Pension reform arrives in a heated National Assembly

The Minister of Labor Olivier Dussopt (g) was strongly heckled by the benches of the left, this Monday, February 6.

AP - Christophe Ena

Text by: RFI Follow

3 mins

This Monday marked the arrival of the pension reform in public session at the National Assembly.

On the eve of a new day of mobilization, the government had to deal with a very tense situation in the hemicycle.

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Accusations of "

 ", boos and suspension of the session: the kick-off of the debates on the pension reform was announced to be hot.

It turned out to be hot.

All afternoon, the opposition scrapped around the government project, which provides for a decline in the retirement age from 62 to 64 years.

“

 ”, affirmed the

, treated as “

” by the left.

Following him, the Minister of Public Accounts Gabriel Attal stepped up to the plate against opponents of the project, calling on them to choose between " 

" and " 

 ". 

By 292 votes against 243, and 3 abstentions, the deputies then rejected a motion to reject the entire bill brought by the Insoumis.

Then a motion from the RN group calling for a referendum was rejected by 272 votes to 101. During this vote, the left deserted the hemicycle to denounce a " 

 " because its elected officials wanted another motion to be put to the vote: the one she had signed, or the one initiated during the day by the small independent group Liot.

From the start of the session, the Insoumise deputy Mathilde Panot, the communist André Chassaigne and even Charles de Courson (Liot) had denounced " 

 " in the vote on the only RN motion.

The President of the Assembly Yaël Braun-Pivet having not responded to their requests, the oppositions had loudly protested, causing a brief interruption of the session.

A concession described as a “patch”

The planned two weeks of examination promise to be high risk on this flagship reform of Emmanuel Macron's second five-year term, which only has a relative majority in the Assembly.

With the approach of two days of action, Tuesday and Saturday, at the call of the inter-union, the head of government Élisabeth Borne recognized again on Sunday that the decline in the legal age represented " 

 ".

In a last minute concession, she announced that people who started working between the ages of 20 and 21 will be able to retire at 63, an extension of the long career scheme.

Will this gesture be enough to obtain the crucial votes of the right?

No, for Aurélien Pradié in particular, who pinpoints a " 

 " and asks to go further for those who started contributing early.

Marine Le Pen mocks a " 

 " between the government and the right.

On the union side, Ms. Borne's effort did not convince: a "

 " which " 

 " expected response " 

 ", denounces Laurent Berger, boss of the CFDT.

The mobilization days of January 19 and 31 have already brought together more than a million demonstrators each time according to the police, more than two million according to the organizers.

While the school holidays have started for zone A, traffic will be severely disrupted this Tuesday at the SNCF and the RATP.

For the fourth day of mobilization on Saturday, the start of the holidays in zone B, the SNCF unions have decided not to call a strike so as not to penalize travelers.

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(

AFP)

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