The president of the organization, Geoffroy Roux de Bézieux, points to a problem of “competitiveness” with Asia and the United States.
French employers (Medef) on Wednesday asked for an overhaul of the European electricity pricing mechanism “which no longer worksand jeopardizes businesses in the face of Asia and the United States, and also insisted on the end of the “every man for himselfin terms of national aid. Energy pricesare creating a huge competitiveness problem for our companies, first and foremost vis-à-vis China, Asia and the United States“, estimated the president of the first French employers’ organization, Geoffroy Roux de Bézieux, during a press conference. In particular, he pointed to a “ratio of one to ten between the price of energy in the United States and in France“.
In some cases it is aproblem of survival, because we are unable to pass on these prices to the end consumer“, he added. Faced with a situation that puts France and Europe at risk of deindustrialisation, the Medef turns to the European Commission “which we expect very quickly to redo what is called market design – the fixing of the price of electricity – which today is a system that no longer works“, underlined the president of Medef.
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Geoffroy Roux de Bézieux hopes to have a new system in place within four to five months and is discussing with other European employers’ representatives, and in particular German ones, to arrive at common proposals. Currently, aid systems “are not consistent: large companies and ETIs, in particular industrial ones, which are very energy-intensive, are better supported in Germany“, he criticized. “In the short term, if we go through aid systems, which are probably necessary, they must be coherent and compatible between all the countries of Europe“, insisted the president of Medef.
According to him, “this is the role of the Commission» to harmonize aid. “This is what went very well during the Covid and there we are a little amazed at the every man for himself who is in the process of being put in place.“. In order to illustrate the difficulties caused by soaring energy prices, the Medef presented testimonies from companies which have seen their bills explode, such as that of Polytechs, a chemist specializing in plastics. “This is unheard of“, said in a recorded video its president Patrick Coquelet. “I, who have 40 years of experience in the business, feel like I have left a normative economic world to head towards the casino economy.“, he said.
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