The centrist group, an ally of the right in the Senate, tabled a bill this Thursday, February 1, which takes up most of the measures of the immigration law censored by the Constitutional Council.
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Family reunification, illegal residence offense, social benefits… Submitted at the end of January and currently being registered by the Senate services, the bill from the centrist Union, led by its president Hervé Marseille (UDI), intends to resume dispositions “ essential to the implementation of a fair and effective migration policy “, without ” no mistrust of the Constitutional Council “.
On January 25, THE “ Wise » had censored many measures integrated into the immigration bill at the initiative of the right, not on the merits, but on the grounds that they were “cavalier” and therefore did not fall within the scope of the text. This therefore opened the way to new parliamentary initiatives on these measures, without excluding their being, in the future, rejected on their merits.
Tightening of family reunification
The centrist text includes 16 censored measures, several of which had greatly irritated the presidential camp when they were included in the government bill in December, after negotiations between the right and the Prime Minister at the time, Elisabeth Borne. The proposal from the centrist Union thus plans to toughen the conditions for family reunification by extending from 18 to 24 months the length of residence required to qualify for it, by excluding from the system spouses under the age of 21 and by imposing on the applicant a level “ elementary ” in French.
Also reinstated, the extension to five years of the duration of residence necessary for foreigners who do not work to benefit from the personalized autonomy allowance and family benefits. However, the centrists do not mention personal housing assistance (APL), which caused a lot of talk in December. The “crime of illegal residence”, punishable by a fine, is also proposed in their text, as is the impossibility for foreigners in an irregular situation to benefit from fare reductions in Ile-de-France transport.
The question of quotas not reinstated
Much debated, the deposit requested from foreign students in France to plan their return is not integrated into the text, but they must nevertheless “ justify annually » of the character « real and serious » of their studies. The centrists also did not take up the end of automatic land rights for the children of foreigners born in France, nor the establishment by Parliament of annual migratory “quotas”, which had been censored by the Council. constitutional under the principle of separation of powers. As for State Medical Aid (AME), a system allowing foreigners in an irregular situation to benefit from access to care and which the new Prime Minister, Gabriel Attal, plans to reform “by regulatory means”, it is not included in the text either.
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The centrists, on the other hand, rewrote, to make it constitutional, a provision censored in substance by the “Sages” on the taking of fingerprints and the taking of a photograph of a foreigner without their consent. This was the only measure initially planned by the government which had been censored.
If it has not confirmed to AFP an upcoming inclusion on the agenda, the centrist group has multiple opportunities in the Senate agenda to have it examined. Its adoption in the upper house would then leave little doubt, the Senate being overwhelmingly dominated by an LR-centrist alliance.
(With AFP)