An important meeting at the Hotel Matignon and a very attentive observer, in China. Wednesday April 5, the Prime Minister, Elisabeth Borne, welcomes the inter-union, by blocking in her agenda a slot from 10 am to 1 pm. The moment is crucial for the executive who wants to display his desire to renew the dialogue with the social actors. Still united, the leaders of the eight employee organizations have just arrived together, following walking up rue de Varenne.
Some 8,000 kilometers away, in Beijing, where he is on a three-day state trip, Emmanuel Macron follows the talks live. He is « on touch » – according to Elysian phraseology – with the head of government and her teams. But, as expected, the meeting is cut short. After barely an hour, the protagonists separate, noting, once once more, the depth of their differences. Mme Borne wanted to address the rest of the five-year term, in particular the preparatory discussions around the future labor law; his interlocutors wanted, once more, to ask for the abandonment of the decline in the legal retirement age from 62 to 64, on the eve of an eleventh day of mobilization once morest this measure.
During their meeting with the Prime Minister, the representatives of the eight workers’ movements expressed themselves, successively, ending their remarks with this question: “Are you going to withdraw this reform? » There is, of course, no positive answer. It is finally Laurent Berger who indicates that he and the other guests leave the room. The secretary general of the CFDT made this announcement – carefully prepared upstream with his counterparts –, while Mme Borne has the floor and pauses in his intervention. “It happened in all civility, there was no clash”says one of the participants.
The union leaders take their leave and regroup in the courtyard of Matignon, facing a swarm of journalists. Cyril Chabanier reads a text, on behalf of all his comrades, to explain their position during the exchange with the Prime Minister. CFTC chairman reports head of government wanted to open “other sequences of consultation on themes as diverse as full employment and the sharing of wealth”. But it is excluded from ” turn the page “he continues, as long as the power in place does not give up retirement at 64.
Government “obtuse and disconnected”
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