Paris.
France’s president wants to push through a pension reform in the face of fierce resistance. His entire second term is at stake.
It was nothing less than an incendiary device France’s President in his New Year’s speech. “We all have to work longer if we want to secure the future of our country and our young people,” explained Emmanuel Macron and announced a gradual increase in the retirement age from the current 62 to 64 or 65, which should come into force as early as autumn. It is therefore clear that the head of state wants to push through what is probably his most controversial reform project, despite a social climate that has already been roughened by the pandemic, the war in Ukraine, the climate crisis and inflation.
In no EU member state is life expectancy higher and that retirement age lower than in France. A discrepancy that Emmanuel Macron has always wanted to end. He had already endured weeks of strikes at the end of 2019 for the overdue restructuring of the old-age security system, which he believed to be overdue. But the pandemic meant that the reform that had already been approved by Parliament was finally withdrawn. Provisionally – as Emmanuel Macron made clear in the election campaign for his second mandate. And he can point to the fact that he won the presidential elections last spring, even though raising the retirement age was part of his program.
Retirement: Gradually increasing the retirement age to 64 or 65 is considered safe
Prime Minister on Tuesday Elizabeth Borne present the details of the reform project. What is certain is that the retirement age will gradually increase to 64 or 65, as well as a gradual increase in the contribution years from 40 to 43, as well as “cushioning” measures for people with a particularly long working life, interrupted contribution periods or physically demanding jobs, and an increase the minimum pension to 85 percent of the minimum wage (currently that would correspond to 1200 euros per month).
Trade unions and the extreme left and right-wing opposition parties are up in arms against these plans, which are expected to be approved by the Council of Ministers on January 23 and will be submitted to parliament by March at the latest. “The President will cause a conflagration,” warned Laurent Berger himself, the leader of the moderates Workers’ organization CFDT and announced a massive wave of strikes, to which all unions want to call from the second half of January.
Emmanuel Macron, his main partners and goals:
France’s majority rejects pension reform
According to the Minister of Labor Olivier Dussopt, the French are “more sensible than the unions and know that you can’t retire so early forever if you live longer and longer”. Recent opinion polls, however, contradict the minister’s optimism. Accordingly, 55 percent of those surveyed reject a pension reform outright, 67 percent are against pensions from the age of 65 and only 35 percent consider the reform to be necessary. The vast majority of advocates are seniors, who would not be affected by the changes.
Macron argues that he is concerned with the long-term sustainability of the pension, which is at risk. In doing so, he can rely on the calculations of the Pensions Supervisory Board COR support, which sees the pension fund, which is currently still almost balanced, slipping into a constantly growing deficit from this year onwards, which threatens to total 20 billion euros in 2032. Prime Minister Borne also referred to this forecast, which the unions doubted, when last week she described the pension system as “structurally deficient”.
Emmanuel Macron – no “lame duck”
Of course, France’s president isn’t just about that pension reform, but also about his role and his reputation. Macron does not want to serve his second mandate as a “lame duck” (lame duck), but to continue his reform program that was interrupted by the pandemic. And he wants to prove that he remains capable of acting despite his ruling party losing the absolute parliamentary majority in the summer. In addition to the pension reform, he has therefore also put a major energy transition law, a tightened immigration law, judicial reform and a reform of the health system on the agenda for the coming months.
However, they are parliamentary hurdles at least as high as Macron’s ambition is. This applies in particular to the pension reform, which, regardless of the impending wave of strikes and the mass protests to be expected, is not only dividing the country but also the National Assembly. Communists, Socialists and Greens reject them, while the radical left-wing party “Indomitable France” even wants to mobilize for a return to retirement from 60 with a large-scale demonstration on January 21. A demand that Marine Le Pen’s “Rassemblement National”, which is also fighting against an increase in the retirement age, has just said goodbye to.
Pension: Reform is classified as “too brutal”.
The governing party can only rely on that Support for the conservative Republican Party Hoffnung, who has been advocating retirement from the age of 65 since 2017. But its new party leader, Eric Ciotti, has now classified the reform as “too brutal”. How the vote of the LR deputies turns out is therefore in the stars. Should they also turn against the reform, the Prime Minister’s only option would be to box it by decree, i.e. without a vote by Parliament. The inevitable result would be a no-confidence motion by the opposition parties, threatening to overthrow the government. But Macron, for whom another withdrawal of pension reform is out of the question, seems determined to gamble all on one card.
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