Elisabeth Borne wished Sunday, in an interview with AFP, “to put some appeasement” with the unions by saying that she was at their “disposal” to meet them on other sites than that of pensions, disputed for ten weeks in the street. “I am also at the disposal of the social partners. We have to find the right path: are these bilateral meetings, an inter-union? We have to put some appeasement. And that we can resume work on all these sites” of hardship, professional retraining, etc., said the Prime Minister.
“No 49.3 apart from financial texts”
In this regard, the head of government has provided a slot in her agenda to possibly receive trade union organizations and employers’ organizations in the week of April 10. On pensions, she recalls that the reform has been adopted and will “follow its course” until the Constitutional Council which will give an opinion, at the end of which the President of the Republic “must promulgate the law”, as provided for in the Constitution.
While the use of 49.3 to have this reform adopted has fueled the dispute, it wishes to no longer use it outside of financial texts. “The goal I set for the future is not 49.3 outside of the financial texts,” she said. “Since the beginning of the legislature, 11 bills have been definitively adopted and 12 legislative proposals. There has been recourse to 49.3 on three texts only” which are the budgetary texts for 2023, of which the pension reform is a part , carried by an amending law on the financing of Social Security, recalled the Prime Minister. Article 49.3 of the Constitution allows the adoption of a text without a vote but exposes the government to a motion of censure. Two motions were rejected on the text of the pensions, including one with nine votes.
Parliamentary groups and political parties received the week of April 3
Charged by Emmanuel Macron with building a government program and a legislative program, Elisabeth Borne specifies that she will “deploy” to do this an “action plan” over the next three weeks “which mobilizes all the actors who want advance (the) country”. During the week of April 3, she will receive parliamentary groups and political parties, including those of the opposition, as well as representatives of local authorities, with the aim of “appeasing the country” and “dialogue with all the actors on the method we want to put in place”.
Next week, she will receive on Monday the presidents of the majority of the committees in Parliament, on Tuesday the presidents of the Senate, Gérard Larcher, and of the National Assembly, Yaël Braun-Pivet, then on Wednesday the leaders of the majority parties, before bring together ministers and parliamentarians on education at the end of the week. The week of April 3, she will also exchange with ministers and parliamentarians concerned with the themes of health and ecology. The quality of life at work and the employment of seniors will be discussed the week of April 10.
“We really want to prioritize a few subjects to quickly show concrete results to the French,” said Elisabeth Borne. On education, she intends for example “to keep the commitment from the start of the school year that each absence, including short-term, is replaced”. And on health, she wants “each patient with a long-term condition to have access to a treating doctor”.