PARIS (Reuters) – Prime Minister Gabriel Attal announced in an interview with La Tribune Dimanche the broad outlines of the unemployment insurance reform which will tighten the conditions of access to compensation from December 1 and that the government sees as a step towards full employment.
With this reform, presented in recent days to the social partners by Minister Catherine Vautrin and contested by the unions, the executive hopes to put 90,000 people back on the job market and make some 3.6 billion euros in savings.
According to the new rules, which the executive wishes to establish by decree without going through Parliament, it will be necessary to have worked eight months during the last 20 months, instead of six months during the last 24 months currently, to benefit from unemployment benefits. .
“We have shown that we are not condemned to mass unemployment. But if we do not reform unemployment insurance today, we risk stalling on the road to full employment,” explained the Prime Minister in the ‘interview. “This reform is therefore the fuel that will allow us to create ever more work in our country.”
“as we are reducing the affiliation reference period, there will be an impact on the duration of compensation,” he added, specifying that this will go from 18 months to 15 months.
“At the same time, we are massively strengthening support with France Travail,” he continued.
The government also wishes to extend a “bonus-malus” to more than the 7 sectors currently concerned in order to fight against the abuse of short contracts, a project which will be the subject of consultation led by the Minister of Labor.
There is also an incentive to return to work for seniors aged 57, with the possibility of combining their unemployment benefit for one year with a new job that is less paid than the old one.
“It is with responsibility that we make these decisions. This reform of unemployment insurance will come into force
in autumn. I spoke of the “autumn of work”. We are going to issue a decree, on July 1, so that it can enter into
force on December 1,” said Gabriel Attal.
(Reporting by Elizabeth Pineau and Gilles Guillaume)
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