of the gain in power. purchase of basic hourly wages for workers and employees (SHBOE).

The minimum wage had thus been increased by 0.99% on January 1, reaching 1,554.58 euros gross per month (+15 euros).

© 2021 AFP