An ode to independence. On September 10, Gabriel Attal brought his family together for a seminar in Rosny-sur-Seine (Yvelines). Michel Barnier has just joined Matignon, the Macronists are skeptical about this budding coalition with the right. The head of the Ensemble pour la République (EPR) deputies is showing the muscles to mobilize his troops. He certainly recalls the “duty to construct” the central block, but insists on its “right to demand”. “Not a vote can be won without us”, “our support cannot be taken for granted”… The former Prime Minister multiplies the declarations of autonomy towards the new executive.
He theorizes it in private: “We feel totally free, especially since we have not negotiated a common program. Laurent Wauquiez is more constrained than us.” The reasoning is obvious. Aren’t the Macronist deputies the first force of the common base? They owe nothing to Michel Barnier, appointed by the prince. The former majority lost power on July 7, the regained freedom will console them.
They must swallow several ideological snakes
Two months have passed. “Freedom” has a bitter taste. Was she just an illusion? In any case, it is full of ambiguities. The Macronists participate in a government led by a political adversary, hardly sensitive to the legacy of the head of state. They must swallow several ideological snakes when examining the budget. Here, an increase in taxation. There, a freeze on retirement pensions. And tomorrow, perhaps, the establishment of a “citizen contribution to public service” which would be very similar to the housing tax abolished by Emmanuel Macron? It is Macronism that is being assassinated! “We support an executive who unravels our balance sheet. And we sign the copy,” laments a former minister. Two EPR executives – Laurent Saint-Martin and Antoine Armand – are based in Bercy.
Michel Barnier does not need to take out the swift, the French hold the leash. The EPR deputies observe the thirst for stability of their compatriots, worried about institutional chaos. This fear ties their hands. “We support this government out of a spirit of responsibility more than out of conviction or support,” admits EPR deputy Pieyre-Alexandre Anglade. “It’s uncomfortable.” “We feel stuck,” adds her counterpart Laure Miller. On a political and arithmetic level. The former all-powerful majority is condemned to suffer this defeat after defeat in a fragmented hemicycle, without defending the chemical purity of its own orientations. “Michel Barnier will respect us the day he considers that we can become unmanageable. We must therefore instill the idea of strategic ambiguity,” theorizes a former minister. Who would believe it?
“We have the negative of majority and opposition”
The prime minister derives a sense of freedom from his tenuous coalition. Am I weak? They therefore cannot censor me, the French would not forgive them! By a curious paradox, its fragility is its strength. “I am freer than if I had a majority,” he said in substance to a Horizons elected official. “Whoever overthrows me will take a shot of juice.” Thus, EPR deputies feel little considered by the executive in the construction of the budget. Sometimes instrumentalized, the executive delays as much as possible the inevitable recourse to 49.3. But “responsibility” is their grave, we only give in to real threats.
Here are the EPR deputies lost in a gray area. They do not have the ideological latitude of an opponent, nor the satisfaction of putting their total imprint on the budget. “Sitting sometimes lacks meaning, confides EPR deputy Mathieu Lefèvre. I have difficulty explaining to my voters what our added value is, unlike the left which unwinds its ideological thread and tries to win a cultural battle .” “We have the disadvantages of the majority and the opposition,” adds a colleague.
So, what to do? The EPR group targets its battles. Goodbye to the war against the increase in corporate tax, the centerpiece of the Barnier budget. Go for a battle against the increase in employer contributions, a measure swept aside by the common base in the National Assembly. Just a few MPs are raising their voices against parts of the budget, but on an individual basis. In the press or by way of amendments. “We must show our reason for being in the hemicycle without giving the impression of heckling Michel Barnier. We must demonstrate a contribution to the public debate,” slips the Paris deputy Sylvain Maillard. The exercise is done slowly. Gabriel Attal lowered the volume, after his initial criticisms against the executive. An EPR deputy, used to television shows, opted for media sobriety: “Often, I don’t know how to position myself. And I don’t want to be singled out as responsible for a possible failure of the government.”
“Disagreement is seen as disloyalty”
The media system is sometimes contradictory. We pin down the sluggish deputies, subject to an omnipotent executive. If a parliamentarian expresses a dissonant voice against the government, and the rhetoric of the “fronde” arises. The culture of absolute majority is as anchored among elected officials as it is among commentators. “A one-off disagreement with the government is perceived as disloyalty, notes Paris MP David Amiel. But this is not the case in any parliamentary democracy. This media reading grid produces effects in public opinion.” This risk of self-censorship is all the greater since the central bloc failed in the legislative elections. Its legitimacy to remain in charge is questioned by the French. Let him at least remain discreet!
A quest for meaning agitates the deputies. Everyone is wondering about the continuation of the mandate, once the budgetary stage has been reached. These deputies joined the Macronist adventure with the promise of a “transformation” of the country. Immobility scares them. Let them be reassured: Michel Barnier intends to build a reform project for France, his “horizon line”. Let them thank Nicolas Sarkozy: the former head of state gave back weight to Parliament by limiting the use of 49.3 to one text of law per parliamentary session. “To bring a political object to life among the French, parliamentary debate is fundamental,” notes Yvelines MP Marie Lebec.
“Find a way to work”
Thus, Bruno Retailleau wishes to defend several laws in the hemicycle, on immigration or the fight against drug trafficking. Around the Minister of the Interior, we invoke the “symbolic charge of the legislative tool”. The French passion for the law is decried by jurists, it serves here as an outlet. EPR deputies can hope to regain influence. Without 49.3, their presence in the hemicycle becomes strategic again, like their votes.
But arithmetic is stubborn. This influence is condemned to be exercised in this fragmented Assembly, where the alliance of oppositions is by nature a majority. The prospect of a new dissolution – possible from the summer of 2025 – locks the deputies into their electoral sociologies and does not push them to compromise. “The other texts can be postponed indefinitely if we cannot find a way to operate, fears David Amiel. Without working with the Republican left, this mandate will go to the wall.” The spleen of the EPR deputies will then be very paltry.
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