The first Council of Ministers of the Attal government lasted only around thirty minutes, this Friday, January 12, time for Emmanuel Macron to hammer home his speech to his new team. The President of the Republic thus asked members of the government to be “revolutionaries”, not “managers”, and encouraged them to “discipline”, according to comments reported by participants in the meeting.
“I ask you for solidarity and speed, which are the condition for effectiveness,” the president said this morning. “I expect results from you, more results and more results,” he insisted behind closed doors. “This government will be one of republican discipline. I don’t want qualms, I want service records,” said the head of state, visibly determined to mark his authority over a tight government. “I don’t want ministers who administer, I want ministers who act. I don’t want managers, I want revolutionaries,” he insisted.
“You embody the return to the sources of what we are, surpassing ourselves in the service of the country, the spirit of 2017”, which prevailed in his first election to the presidency, said Emmanuel Macron. “It’s a historic responsibility. Live up to it.”
“The government united, to work!”, launched the President of the Republic at the start of the meeting in front of the cameras, seated between ministers Bruno Le Maire (Economy and Finance) and Catherine Vautrin (Labor, Health and Solidarity). Facing them, the new Prime Minister was installed between Gérald Darmanin (Interior) and Amélie Oudéa-Castéra (National Education, Youth and Sports).
A presidential speech next week
According to his entourage, the Head of State will speak “at the beginning of next week”, in a format which remains to be decided, before Gabriel Attal’s general policy declaration to the National Assembly. This presidential speech, for which a press conference is not excluded, will be part of the “meeting with the Nation” decreed by Emmanuel Macron for January.
For the first time, the Council of Ministers met in the “green room” of the Elysée, that is to say the president’s meeting and working room next to his office, smaller than the “ambassadors’ lounge” where it is usually held.
The choice to now favor this piece illustrates, according to an advisor to Emmanuel Macron, this “tightened” government of 11 full ministers and three delegate ministers, while awaiting a second salvo of delegate ministers and secretaries of state planned “within ten days”. “It’s a new breath, a new movement and a new rhythm that we want to inspire,” underlined the Elysée. “The important thing is work, work, work,” the same source added.