Pension reform: “Let’s remove the retirement age”, insists Henri Guaino

While the text on the pension reform will arrive in the Senate on March 2, and a big day of mobilization against raising the retirement age to 64 is already scheduled for March 7, the former special adviser to Nicolas Sarkozy Henri Guaino was the guest of the Grand Rendez-vous d’Europe 1/ Cnews/ The echoes this Sunday. Opposed to this reform, considering that it is “political madness”, the former deputy for Yvelines called for “[supprimer] retirement age”.

“Let’s only deal with this problem by the contribution period”

For Henri Guaino, raising the retirement age “is political madness because the social crisis [qui en découle, NDLR] already has, and will have even more political consequences, even if there are also other causes”, such as the health crisis, inflation and the war in Ukraine. The former special adviser to Nicolas Sarkozy would have moreover advised Emmanuel Macron “not to do it. Is it relevant to raise the retirement age? We are told that we live longer, but that has nothing to do”, he insists at the microphone of the Grand Rendez-vous.

According to Henri Guaino, abolishing the retirement age made it possible to “[clarifier] things. Let’s only deal with this problem by the contribution period: it will be fairer and clearer. Let’s stop with this double slider which makes no sense, which saves us money in the retirement system only if there is a distortion between the contribution period and age. Because if it coincides, it doesn’t change anything at all,” he said.

“We make fun of the world”

While the government justifies its reform by the risk of a very deficit system, which could reach 43 billion euros of debt in 2050, for Henri Gaino, “we are making fun of the world, there is nothing in the report orientation of the Pensions Orientation Council which can support the idea of ​​a bankruptcy of the pension system in a few years: this is not true.

At the microphone of the Grand Rendez-vous, the former deputy insists on “a figure that must be remembered: it is the share of retirement expenditure in the annual national income which is expected to drop in significant proportions. There is no macro-economic problem. The problem that arises is that of the way in which we finance the pension system. There is no reason either that it only concerns work today: c It is also a real question to be debated with the social partners and the French”, he concluded.

Henri Guaino also declared himself “in solidarity” with the blocking movement planned by the inter-union on March 7.