Pension reform in France: Macron’s choice of force puts the country in turmoil

Macron finally chose article 49.3 to push through his pension reform. In the absence of an assured majority, the vote seemed to him too risky. The government is hanging by a thread.

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Permanent envoy to Paris

By Joelle Meskens

Published on 03/16/2023 at 18:44
Reading time: 5 mins

LUncertainty hangs over a few voices. We cannot take the risk of seeing the compromise, built by the two Assemblies, discarded. This reform is necessary. “It is three five p.m. this Thursday in a packed and tense hemicycle to the extreme when Elisabeth Borne begins a practically inaudible speech. The Insoumis deputies have just sung at the top of their lungs a “Marseillaise” which completely covers the voice of the Prime Minister. Fists raised, placards brandished, they shout: “Democracy! On the perch, the eyes of the President of the National Assembly, Yaël Braun-Pivet, are wide open. A few minutes earlier, when the drums of the Republican Guard had already sounded, the government, betraying its panic, was not yet there. The session had to be adjourned. The ministers had arrived a few minutes later to a huge hoot.

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