RETIREMENT THE USE OF 49-3 A STRONG PASSAGE

The government made the decision on Saturday noon to use article 49-3 on pension reform. Prime Minister Edouard Philippe went to the National Assembly to announce it to the deputies. The decision was ratified mid-day Saturday during a Council of Ministers, just after a Defense Council devoted to the epidemic of coronavirus.

The Prime Minister went up to the rostrum to make this announcement, in order to "put an end to this episode of non-debate" with the oppositions and "to allow the rest of the legislative process to start," he said. to the applause of the majority and to the boos of certain members of the opposition, including François Ruffin and Ugo Bernalicis (LFI).

Right and left standing wind

Right, left and unions are standing up against the use of 49-3 announced on Saturday. On the right as on the left, nobody spared his words to denounce the surprise announcement of Edouard Philippe on Saturday evening in the hemicycle. "Government coup" for the Communist Fabien Roussel, "totalitarian impulses" by Emmanuel Macron for the leader of the Insubmissives Jean-Luc Mélenchon, "worst solutions", for the ecologist Yannick Jadot, "the most total cynicism" for the boss of deputies LR Damien Abad…

Even many deputies of the majority criticize the fact of not having been informed before the announcement of the Prime Minister.

Discomfort among LREMs

Once past the stupor, the majority was ordered to unite behind the executive. It is an understatement to say that the announcement of the use of 49-3, "learned by the press", annoyed more than one among LREM deputies. We feel a real discomfort with the Republic on the move. Since 2017, around twenty deputies have left the group with acceleration in recent months (The group has 300 members and relatives today compared to 314 after the legislative elections). There is discomfort about the content of the reform and especially the way it was managed. And for the municipalities then, in cities with more than 50,000 inhabitants, there are dissident candidates in about a third of them.

Recourse to article 49-3 of the Constitution will allow the adoption of the pension reform without debate or vote in the National Assembly.

Without debate or vote at the Meeting

Contested for more than a year, the pension reform project was indeed the subject of a battle of amendments to the National Assembly for a week.

Since the arrival of the text - and its more than 41,000 amendments - in public session on Monday, February 17, debates were tense between majority and opposition. By Friday, the 100-hour mark had been crossed and MPs were sitting this weekend. The calendar planned to go until March 6 and the truce linked to the municipal elections. This will not ultimately be the case. As expected, 49-3 will therefore be used to pass the bill without a vote.

The National Assembly had voted on Saturday morning article 7 of the reform project which plans to integrate special regimes (SNCF, RATP, Paris Opera ...) in the "universal" pension system by points. The debates will therefore stop with the Prime Minister's announcement and the use of 49.3.

Censorship motions

But the element of surprise, however, did not prevent the opposition from tabling two motions of censorship on Saturday evening, the first by LR, the second by the PS, the PCF and La France insoumise. To be considered, a motion must be signed by at least one tenth of the members of the Assembly, that is to say 58 deputies. They should be discussed next Tuesday but have no chance of succeeding since LREM alone has a very large majority in the National Assembly and can count on the support of the Modem.

The government therefore takes no risk in unsheathing article 49-3 to push through its pension reform!

A strong move

But usually, we use article 49-3 to discipline a recalcitrant majority. Here the use of this article just allows to pass this pension reform in force after a year of unsuccessful social consultation and while public opinion is still mainly against the project.

The sequence of pension reform is not over yet. On the street side, the unions are already considering new mobilizations in the face of recourse to 49-3 deemed "deeply scandalous" by the CGT and "unacceptable" by FO. On the Senate side where the right is the majority, the executive is preparing for another parliamentary battle.




Britney Delsey for DayNewsWorld