Censorship: farmers in Hauts-de-France tired and worried about another return to square one

Patrice was counting on an increase in his pension, which is very low today. Without the supplement, he receives between 600 and 700 basic pension. “My raise falls throughlike all the achievements we were supposed to gain”deplores this retired cereal farmer from Oise. He sold his farm, near Breteuil, to his son in 2020. “It is very difficult to live on less than 1,000 euros per month. I blame the deputies for putting this increase on hold, but especially the President of the Republic. He knew, by dissolving the Assembly this summer, that it wasn't going to go well, and then, there. there is no majority in the Assembly. So we can change Prime Minister, that will not guarantee great stability. There will still be no majority.”

Among the measures included in the agricultural orientation bill, on hold in the Assembly, and whose future is threatened by the overthrow of the Barnier government, farmers were particularly expecting a change in the method of calculating their pension. It would be determined on the basis of the best twenty-five years, as for private sector employees, and more on entire careerlike today.

“We will once again experience a period of instability”deplores Quentin Thibaut, the general secretary of the Young Farmers of the Somme. “Everything will be pausedlike this summer when the Attal government resigned.” More during this time, “the earth keeps turningwe have to work to pay our bills, feed our families, our animals”adds Valentin Crimet. “The deputies think we can tear out the page and start again, but that's not life. They're above ground. Who do they take us for? For what?”

The farmers met in front the regional payment services agencywhere they demonstrated this Wednesday, December 4, protesting against the delays in payment of CAP aid, fear that the agricultural orientation bill, taking up certain demands of the FNSEA, will go by the wayside. “We are going to find ourselves again with our noses in the water”denounces Marie-Françoise Lepers, a beef cow breeder in Argoules, in the north-west of the Somme. She is particularly concerned about probable postponement of payment of emergency aid intended for farmers in greatest difficulty. Some, she fears, will stay on the side of the road and leave the profession, on the verge of a financial abyss.