In a few weeks, a united union front was organized against him calling for a strike and mobilization on Thursday, which the former housing minister could helplessly attend, he who risks being swept away by a motion of censure that the left and the RN promise to vote the day before against the government of Michel Barnier.
Questioning the method
The unions, which maintain their call despite the political turbulence, also question the minister's method, some, including Unsa, having even announced “no longer sitting in the social dialogue bodies” that he chairs.
A key moment comes up again and again in the conversation: the congratulations addressed by the French minister to Elon Musk, his counterpart charged by Donald Trump with “dismantling” the American bureaucracy, and with whom he was delighted to “share good practices” in the face of “ excessive bureaucracy.
“It’s dismaying and dangerous to be minister of the civil service in France when we share the idea of destroying the public service,” laments Benoît Teste, secretary general of the FSU civil service, who sees in this message a “ switches to another model” and a “brutal” attitude from Mr. Kasbarian.
There is “no regret to express because that did not mean that we were going to use Musk's methods”, sweeps the entourage of the minister, who defends a method never renounced since his time at the Ministry of Housing. During this ephemeral lease (February-June 2024), “people talked a lot about the anti-squat law, the end of social housing for life”, two texts carried by the minister. “And when politicians deal with subjects that concern the French on a daily basis, they print,” says one of his close collaborators.
Leave a footprint
Guillaume Kasbarian “needs to leave an imprint, and not say to himself at the end “I was there and I watched the trains go by””, describes Marie Lebec, MP for Yvelines (EPR), and friend of the minister whom she worked alongside within the Economic Affairs Committee. She is also full of praise for her time in Housing, where “Kasba” had inherited one of the most exposed portfolios and often described as a “social bomb”, in a context of historic crisis.
But on the side of associations, the 37-year-old minister did not leave the same memories. “We camped in January and February a stone's throw from the Ministry of Housing, he never followed up,” remembers the spokesperson for the Right to Housing (DAL) association Jean-Baptiste Eyraud, who said having questioned several times. “He is clever in communication”, and during the proposed anti-squat law for example, “he relied on a network of small owners, and knew how to divide social landlords and get the mayors in the pocket” .
