With article 40, the majority got the better of the Liot group’s pension bill – RT in French

During a stormy session in the Assembly, the Liot group withdrew its bill aimed at repealing the pension reform. In question, the recourse by the majority to article 40 of the Constitution to reject the key provisions of the text.

After the indignation, the dejection. “There is nothing left of our text. Consequently, we are not going to make a fool of ourselves by continuing this debate”, lamented Bertrand Pancher, this June 8 at 11:45 am in front of the national representation. Deputy of the Liot group (Freedoms, independents, overseas and territories) and co-author of the bill aimed at reversing the pension reform, he announced in his own words the withdrawal of the text.

“You have gone completely mad!”, Launched Charles de Courson at the Palais-Bourbon tribune, earlier in the morning. The reason for the wrath of the president of the Liot group: the wholesale rejection of dozens of amendments by the president of the National Assembly, thereby preventing them from being debated in the hemicycle.

Yaël Braun-Pivet indeed declared on the evening of June 7 “the financial inadmissibility” of the 53 amendments restoring article 1 of the bill presented during the parliamentary niche of the centrist group Liot. The latter aimed to repeal the passage of the retirement age to 64 years and had been challenged by the social affairs commission of the National Assembly.

A decision taken in the name of article 40, which stipulates that the proposals and amendments of parliamentarians are not admissible if they lead to a reduction in revenue or an increase in public charges. The use of this article constitutes a first under the Fifth Republic and contradicts the practices of the Chamber and the decision of the chairman of the finance committee, the deputy LFI (La France insoumise) Eric Coquerel, who had deemed the text admissible. of the Liot group on May 30.

“You are crushing our parliamentary democracy”

A choice which “deals a terrible blow to our parliamentary democracy”, which “you crush”, denounced the PCF deputy (French Communist Party) André Chassaigne during his speech on June 8 in the Assembly. “Today we are facing a major democratic rupture”, supported shortly after Marine Le Pen, president of the parliamentary group Rassemblement national (RN). “You know that you do not have a majority for this text, neither in this Assembly nor among the people. In reality, you are afraid of the people,” she added.

Mathilde Panot had for her part announced on June 7 the filing of a motion of censure against the government. “It is unacceptable that we can make such a coup without there being a reaction behind”, was indignant the president of the LFI group in the National Assembly, questioned by the press in the corridors of the Palace. -Bourbon.

“How do you feel when the National Front [sic] and LFI stand up to support you in an admirable identity and extremist pincer movement?”, launched Olivier Dussopt, Minister of Labour, to Charles de Courson on May 30, denouncing the support of the various oppositions to the centrist deputy’s bill.

A decision “under pressure from the executive”?

An opposition that denounces not only a form of obstruction, but also the submission of the President of the National Assembly to pressure from the government. “By taking this decision, Mrs. Braun-Pivet is no longer President of the National Assembly, she is a kind of good little soldier who applies the instructions of the President of the Republic to the letter”, Manuel Bompard got carried away, national coordinator of LFI at the microphone of BFMTV-RMC, this June 8.

The same day, the deputy RN Sébastien Chenu castigated “a pressure which was made on the part of the President of the Republic and the government on the National Assembly and its president Yaël Braun-Pivet”. Terms almost identical to those of the press release from the Liot group, released on June 7, which speaks of the use of Article 40 as a “dangerous precedent and an unprecedented attack on the rights of Parliament”, carried out “under the pressure of the executive”.

In fact, deputies of the presidential majority, but also members of the government, have been agitating for several weeks the use of article 40, to which Yaël Braun-Pivet was not initially favorable. In parliamentary committee, it had also initially declared admissible the text of the Liot group. For his part, Franck Riester, minister in charge of relations with Parliament, had judged “logical” that the text be rejected in the name of article 40, at the microphone of Radio J on May 16. “This proposed repeal is unconstitutional. I think everyone must be aware of this and take their responsibilities accordingly”, for her part, launched Élisabeth Borne, the Prime Minister, on May 17, after her meetings with unions. She was referring to article 40, which finally took the skin of the Liot group’s bill.