Arthur de Laborde 09:31 a.m., February 15, 2023

On the eve of a new day of protest against the pension reform, the government is monitoring the mobilization like milk on fire but without real reactions.

The executive knows that it will no longer reverse public opinion and that its reform will remain unpopular and rejected.

The government is therefore tempering and impatiently awaiting the end of the debates.

Lovers of dramatics were served on Tuesday evening.

In the National Assembly, the deputies rejected article 2 of the pension reform project, which provided for the creation of a "senior index" in companies.

A warning for the executive who still hopes to see his text adopted before Friday evening.

On the eve of a new day of mobilization, the government is therefore impatiently awaiting the end of the debates.

Two more days before the text is sent to the Senate

“We are hopeful that article 7, which raises the legal age of departure to 64, will be voted on before the end of the examination of the text this Friday at midnight”, confides an executive of the presidential camp.

Such a scenario would allow the government to take advantage of a first symbolic victory.

But the outcome of such a vote remains uncertain at this stage, and it may not take place because of Nupes' strategy of obstruction.

"The very aggressive climate of recent days in the Assembly has at least the advantage of reuniting the majority when many were worried about seeing it unravel," observes a heavyweight from Macronie.

"The spectacle of irresponsibility and violence offered by the Insoumis reveals their brutal, sectarian and anti-democratic approach", analyzes a minister who says he is convinced that this posture acts as a foil for a "silent majority", even hostile to the reform.

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"We will have to fight against the feeling of betrayal felt by the French"

Nevertheless, within the government, one wonders above all how to get out of this sequence of retirements.

"The political cost will be very high, we will have to fight against the feeling of betrayal felt by the French", recognizes an adviser who observes that for the moment, with the exception of Gabriel Attal, all ministers are falling sharply in the polls.