With a majority in the hemicycle, the left and the RN failed on Thursday to pass a law proposing to repeal the pension reform, in the face of obstruction from the presidential camp, to which rebellious France has never stopped promising censorship next week, in a particularly tense atmosphere.
Here is what you should remember from this day of debates in the National Assembly.
Failure to repeal pension reform
La France insoumise had placed at the top of the texts in its “parliamentary niche” – the annual day reserved for its texts – a proposed law aimed at repealing the 2023 reform which raised the legal retirement age from 62 at 64 years old.
But the text could not be voted on, due to hundreds of amendments tabled by the government coalition in order to slow down the work which necessarily had to end at midnight, and heated debates marked by multiple points of order and suspensions of sessions. .
At the end of the afternoon, the supporters of repeal had nevertheless won a symbolic victory: they rejected by 241 votes to 100 the amendments by which their colleagues from the government “base” wanted to empty the text of its substance. This “stinging defeat for the presidential camp” proves that“there is a majority in the Assembly and in the country for repeal”, LFI MP Clémence Guetté then congratulated herself on the social network
Opposition denounces obstruction and promises censorship
The left-wing deputies have never stopped denouncing the obstruction of the Macronist camp, castigating a “unworthy sabotage” or “thug methods”. And they vowed to take their revenge on Wednesday, by bringing down the government.
“The macronie is over and […] the first vote to really repeal the retirement reform at 64 is next Wednesday, during the censure which will allow both to bring down the Barnier government but also to undo this retirement at 64 which no one wants. reacted to the press the president of the LFI group, Mathilde Panot, at the end of the debates.
During the debates, the Macronists made a point of recalling that the Insoumis had themselves done everything to avoid a vote during the examination of the pension reform in 2023. “It was you who at the time wanted to block the debates, prevent the votes! “, exclaimed Budget Minister Laurent Saint-Martin, observing that the “a few hundred amendments” to be examined on Thursday were nothing compared to the 19,000 filed by the left in 2023.
The leader of the RN, Marine Le Pen, whose group had proposed a similar text during its “niche” on October 31, denounced on “obstruction maneuvers” through which “Macronie gave a helping hand to the democratic debate this evening.” But she also attacked the left, which had refused to vote for the RN text, “out of pure sectarianism”.
Prime Minister Michel Barnier could decide on Monday to trigger 49.3 to have the Social Security budget adopted without a vote in the Assembly, exposing himself to a motion of censure from the left, and which the National Rally threatens to vote on.
Incident and threats between deputies
During the debates, the ushers of the Assembly had to intervene between several deputies, following an incident caused in the hemicycle by the MoDem deputy Nicolas Turquois, according to parliamentary sources interviewed by AFP.
According to these sources, Nicolas Turquois climbed into the aisles during a session suspension, appearing threatening towards a socialist deputy, Michael Bouloux. “My family was threatened! And these are people from your village! “, would have thrown first to second, according to Le Figaro.
According to a source at MoDem, Nicolas Turquois complained to Michael Bouloux about “threats, insults and phone calls” received because of his opposition to the repeal of the pension reform.
LFI deputy Antoine Léaument also said he was threatened by Nicolas Turquois when he asked him to leave. The president of the MoDem group Marc Fesneau intervened, as well as ushers, before Mr. Turquois ended up leaving the hemicycle. Antoine Léaument returned to this incident during the rest of the debates, as shown in this extract from his intervention published on his X account.
When the debates resumed, the session president Xavier Breton (LR) announced that he would suggest to the President of the National Assembly Yaël Braun-Pivet to discuss the incident at the next meeting of the office of the Assembly for sanction.
