The former Prime Minister was chosen by François Bayrou to read his general policy declaration before the Senate. She had to comply with a difficult announcement.
The former Prime Minister knows it: we will remember from her action, and from her few months spent at Matignon, two texts for which she fought with difficulty. The first: immigration reform, which will have affected even the camps of the presidential majority. The second: pension reform, so unpopular and so widely rejected by the French, according to polls. The former socialist nevertheless held her ground, at the forefront of this burning issue, even using article 49.3 to have the measure adopted.
However, this Tuesday, January 14, 2025, Elisabeth Borne had to do violence to herself. It was she, as number 2 in the government, who was chosen by François Bayrou to read the general policy speech in the Senate – while the latter delivered it to the Assembly, simultaneously. A joke of political life, the former Prime Minister therefore announced the questioning of pension reform, undoubtedly the most difficult political fight of her public life.
“We must put this subject back on the table with the social partners for a short time and under transparent conditions,” she declared. “I am going to ask the Court of Auditors, apart from a flash mission of a few weeks, to give us the current and precise state of the financing of the pension system”, she added to the platform, repeating word for word the text from the Prime Minister. “We can seek a new path of reform, without any totem and without any taboo. Not even the retirement age, provided that it meets the set requirement and the only set requirement that we cannot let degrade the financial balance that we seek and on which almost everyone agrees,” she added.
The current Prime Minister has set a line which does not delight Elisabeth Borne, but she can undoubtedly be reassured with a substantive announcement: “If the partners do not agree, it is the current reform which would continue to be implemented. apply’, announced François Bayrou And in terms of form, the former tenant of Matignon undoubtedly appreciated this delicacy: “Pension reform is vital for our country and for our strong social model, the one supported by the courageous government. ‘Elizabeth Terminal”. A nice formula which will not prevent its unraveling if a new agreement is found.