Elisabeth Borne. This Thursday, February 2, Elisabeth Borne was a guest of the program L’Événement on France 2. The Prime Minister reaffirmed her desire to pass the pension reform and the need to raise the retirement age.
“If we don’t make this reform, it’s our distribution system that won’t hold”. Elisabeth Borne stuck to her guns and, on the set of France 2, defended his bill presented as “indispensable”. No chance of seeing the government reconsider the postponement of the retirement age according to the Prime Minister who has nevertheless paved the way for debates on the employment of seniors or long careers. A way to respond to the “reluctance, concerns and questions” of the French? A response which remains insufficient all the same since 64% of French people are opposed to the reform according to an Ipsos poll for France Info published on February 2.
Elisabeth Borne, aware of the unpopularity of the pension reform, however assured that if the project is necessary and requires “a collective effort” that she does not plan to resort to 49.3 to have the text adopted. “I am looking for compromises on this text as on all those that I present to Parliament,” she assured. No 49.3 therefore, but the Prime Minister refrained from mentioning the use of article 47.1 of the Constitution which drastically limits the duration of the debates for the benefit of the government.
What did Elisabeth Borne announce about the pension reform?
Elisabeth Borne is moving against the wind with her pension reform. But she tried to ease the way with a (very) slightly nuanced speech on certain points of the project. As for the employment of seniors – who will be required to work until the age of 64 – the Prime Minister defended the seniors index which will oblige companies with more than 300 employees to recruit senior workers under penalty of being sanctioned . This senior index could even be applied in companies with 50 employees. A solution considered too marginal.
No precision on the other hand on the question of long careers. Asked about the fact that some workers will have to contribute 44 annuities instead of 43, the Prime Minister referred to the parliamentary debate: “We can always work on the system”. Finally on the delicate issue of women who could be the losers of the reform, it is again the card of defense that has been played. “This reform protects women who started working early, women who are in difficult jobs, women who have had to interrupt their careers”, estimated Elisabeth Borne while acknowledging that women “who are not damaged by the work” will work longer.
In this batch of statements, not enough to reassure the unions who called through the voice of Laurent Berger, boss of the CFDT, to amplify the mobilization against the pension reform.
No inflection of Elisabeth Borne on the pension reform
The Prime Minister wants to hold her positions on pensions, but the repeated social movements are gradually weakening her support. To the point where an emergency meeting was held on February 1 between her, the president of the Republicans Eric Ciotti and the boss of the group of right-wing deputies Olivier Marleix to close ranks. The LR vote in the National Assembly is essential to hope to see the text adopted. Problem: several elected officials are no longer as inclined to vote for the reform, not without improvements desired by the party – which has demands on the employment of seniors or long careers – or claimed by the demonstrators.
Small steps aside that the government has said it is ready to take as long as the substance of the project – to understand extending working hours from 62 to 64 – remains unchanged. But the majority has already shown that it has difficulty in readjusting the imbalances concerning women or young people by referring to the parliamentary debate for the first modifications. However, we must expect sterile exchanges, non-constructive attacks only punctuated, sometimes, by small advances during the examination of the reform in the hemicycle.
Elisabeth Borne changes her tone on pensions
Faced with repeated criticism, the government has changed its paradigm and no longer presents pension reform as “just” and a sign of social improvement, but as a “necessary” project that requires effort. But here again the urgency of reforming the pension system is not justified for everyone. The opposition even boasted about the words of Pierre-Louis Bras, president of the Pensions Orientation Council (COR) who in the 2022 report wrote that “pension expenditure is relatively under control”. The fact is that if the projections are less alarmist than the speech of the executive, all the camps can find water to feed their mill in the various advanced scenarios as pointed out by Pascal Perri, economic specialist of TF1/LCI.
This notion of necessary efforts is taken up and declined by more political and less technocratic weights in government. Gérald Darmanin, Minister of the Interior, for example, opposed the “work value” to the “lazy bobo leftists” in the columns of the Parisianwhile Minister Gabriel Attal has closed the door to increasing certain taxes to pay pensions.