the left leaves the meeting “disappointed” and threatens censorship

POLITICS – Now things are clear: the left is in opposition. After several days of doubts and proposals for a non-censorship agreement, the forces of the New Popular Front left the meeting in Matignon this Thursday, December 19 with the certainty of having both feet in the opposition to François Bayrou. “We have not found a reason not to censor”Olivier Faure even said.

The Prime Minister had invited all the parties which had “responsibilities under the Fifth Republic” to discuss the contours of the government he is about to appoint. The National Rally and La France insoumise were thus excluded, when the socialists, ecologists and communists wondered what they were doing there. “We are not partridges of the year. We didn’t come to Matignon with hopes in our eyes”confided the national secretary of the Ecologists Marine Tondelier, as if to put the issues of the interview into perspective.

In the midst of the crisis in Mayotte, where drinking water, food and electricity are sorely lacking, where the human and material toll promises to be appalling, the Greens would even have preferred that the meeting be canceled. “If what is happening in Mayotte had taken place in a department of France, this meeting would not have taken place”estimated the president of the group Cyrielle Chatelain, who had sharp words towards François Bayrou.

“Not acceptable”

“Our voters don’t want a small step forward. We will never accept renunciation and compromise”she supported, standing up against the idea put on the table by the boss of the MoDem to reopen the discussion around pension reform. Because, she denounces, “meanwhile, the reform continues to apply”. “We waste eight months, we talk and the unions discuss with a form of blackmail. This is not acceptable”.

On the socialist side, François Bayrou’s proposal does not receive any more support. “It is very very insufficient, considers the First Secretary of the PS Olivier Faure. We demand the suspension of this reform immediately, and then there be a discussion.” Wishing not to appear as blocking, the three NFP forces present at the meeting asked the Prime Minister not to resort to 49-3 in exchange, possibly, for non-censorship. Which he refuses. Therefore, why deprive yourself of overthrowing the future government?

“Hollow, empty speech”

“He said nothing about the budget, nothing about the possibility of having new revenues, nothing about the climate issue, nothing about saving jobs and layoffs”regretted Cyrielle Chatelain. “We had a consultant instead of a Prime Minister”continued the president of the environmental group in the Senate Guillaume Gontard, for whom François Bayrou held “a hollow, empty speech, without any political orientation”.

“We are not being heard”also complained Olivier Faure, who expressed his “spite” facing a Prime Minister according to him who is missing the point: “He needs to wake up and become aware of what is happening. It takes effort”. For both, “censorship is still very clearly on the table”. Guillaume Gontard regrets that there is no “no change compared to Michel Barnier”. From there to suffer the same fate?

Also see on HuffPost :