On Thursday March 16, the French authorities passed a resounding law raising the retirement age from 62 to 64. The pension reform was approved by the country’s President Emmanuel Macron, bypassing parliament using Article 49.3 of the Constitution, which allows the document to be approved without a vote in the National Assembly. The opposition judged such a procedure “authoritarian”, while thousands of French people continue to demonstrate. What the Western press writes about the reform and its consequences – in the magazine RTVI.
Financial Times: Macron’s decision to pass the controversial law bypassing parliament shows the government has failed to convince opposition MPs to back the reform. Such actions could lead to the start of a political crisis in France. The president’s inability to pass legislation without resorting to Article 49.3 of the constitution is a ‘serious blow’ to the head of state, calling into question his ability to garner support from other parties for further reforms in other areas, from immigration to climate change.
“Macron is stuck in a political stalemate. <…> retirement in France is sacred. So, before touching (on the pension reform), it was necessary to act methodically: to explain why it had to be done. <…> Macron and his government have done the exact opposite.
The New York Times “(The Head of State) struggled to portray a softer Macron, more attentive, less inclined to govern alone. <…> But a two-month showdown over his retirement plan has already revealed a weakened and more isolated president with fewer allies he could trust.
The Wall Street Journal : By reforming, Macron is depriving the French of the right to retirement, which is at the heart of the French social model. At the same time, the current pension model is weighing on the country’s financial health at a time when the president intends to increase state military spending amid the conflict in Ukraine. Thus, Macron “fell into a trap between demographic and geopolitical contradictions”.
The Republic of the Pyrenees :
“What an admission of weakness (by Macron and the government)! <…> A huge political crisis is looming.
The Telegraph : The leader of the left-wing La France Rebel party, Mathilde Pano, said the bill “has no legitimacy” and that its passage was an alarming “authoritarian moment”. According to former Republican spokesman Aurélien Pradel, the decision to pass the law bypassing parliament was a sign that France was on the verge of “democratic collapse”.
Pension reform in France
In January 2023, French Prime Minister Elisabeth Born proposed a pension reform bill. The document assumes that the French retirement age will rise from 62 to 64 and increase in stages until 2030 – three months a year; The first increase is scheduled for September 1, 2023. At the same time, Macron initially proposed raising the retirement age to 65, but after talks lowered the bar to 64.
In addition, by 2027, France plans to increase from 41.5 to 43 years the seniority required to benefit from a full pension.
To mitigate the impact of the reform, the government has committed to raising the minimum monthly pension from €1,100 to €1,200. The law raising the retirement age is extremely unpopular among French citizens; since January, people across the country have been staging mass protests. According to opinion polls, around two-thirds of French people strongly disagree with the reform. After the law was passed on March 16, opponents of the reform resumed going to rallies, which were accompanied by clashes with the police.
The reform is also opposed by a significant part of the parliamentary parties, including the far left Defiant France, the country’s Socialist Party and the far-right National Rally, Marine Le Pen.
The authorities insist that the reform must guarantee the viability of the French pension system. If the initiative is not implemented, the pension system deficit will grow as the population ages, Macron said. However, the unions believe that changing the retirement age will undermine the rights of women and the poorest, especially those who started working early and did not have a higher education.
Article 49.3 of the French Constitution, which Macron took advantage of, allows the lower house of parliament to propose a vote of no confidence in the government. At the same time, the French leader has the right, in response, both to accept the forced resignation of the Cabinet and to dissolve the National Assembly, by calling new legislative elections.
Macron now leads a centrist minority government. In June 2022, Macron’s party won the elections, but failed to secure a majority in parliament.
