The day before, the boss of the bosses had once again expressed his opposition to the measures defended by the NFP, which he described as “unsustainable” for the country.
(AFP / JULIEN DE ROSA)
Medef president Patrick Martin said on Tuesday August 27 that his movement was “reassured” by the Elysée’s announcement on Monday that there would be no NFP government.
“I have to be consistent with myself,” Mr. Martin said during a press briefing at the Rencontre des Entrepreneurs de France (REF) organized by the employers’ movement at the Longchamp racecourse.
“I have been sufficiently critical of the LFI programme – I had also said that we would accommodate the participation of social democrats”
(to a government, Editor’s note) – to say that the announcement of the President of the Republic
“reassures us in some respects.”
Mr. Martin nevertheless wished for “a program, a calendar, and political and parliamentary longevity.” He added that he hoped that “the deadline does not extend too much” for the formation of the new government. “But we are not a few days away from the moment when the ‘program’ and ‘sustainability’ boxes are checked.”
The question of RN voters
Incidentally, he regretted that the RN does not have any positions of responsibility in the National Assembly:
“We think what we want about the RN, there are no fewer than 11 million of our fellow citizens who voted in its favor, that deserves interest, consideration.”
Asked about a possible challenge to the pension reform, which the NFP and the RN are in favour of, Mr Martin noted that “everyone would then have to take responsibility: will employees accept an increase in contributions, pensioners a reduction in pensions? Will companies be able to bear an increase in contributions? To each of these questions, I answer ‘no'”, he warned.
In favour of resuming negotiations on senior workers’ work, Mr Martin suggested that the trade union organisations would also be in favour: “I did not make this announcement with a flower in my gun”, he stressed.
Very much in favour of social dialogue, he observed that “two agreements were concluded between the two rounds of the legislative elections”, one on workplace accidents and occupational diseases, the other, somewhat “through abstention” by the unions, he acknowledged, on the rate of revaluation of unemployment benefits.
As for purchasing power, the president of Medef noted that there was also a way to reform household “expenditure”, including housing, which represents “40% of the compulsory expenditure of low-income households”.
