They had come to dialogue and negotiate, they stayed for dinner. Pâtés en croute, smoked salmon and a host of desserts… A full stomach (without excess), and progress in the pockets. Bercy, funny place for a meeting. Since 2017, we have not seen every day a member of the government, appointed by Emmanuel Macron – on the proposal of François Bayrou, of course – and the socialist, environmentalist and communist representatives exchanging the piece of fat part of the night. On Wednesday January 8, the working meeting between the left and Eric Lombard continued until around 11 p.m. The communists made it known that they would happily break bread, the socialists immediately acquiesced, the ecologists, to say the least, did not want to harm the climate.
The next morning, the Minister of the Economy’s phone vibrated loudly. And it vibrates to the left. The evening guests are multiplying their SMS messages: thank you for this moment, as someone said. “Hello, Marine”: at lunchtime, it is Tondelier who calls the minister directly back on his cell phone. Contacts will continue to increase until Tuesday January 14, the day of truth, the day of François Bayrou’s general policy declaration. The Minister of the Economy has undertaken to tell his interlocutors before the fatal hour the results of the races. In particular the semantic landing strip which will be cleared on the pensions file. Jacques Chirac in his time invented “susmulgation” (promulgation of the CPE for students and immediately suspension), the executive today is looking for the philosopher’s stone. And dreams of stirring, if not the letter, at least the spirit of the famous points pension.
Because it’s him, because it’s them. Lombard and the socialists, it’s an old story. So old, that they say they speak “the same language”. So old, let’s call each other informally. So old that Olivier Faure considers him “a personal friend”. At the beginning of the 1990s, the latter and his friends Benoît Hamon and Christophe Clergeau, in their late twenties, followed in the footsteps of Michel Rocard. This is where the young guard crossed paths with Eric Lombard, thirty-four years old at the time. A pure Rocardian, who gives his time in ministries as a collaborator and with his friend Michel Sapin and Bernard Poignant in the “Convincre” clubs, these chapels at the service of the reformist’s presidential candidacy (which will remain virtual).
Faure and Lombard will meet again twenty-eight years later, over lunch one day in spring 2018. The first has taken on a few gray hairs and the head of a Socialist Party in crisis. The other has not renewed his card for decades, but has maintained friendly ties with many socialists. The start of a long series of tête-à-têtes between the two men, at crucial moments in the PS: after the catastrophic campaign of 2022, just before the socialists signed the Nupes agreement or even a few days after as the birth of the New Popular Front. “Eric gives him his support in the difficult post-Hamon and post-Hidalgo moments, he seeks to understand, without judging, the alliance with Jean-Luc Mélenchon. It discusses poloch’ as they say”, recalls a confidant of the fresh minister of the Economy. Last summer, after the legislative elections, while Emmanuel Macron was looking for a new Prime Minister who would not be Lucie Castets, it was again Olivier Faure who whispered the name of the director of the Caisse des Dépôts to people close to the head of the state.
“I have a problem with Bruno Retailleau”
Wednesday evening’s guests are more than acquaintances: Patrick Kanner has already taken Eric Lombard to his land in Lille, senator Claude Raynal, PS president of the Senate finance committee, was seated to his left (obviously) on the supervisory board of the Caisse des Dépôts et des Consignations (CDC), Green MP Eva Sas has been in its landscape for a long time. The minister discovered Marine Tondelier on television like many others, and he finds her excellent. As he comes from the left, he knows the weight of certain symbols. Retirement at 64 for example. He doesn’t neglect gestures either. He exchanged messages with François Hollande in the week following his appointment. The two like each other: at the head of the CDC, Lombard has never missed a board meeting of the former president’s foundation, La France s’engage. Thursday morning, he made the trip for a courtesy visit to his offices on rue de Rivoli, just to underline that he does not consider the Corrézien to be a deputy like the others.
It’s been months since Lombard entered the game. In August, Emmanuel Macron found himself in shorts after a failed dissolution. So he plays ball and one of those (test) balls is called Eric Lombard. The president does not propose Matignon to him but questions him about his relations with the left-wing forces and about programmatic elements. When Michel Barnier arrives at Matignon, Eric Lombard could have gone to Bercy but he does not believe in the Savoyard’s strategy of looking more to his extreme right than to the socialists. Since we tell you that he is on the left. When François Bayrou arrives at Matignon, Eric Lombard this time begins real discussions with the new Prime Minister. Three long exchanges, including one on the Minister of the Interior.
– I have a problem with Bruno Retailleau.
– You don’t like it?
– I really like the guy, we know each other well. But for me, a major immigration law and a drastic reduction in the AME are no.
– There will be no major immigration law or abolition of the AME.
You would think you hear Boris Vallaud when he leaves Matignon, it is Eric Lombard when he enters the government. Since we tell you that he is on the left…
“Le Pen, it’s ontologically impossible for him”
Moreover, if he accepts the portfolio, he “the leftist on duty” as he says with a laugh, it is also because he thinks he will succeed in making the PS and others the main interlocutors of the government, and no longer the RN. As a sine qua non condition for his participation in the Bayrou adventure. “It’s his mandate,” assures one of his friends, who emphasizes the aversion of the Rocardian towards the far-right party. Oh, he received them at Bercy this Friday, but the paradigm has changed: in his conversations with Emmanuel Macron and François Bayrou, before accepting the job, Lombard ensured that political stability was discussed with the left. “He will be Republican, and absolutely friendly with the RN, but he will never want to depend on their vote. Le Pen, it is ontologically impossible for him,” adds one of his old comrades, who recalls that the great- father was saved by some Righteous people in deep Berry. A state of mind which has finally convinced the socialists, ecologists and communists to sit at its table, they who had already heard the head of state ring the end of recess with the RN during the consultations of the left for the Élysée at the beginning of December. A new rule of the game, and in reverse from Michel Barnier, which François Bayrou had recalled when receiving them in turn.
It’s not because we speak the same language that the matter is settled. At Bercy, it is not a consultation that is at stake but a balance of power. “There will be a change in method if there is a change in result. The survival of this government depends on its ability to negotiate with us,” procrastinates Boris Vallaud, the leader of the socialist deputies. On the table, technical discussions on five areas: pensions, purchasing power, public services, ecological bifurcation and tax justice. It is on this last point that things have progressed most easily: the idea of a new taxation of high wealth would be well underway. A sign of the times, all the plenipotentiaries have vowed silence on the progress, careful not to interfere with the ongoing negotiations. “The proof of the pudding is in the eating,” says Senator Patrick Kanner, paraphrasing the Marxist philosopher Engels. In short, the NFP does not joke with censorship. Michel Barnier served as an example. The executive, which understands this well, is looking for common ground. Eric Lombard told his friends on the left: the government parties who want to prepare for 2027 have every interest in having a stabilized situation. Long live the convergence of struggles…
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