Six candidates are running in the 4th constituency of Vienne in the first round of the 2024 early legislative elections, which brings together Châtelleraudais, Lencloître, Loudun, Moncontour, Monts-sur-Guesnes, Pleumartin, Saint-Gervais-les-Trois-Clochers and Les Trois -Moutiers. A very industrial territory in search of labor.
Can Nicolas Turquois come back?
Nicolas Turquois is aware that his seat as a member of parliament is under threat, with the National Rally having obtained 40% of the votes in the European elections in his constituency, far ahead of the presidential majority at 15%. He cultivates his image as a grassroots elected official, far from the Parisian power. “After a mandate and a half, I am convinced that we need even more arbitration between the local and the national to make good decisions. You have to interact with what is happening on the ground. I was there, but we have to get the message out to the Parisian community. There’s a real disconnect that people perceive.”
Hager Jacquemin: absent from the field?
The National Rally candidate, Hager Jaquemin, is accused by her competitors of having deserted the field. Parliamentary attaché to Edwige Diaz in Gironde, more than 200 km from Châtellerault, she was rarely seen on site and did not participate in the debates organized by France Bleu and France 3 with the main candidates. She justifies her absence by her professional obligations: “I am also production manager for a private trader. I had to sort out all my affairs before fully committing to my campaign.”
Basically, it proposes to revitalize Châtelleraudais and Loudunais: “In Châtellerault, there are many closed shops and desertification which is forcing people to leave. There is not any work. We should reindustrialize. To fight against medical desertification, we will ask retired doctors to come and work again, by exempting them from income taxes.”
Hager Jaquemin will face Patrick Minot of the centrist Alliance and Sabine Bortolotti for Nicolas Dupont-Aignan’s Debout la France party.
Patrice Villeret, from Lutte Ouvrière for retirement at 60
On the left, all the candidates rallied behind Yves Trousselle of the New Popular Front, except one. Lutte Ouvrière sent Patrice Villeret, a former welder for nearly 40 years to the Poitou foundries. If elected, he wishes “Restore the retirement law at 60. My comrades from the Poitou foundries, laid off in 2022, thought they would be able to retire peacefully. They discovered that they had to work several more months even though they were physically worn out.”
Yves Trousselle: the union of the left
Improving purchasing power is also the argument of Yves Trousselle, from Raphaël Glucksmann’s party, Place publique. He carries the colours of the union of the left and proposes: “An increase of €200 in the minimum wage. Immediately review by decree the laws which have increased suffering since Covid: the extension of pensions, the shortening of unemployment benefits and now the RSA. Let us not be surprised that citizens are suffocated and are looking for alternatives to what President Macron has proposed since his election.”
Barely 20% for the left in the European elections
If we add up the European scores of the parties that make up the New Popular Front, the left only represents 20% of the votes in this constituency. However, renewed participation in the legislative elections could reshuffle the cards.
