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Questioned on BFMTV this Thursday, the former Minister of Justice François Bayrou returned, among other things, to the pension reform announced by the outgoing president. Without reviewing the substance, François Bayrou felt that the announcement was brutal.
Guest of BFMTV and RMC this Thursday, François Bayrou estimated that the announcement of retirement at 65 was made “brutally”. For Emmanuel Macron’s support, the announcement priorities are different. “The first thing to say is 1 we will take into account long careers and 2 we will take into account the arduousness” he recalled. With these guarantees, this reform is not unfair according to the High Commissioner for Planning. “I am thinking of the women who work in our CCAS, who lift elderly people all day and who find themselves with back pain. It’s not the same as working in an office,” he compared.
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For the second round, François Bayrou says he is “reserved in the face of satisfaction”. “The situation is still fraught with threat, particularly during a period between two rounds of a presidential election (…). It therefore requires a commitment without slowing down. Then, the President of the Republic must go into the field, with the French. I am very happy with his route in Pas-de-Calais and the North, in Alsace, I am happy with the direct work ”advised the support of the majority. François Bayrou was fascinated by these images where he looks into the eyes of the Head of State. “He is in direct contact with people. It is an essential dimension of the responsibility of the President of the Republic who embodies the institutions. It has to be as close as possible to the people,” he said.
François Bayrou also returned at length to the rise of extremes in France, “same situation as in the United States”. He tried to explain this radicalization in society. “Very large numbers of landmarks have been erased, our traditional societies have been organized around religious landmarks, and these landmarks are fading. And then the instantaneous media omnipresence and social networks expose societies to very heavy shocks,” he reproached. According to him, the biggest divide in society remains that “between the bottom of the social pyramid and the so-called summit”.
A finding that allowed journalist Apolline de Malherbe to recall the president’s objective when he left in 2017: to overcome the extremes. “There were 3 absolutely unpredictable tsunamis. First the movement of yellow vests which is a social anger, around the recognition and the place of each. The yellow vests did not come from 6 months ago, it goes back 30 years. Then there was the epidemic, an immense planetary shock, the world economy stopped, and then the war in Ukraine” put François Bayrou in context.
Bayrou wants to change the method of financing a presidential campaign
Asked about Valérie Pécresse’s reimbursement problems for her electoral campaign, the High Commissioner for Planning recalled her point of view. According to him, it is “abnormal” that it is private bodies that “decide whether or not to address the means necessary for a candidate or a political movement”. “All presidential candidates must borrow personally. It is a very big risk. We should have a democratic authority under the control of Parliament, linked to the deposit and consignment fund because it is the good of all French people. Their mission will be to guarantee funding for political life with the necessary precautions,” he proposed.
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