The Minister of Health, Aurélien Rousseau, would “advise” Elisabeth Borne to no longer vape in the hemicycle of the National Assembly, a persistent habit which this week earned the Prime Minister criticism from a member of parliament Insubordinate. On Wednesday, Caroline Fiat criticized Elisabeth Borne for vaping while she presented the new LFI motion of censure against the government. “Here, we write the law”, “we are not above the law”. “Vaping in this chamber while I am talking to you is total contempt,” she said.
Elisabeth Borne frequently vapes in the hemicycle of the National Assembly, as on many public occasions, which has already earned her criticism from opposition deputies. “When we are in a motion of censure, when none of the deputies – or almost none – who tabled the motion of censure took the trouble to come, when we have a speaker who is extremely aggressive with the Prime Minister , both I would advise him not to do it anymore, and at the same time I understand that it is a rather unpleasant moment to go through”, declared Sunday Aurélien Rousseau, questioned on the subject during the program “Dimanche en politique ” on France 3.
“Puffs” in the Assembly’s sights
“Vaping in the Assembly, moreover, is not authorized, I believe, according to the regulations of the National Assembly,” added Aurélien Rousseau, who was Elisabeth Borne’s chief of staff at Matignon for a year. “But I also invite everyone to see the violence of the comments that can be made at these times of motions of censure,” he insisted.
“I actually think that we need to get out of the habit of constantly showing smoke or cigarettes. Afterwards, we are in a very different subject: for example here, we have a former smoker (the Prime Minister) who, to wean herself off, goes through vaping. My fight, particularly with regard to young people, is that those who offer them colored puffs, with tastes, etc., do not make them turn to cigarettes”, added Aurélien Rousseau.
The National Assembly will debate Monday evening a bill on the ban on single-use electronic vaping devices (“puffs”), after a unanimous vote by deputies in committee. “I don’t put things exactly on the same level, even if obviously I remind the Prime Minister of the good advice,” concluded Aurélien Rousseau.