Parliament urgently adopted on Monday, by a final vote in the Senate, the extension until the end of 2024 of an exemption which allows restaurant vouchers to be used to purchase all food products.
The text, presented by the government as a measure to combat still high inflation, was adopted 322 votes to 2 by senators in the evening. Pressed for time as the system was due to expire at the end of 2023 if no legislative changes were made, the parliamentarians of the High Assembly kept the same editorial version as that adopted by the National Assembly at the end of November. This will allow the system to come into force as quickly as possible, a very short-term necessity according to the Minister of Commerce Olivia Grégoire.
The system, put in place in 2022 and supposed to end on December 31, 2023, allows some 5.4 million employees in France to use their restaurant vouchers to buy products on the shelves that are not directly consumable (flour, pasta, rice, meat, etc.), while they are normally reserved for directly consumable products in addition to restaurants.
In the Senate, several environmentalist and centrist senators tried, in vain, to limit the extension to six months – to June 30, 2024.
Restaurant voucher: what can you really still pay with? (and 10 other questions)
Towards a lasting reform of the restaurant ticket
The government, in favor of extending the system temporarily, repeated Monday evening that it would be open a lasting reform of meal vouchers, particularly with a view to its dematerialization. We need to modernize it, dust it off, said Olivia Grégoire. However, outright sustainability requires more in-depth work and consultation, she added.
Les Républicains rapporteur Marie-Do Aeschlimann went in the same direction by asking for a broad vote without immediate modification and in the face of the emergency. She nevertheless underlined the reservations expressed by the restaurateurs against which the Senate will be vigilant.
We do not ignore the risk of destabilization of the catering sector already strongly affected by successive crises. Likewise, we do not ignore the need to find a solution for the purchasing power of the French because the check policy is akin to a bandage on a wooden leg, she continued.
Reproduction forbidden.