The left, supported by the RN, marked a first point on Wednesday in its fight to repeal the much-maligned pension reform, with the adoption in parliamentary committee of a text reducing the starting age to 62, a new blow hard for the government, often mistreated in the Assembly.
“Huge victory!”, enthused the leader of the rebellious deputies, Mathilde Panot, after the vote.
The text, presented by the LFI group as part of its parliamentary “niche”, was approved by 35 votes (those of the left and the National Rally), against 16 (coming from the ranks of the center and the right). It will be examined on November 28 in the hemicycle.
The reform, adopted in 2023 under the government of Elisabeth Borne to raise the starting age to 64, was “unjust democratically and socially, and economically ineffective”, argued the rapporteur (LFI) of the text, Ugo Bernalicis.
The National Rally, which presented a similar proposal at the end of October – but which the left did not support – voted for the text. It is “the same as ours, and we are not sectarian”, argued Thomas Ménage (RN).
The proposal approved on Wednesday affects not only the retirement age (i.e. the Borne reform), but also the contribution period: this is reduced from 43 to 42 annuities, which amounts to also repeal the reform carried out in 2013 by socialist minister Marisol Touraine during the five-year term of François Hollande.
An amendment, presented by the centrists of the Liot group to preserve the Touraine reform, was rejected. The socialists, who would have preferred to keep this 2013 reform, decided to approve the overall text despite everything.
– “No gift!” –
Representatives of the government coalition, for their part, warned against a “not serious” or “irresponsible” text.
“We have to be honest with the French: if this pension reform is repealed, of course they will be able to leave” earlier, “but with a much lower pension,” argued Macronist MP Stéphanie Rist.
After this first stage victory for the left and the RN, all eyes are now on November 28, the day when the text will be examined in the hemicycle.
With this in mind, the right and the center continue to weigh their strategy, according to an MP from the Barnier coalition.
“Some are pleading not to go to the vote” in session, by defending hundreds of amendments, to slow down the debates and prevent the text from being voted on within the allotted time, but the tactic could be “dangerous in terms of image”, estimates an elected official.
“We are not going to give up, no gifts!”, anticipates another Macronist executive, who pleads for this strategy of obstruction, aware that the ex-majority does not have much to lose on this issue anyway, where she has long assumed a position that she knows is unpopular.
Beyond the key date of November 28, the left claims to be able to carry this repeal proposal through to the end: it has already planned to include it on the Senate agenda on January 23, at the occasion of a communist niche, then in second reading in the Assembly on February 6, this time in a niche dedicated to environmentalists.
However, the repeal has no chance of succeeding in the Senate, where the majority of the right and the center had approved the Borne reform in 2023.
The Insoumis text could even be judged inadmissible before being put to a vote, due to the excessive burden it would place on public finances. This was the case in the spring, when a proposal to repeal the socialist group was rejected by the Finance Committee, for this reason.
