The most dangerous motion of no confidence for the French government since Emmanuel Macron came to power has failed this Monday in the National Assembly. They have voted in favor 278 deputies, nine less than necessary for it to succeed. This very narrow margin compared to the forecasts has been a very negative surprise for the president and means that many deputies from the Los Republicanos (LR, traditional right) party have voted for the motion, disobeying their leaders.
If the motion of censure had succeeded, the pension reform, approved last Thursday through the use of article 49.3 of the Constitution, would have been annulled, which considered it automatically validated, without a parliamentary vote. Another motion, from the National Regrouping (RN, extreme right), must be voted on tonight, but it will get much less support because the left will not vote for it.
A few minutes after learning that the Government had escaped by the minimum, people began to gather in Place Vauban, in Paris, near Les Invalides, in an unauthorized protest demonstration. The square is not far from the National Assembly and the Matignon Palace, seat of the Prime Minister. Almost every night there are protests and clashes with riot police. The new political situation represents a significant risk to public order given the prospect of the protest becoming more radical.
Such a close victory leaves a very bitter aftertaste for the Government because its isolation has been revealed and it occurs in the midst of mobilizations and strikes that do not stop. This Thursday there will again be a day of protest on a national scale. In the National Assembly there were many absences among the parliamentarians of the groups that support Macron, visibly uncomfortable with what has happened in recent days and the fact that the reform was not voted on.
The centrist deputy Charles de Courson, dean of the chamber, was in charge of defending the motion on behalf of his parliamentary group, an amalgamation called Liberties, Independents, Overseas and Territories (LIOT). De Courson was very hard and forceful against the Government and against Macron for having imposed, in his opinion, an unnecessary, unfair and inconsistent pension reform, and for having done so “distorting the spirit of the Constitution”.
De Courson regretted that the Élysée did not have the courage to accept that the reform be voted on. “They probably would have lost that vote, but it is the rule in a democracy,” added the deputy.
The head of the group of the macronista party, Renacimiento, Aurore Bergé, dedicated a good part of her speech to castigating the opposition for reaching an agreement, despite the enormous ideological distance between the extreme right and the radical left, the ecologists and the communists. “Yes, a motion of censure becomes, de facto, a common program,” said Bergé amid the shouting of the camera and disapproving gestures.
Mathilde Panot, from La Francia Insumisa (LFI), spoke on behalf of the New Popular Ecologist and Social Union (Nupes), the broad left-wing coalition that contested last year’s elections under the leadership of Jean-Luc Mélenchon. “The people look at them like someone who has betrayed,” said Panot, who cited severe articles published by the foreign press on Macron’s management of the pension issue. “For many, his government is dead,” stressed the deputy. When the result of the vote was announced, the left-wing deputies stood up and held up a banner with this text: “Appointment on the street.”
In her turn to reply, the Prime Minister, Elisabeth Borne, reproached the opposition for its duplicity of behaviour, that of having obstructed the reform debate with thousands of amendments while, at the same time, accusing the Government of having resorted to the expeditious method to approve the project by decree. According to Borne, you have to tell the truth to the French, that the distribution pension system can only be sustained if you work more years. Actually, you should work 45 years, but the Government considered it excessive and reduced it to 43 years of contribution to collect the full pension.
