Macron's pension reform is at stake in the Constitutional Council

MADRID, 14 Abr. (EUROPA PRESS) -

The Constitutional Council of France will decide this Friday the future of the pension reform promoted by the Government and by the president, Emmanuel Macron, in a day that is called to be a turning point in the political and social debate and that can conclude with the total or partial veto of the controversial project.

The magistrates have several possibilities before them, since the veto or endorsement of the text does not have to be definitive. At stake is a reform that raises the retirement age from 62 to 64, extends the necessary contribution period and withdraws privileges from certain sectors.

The Constitutional Council must decide between different scenarios:

The horizon longed for by the Government is that the Constitutional Council fully supports a reform that has already passed the parliamentary process, thanks to a constitutional prerogative that allowed the Executive of Elisabeth Borne to circumvent the vote in the National Assembly at the cost of submitting to two motions of no confidence

In this scenario, "almost impossible" in the words of the constitutionalist Paul Cassia, consulted by the BFMTV chain, the magistrates would support not only each and every one of the articles of the law, but also the methods used to push it forward in Parliament.

Macron has decided to delay the promulgation of the law until the judges rule, so the yes of the Constitutional Council would allow him to definitively sign the text and continue with his plan to apply the new measures this year.

The experts predict as the most probable hypothesis that the Council retouches some aspects of the reform, although in this case the key would be in what are the issues that, in the eyes of the magistrates, do not pass the constitutional filter, since it will mark the subsequent reactions of the parts.

Thus, it is possible that budgetary or processing issues that could be considered minor are censored, but both the unions and the opposition parties have fired against the main pillars of the reform, such as the increase in the retirement age , and have threatened to continue with the mobilizations if there are no substantial changes.

The left directly demands the total veto of the law, a hypothesis practically unprecedented in the recent history of France. Of the 1,800 laws examined by the Constitutional Council since 1958, only twenty of them have been knocked down.

If the magistrates take this path, the Government would be forced to start over. In the political field, it would be an earthquake considering that he has defended the law tooth and nail and that Macron himself has ruled out even changing the composition of the cabinet to try to weather the controversy.

Regardless of the consideration of the law, the Constitutional Council must determine whether it endorses the shared initiative referendum (RIP), with which the unions and left-wing parties want to press the opinion of the citizenry on the future of the public pension system in France.

This procedure has never prospered since it was introduced into the Constitution in 2008 and the objective of the left is, ultimately, to protect by law that the retirement age cannot be modified to delay it beyond 62 years.

In the event that the magistrates support the initiative, a period for collecting signatures will be opened. A tenth of the voters -just under 4.9 million French- must support the calling of a referendum within a maximum period of nine months.