Europe 1 with AFP 19:44 p.m., March 27, 2023

On Monday, the National Assembly unanimously voted a Macronist bill to better inform young people about the financing of driving licenses and reduce delays before the exam. The proposal provides for a new digital platform to identify all state and local authority aid.

A license "cheaper, simpler and faster": the National Assembly voted Monday unanimously a Macronist bill to better inform young people about the financing of the driving license and reduce the delays before the exam. This text, consensual but considered insufficient by the oppositions, was adopted at first reading and must be transmitted to the Senate. The passage of the driving license "takes time and is expensive", "1,800 euros" for a first attempt, said the rapporteur Renaissance Sacha Houlié, president of the Law Commission.

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A new digital platform

His proposal provides for a new digital platform, "one young person, one permit", in order to identify all state and local government aid. The applicant would only have to indicate his postal code to know the funding available in his territory. The text also opens financing through the personal training account (CPF) to all types of permits, including motorcycles and carts, whereas currently only B licenses, trucks and buses are concerned. Amendments by the government and the majority mention an entry into force "no later than 1 January 2024". The CPF helped finance 322,000 driving licenses in 2021, or 28% of the licenses issued that year, two-thirds of the beneficiaries being people under 35.

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A "freedom essential to social and professional mobility"

Finally, in order to provide more examination slots, the authorization for public or contract employees to take the practical test of the permit will be extended to the national level. It is not an "outsourcing", assures Sacha Houlié in the face of the concerns of the inspectors. The left protested against the use of contract workers. On behalf of the government, the Secretary of State for Citizenship, Sonia Backès, supported the text because the permit is an "essential freedom for social and professional mobility" and that the "visibility of aid is sometimes limited".

The deputies adopted an amendment by Pierre Henriet (presidential majority) to facilitate the passage in high schools of the theoretical test of the license: the code. His colleague Renaissance Jean-Marc Zulesi has put to the vote a request for a report on the possibility of lowering the age of passage of the driving licence to 16 years, instead of 17 or 18 years. Examined during a transpartisan week at the Palais Bourbon, the bill received a consensus, even if several opposition deputies, left and far right, regretted a "micro law", a "very small step" or a "tasteless" text.