The boss of LR senators, Bruno Retailleau, judged Sunday “absolutely unacceptable to want to bring France to its knees”, from March 7, believing that it was necessary to “block the blockers” who oppose the pension reform for not that the French are taken hostage. “I find it absolutely unacceptable to want to bring France to its knees,” said the senator from Vendée, guest of the Grand Jury RTL – Le Figaro – LCI on Sunday. “The economy is already on its knees: there is inflation, there is the deficit, there are public services which are collapsing”.
“A hostage-taking power”
While a new day of mobilization, this time renewable, is scheduled for March 7, in energy, the strike began on Friday, and some truckers could go on strike on Sunday evening. The secretary general of the CGT Chemistry Federation, Emmanuel Lépine, said he was ready to “bring the French economy to its knees” so that the government withdraws its reform project and its flagship measure: the postponement from 62 to 64 years of the legal retirement age. “We must block the blockers”. Today, these people “have the power to take hostages”, denounced Bruno Retailleau, tackling the lack of minimum service, especially in public transport.
The leader of the LR senators also invited the government to requisition the energy production plants, or even to “sanction” them financially. While the debates on the examination of the text continue in the Senate, until March 12, Bruno Retailleau denounced the strategy of “obstruction” of the left. “We will do everything so that the reform can be adopted,” he assured. A way of evoking, implicitly, the use of article 38 of the Senate rules, introduced in 2015 but never used to date, which makes it possible to accelerate the closing of the debates.
While the National Assembly has failed to go beyond Article 2 of the text, due to the thousands of amendments tabled, the vast majority by La France insoumise, the boss of the LR senators intends to go to the end of the text “in an atmosphere of serenity”.