"Pulling back the legal retirement age penalizes the most choppy careers, (...) difficult jobs, those who started working young. (...) It is a reform that we will fight because it 'is unfair," he said during a press briefing at the headquarters of the confederation.

"It's brutal, because the people who have difficult careers today are for the most part no longer employed when they liquidate their pension rights", and this at a time when "pensions are not in a difficult financial situation," he added.

Asked about the words of the President of Parliament Richard Ferrand, according to which it will remain possible to leave at the age of 62, for "long, intense, exhausting" careers, Mr. Berger remarked that today the people concerned "can leave at 60 years".

"So for them too there will be a postponement," he noted.

Mr. Berger also recalled that the CFDT was not in favor of lowering the retirement age to 60, as proposed by the PCF and LFI candidates.

"The CFDT assumes the reforms that have been made to perpetuate the pension system (...) we do not want to financially endanger the pension system," he said.

On the side of the other trade union centers, the project of the candidate Macron is already unanimous against him.

"Any attempt to impose a postponement of the retirement age would lead to the construction of very strong social mobilizations", warns Catherine Perret, for the CGT.

"We will be on the government's road if it wants to lower the legal age", also warns Michel Beaugas (FO), castigating a "dogmatic" measure, which would only generate "false savings" by postponing the cost on d other social benefits.

"There are already so many unemployed seniors, are we going to ask them to stay there even longer?", worries Pascale Coton (CFTC), who would prefer to "deal with gender inequalities" because "too many women have to work until age 67" to obtain a full pension.

"This reform is not necessary" since "in the long term there is no pension problem", even believes Pierre Roger (CFE-CGC), convinced that the current deficits constitute a pretext "to fill other losses, starting with those of health insurance".

Also criticizing "a simplistic vision, which does not solve the problems", Dominique Corona (Unsa) underlines that "to say that we will negotiate after the employment of seniors and the hardship, but that is the constrained framework of the negotiation is not the right method".

© 2022 AFP