The Gist Against the backdrop of a new health crisis and rising energy prices, the forthcoming texts, and particularly the pension reform, are likely to stoke societal anger. The President plays very big at the beginning of the year.
Glorious sun and summer temperatures on Fort de Brégançon, where the President of the Republic arrived on Sunday to spend a few days with his family. Enough to fill up on vitamin D to get through the already complicated process of going back to school.
This is often the case for 5 years. The month of January 2019 was punctuated by the Yellow Vests demonstrations, the month of 2020 was marked by the progression of COVID cases. 2021 began just like 2022 with rumors of a Russian invasion of Ukraine. The school year 2023 presents itself as a dangerous mixture of the four previous school years.
In the health sector, the difficulties in hospitals, combined with the doctors’ strike and the serious shortage of medicines, are causing great concern among the French, to which the President does not wish to respond personally for the time being. At the same time, the increase in energy prices, particularly due to the war, is fueling anger and frustration among many fellow citizens.
So the road could rumble again. Especially as the tightening of unemployment insurance reform announced this week amid a truce for pastry chefs has fanned embers and angered unions. Something that worries the elected representatives of the majority: “You don’t have to do shit to the government anymore…” a Renaissance MP confided to the Parisian yesterday.
But as explosive as the context is for the tenant of the Élysée, the texts to come are no less so. The pension bill will be the riskiest project. His announcement on Jan. 10 clashes with the vote on the Renewable Energy (RE) Bill, another dangerous passage for the majority.
“We’ve taken issue with the left, but if we upset them too much with pension reform, they might be tempted to get us in trouble by not voting for the ENR,” one of the very committed MEPs estimated before Christmas on this topic one. This would make it the first postponed text of the second five-year term. The immigration law will also have a hard time finding a majority, even if Gérald Darmanin tries to convince MPs one by one.
opposition already in the election campaign
Each party wants to emphasize its difference from the majority. A desire that will grow more and more, the year 2027 will approach. The troubled NUPES should therefore, as soon as Parliament returns, raise their voices to reunite their troops, the LRs will finally try to exist. As for the National Rally, its parliamentary niche on January 12 will be an opportunity to challenge the government on issues such as domestic violence or the wearing of school uniforms.
Emmanuel Macron, who is known to be very annoyed by the parliamentary opposition, may need a second dose of vitamin D to get through the winter.