French President Emmanuel Macron said he was ready to accept the unpopularity of the pension reform and called it a “necessity”. The Head of State said so in an interview on French television.
“Between the (opinion) polls, the short term and the general interest of the country, I choose the general interest. If today it is necessary to accept (own) unpopularity, I will accept it. said Macron.
The Head of State regretted that he and the authorities of the country could not explain to the French the need for a pension reform.
“Do you think it is a pleasure for me to carry out this reform? No. Do you think I could do like my predecessors and just sweep the dust under the rug? Yes, maybe, but in fact I regret that we were not able to realize together the need for this reform. <…> It is not a luxury, it is not a pleasure, it is a necessity for the country”, — declared Macron.
The French leader noted that when he first went to work, there were only 10 million pensioners in France, and now, according to him, their number has reached 17 million. “And by 2030 there will be 20 million,” he said.
Commenting on the massive protests against the pension reform that have been taking place in France since the start of the year, Macron said that the crowds in the streets “have no legitimacy” in the face of “people who express their opinion through their elected” in France. parliament. At the same time, the president condemned the violence of the demonstrators. In addition, he regretted that “no trade union force has offered a compromise” regarding the reform.
Macron said he still wants the reform to come into force by the end of 2023 and is awaiting the decision of the Constitutional Council to enact it in accordance with the provisions of the constitution.
According to a poll conducted in January by the French Institute of Public Opinion (Ifop), around two-thirds (68%) of French people are opposed to pension reform. Macron’s rating fell to 28% amid protests against pension reform, according to another Ifop study published on March 18 (Le Journal du Dimanche Remarks the lowest level of popularity for a head of state since the 2019 yellow vest protests).
Pension reform in France
The pension reform in France was approved by Macron in mid-March. The president passed the law bypassing parliament with the help of Article 49.3 of the Constitution, which allows the document to be approved without a vote in the National Assembly. The opposition deemed the procedure used by Macron “authoritarian”, and also submitted two resolutions of censure to the government, but in both cases they failed to obtain the required number of votes.
According to the law, the retirement age will increase from 62 to 64 and will increase in stages until 2030 – three months a year. The first increase is scheduled for September 1, 2023. At the same time, by 2027, France plans to increase seniority from 41.5 to 43 years, necessary to benefit from a full pension.
As Macron has argued, if the initiative is not passed, the deficit in the country’s pension system will grow as the population ages. Unions, meanwhile, believe the law will undermine the rights of women and poorer segments of the population.
Opponents of French pension reform continue to rally as workers go on strike. The leader of the National Rally, a right-wing opposition party, Marine Le Pen, believes that the authorities “deliberately create all the conditions for a social explosion” in France, by endorsing the raising of the retirement age.
