All against Macron as France descends into chaos

The current pension system in France, one of the most generous in the world, is unviable. This is acknowledged by the vast majority of economists, statisticians, analysts and opinion pollsters and budgetary planners. With a birth rate close to the European average, which already includes Italy and Spain, the official retirement age in France is currently set at 62, with numerous exceptions that allow, for example, train drivers to retire much earlier. For them, the right to do so was acquired when the locomotives were steam-powered and burned coal. These engines are now only to be found in museums, trains are high-speed, train drivers hardly have to carry out any operations, the vast majority of which are now remote-controlled, but the right to a full retirement still remains, even though life expectancy has risen to an average of almost 90 years. It is not the only sector that enjoys this benefit. A further forty or so exceptions are also causing the envy of the French, who are subject to the common system of retiring at 62, which in turn makes the Germans, Italians and Spaniards, for example, who have already set the official retirement age at 67, feel that they are in the ranks of the dull-witted.  

Since, moreover, the system is a pay-as-you-go system, such generous pensions for so many depend on the younger working and contributing generations, who in these times are subject to the volatility of their jobs, which are disappearing at breakneck speed, as technological advances require much less, albeit much more skilled, labour.

Although France is at the forefront of the European Union, it has not been able to escape the general call from Brussels to put in order a system that accumulates growing deficits every year and makes it absolutely unviable. President Emmanuel Macron has been at it since his first term in office, and all the unions have been against him, forcing him to back down, just as they had done and succeeded with all the other presidents who had tried before him.

The worsening of the crisis, spurred on by the pandemic in particular, and all the consequences of both Chinese competition and the invasion of Ukraine, have made the necessary reform of the system even more urgent. Nor has Macron proposed a radical pendulum swing. He first proposed delaying retirement to 65 and then backtracked to 64, which still puts the French on the side of absolute jubilation long before the Germans, Italians and Spaniards.

Well, not even then. Practically all the French trade unions, where the attitude of protest and above all of street fighting is more typical of the first half of the 20th century than of today, have been as enthusiastic in their demonstrations, strikes and destruction of public furniture as in the inter-war period, or in May '68 if you want a closer example. These mobilisations have been joined by Jean-Luc Melenchon's La France Insoumise (LFI).

The decisive battle, however, was being fought in the seat of popular sovereignty, that is to say in the National Assembly and the Senate, the two French legislative chambers. Thursday was the decisive day, as the Macronist party, now renamed the Renaissance, needed the votes of the Republicans (LR), the new name of the traditional and Gaullist right. Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne, after a strenuous effort to obtain the support of the entire LR, found that at least a few LR MPs would not vote for her. So she opted for the radical solution permitted by Article 49.3 of the Constitution, which allows a law to be passed without the support of the legislature.

The only thing she did was to announce that the pension reform would be carried out by this procedure, which the opposition rushed to certify that it would present the corresponding motions of censure. For the moment, the Macron-Borne government will have to face three: from the most right-wing party in the chamber, Marine Le Pen's National Rally (RN), to the one that will inevitably be presented by Melenchon's supporters (he himself is not an MP), to the one that is also being drafted by the centrists of the LIOT party (Liberties, Independents, Overseas and Territories).

With the current composition of the National Assembly, none of the three motions of censure is likely to succeed. It will be enough for the LR deputies, who did not support the bill, to abstain from voting on the respective motions.  

Macron will thus finally approve his watered-down pension reform and his government will not fall because of the no-confidence motions, but he will undoubtedly emerge weakened from the whole affair. Unions and the far-left opposition will continue to agitate in the streets, according to their own statements, and will persist in their attempt to bring the country to a complete standstill.  

In such conditions, the temptation to call early elections will surely hover over the Elysée Palace. But in view of the political landscape and the results of opinion polls, such a call would not lead to a substantial change in the legislative chambers, and would instead strengthen the media presence of the two extreme poles of the parliamentary arc: Lepenism and Melenchonism.  

In the meantime, both sides are setting the calendar for new mobilisations. And Paris, the City of Lights, is burying itself in mountains of uncollected rubbish, on which the rats (the four-legged ones) seem to have become more numerous and stronger.