New crash-test in sight for Macronie: the long-awaited bill for purchasing power arrives this Monday, July 18 in the hemicycle of the National Assembly. Fuel discount, tariff shield, food voucher… The government is defending its measures to respond to the difficulties of the middle classes and the poorest in the face of inflation. Opposite groups are ready to do battle, with strategies and proposals that diverge. Overview.
The 62 LR deputies have priorities and «red lines», which will condition their positioning in fine. At the beginning of July, their leader Olivier Marleix wrote to Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne, calling for the «lowering of the price of fuel to 1.5 euros per liter», the «revaluation of work and not only social minima» and again the «cancellation of the increase in the CSG on all retirees».
On fuel, the Minister of the Economy Bruno Le Maire quantified such a drop at 50 billion euros, judging it «not responsible».
In committee, deputy Stéphane Viry saw in the government project an attempt to «extinguish a fire caused by bad decisions». He regretted in particular with the establishment of checks, as on food, «wobbly and temporary measures».
Marine Le Pen, who has focused her presidential campaign on purchasing power, has repeated several times that she wants the text «to be voted on» because it is «urgent» for the French. The leader of the 89 RN deputies nevertheless estimated that it «will most certainly be imperfect because it is not we who built it».
In the RN, we notably defend a reduction in VAT to 5.5% on fuels and basic necessities. In committee, his colleague Laure Lavalette shelled all his «shortcomings», on wages, gasoline or even «suffocating banking practices»… «The French, know it, do not want alms», has she also launched, denouncing a «social regression» with «the policy of the check», and pleading for «a real start». But the RN group «will vote for anything that brings in purchasing power while saying it’s zero or almost nothing,» said one of its elected officials.
For the LFI, PS, ecologists and PCF, strong of 151 deputies, «the account is not there». They have prepared their own «social emergency» text with an increase in the minimum wage to 1,500 euros, a «real thaw» of the civil servants’ index point (10%, where the government announced 3.5%) or another «price blocking», as many measures as they will carry in the hemicycle.
The government’s version is «very, very far from living up to what the French expect», according to LFI leader Mathilde Panot, her colleague François Ruffin castigating «a law where it is a question of distributing crumbs because we arrive after an electoral sequence».
The First Secretary of the PS Olivier Faure also mentioned a text of «lesser loss» rather than purchasing power, while he «does not make the mesh» for Sébastien Jumel (PCF).
As for environmentalists, they also have in their sights measures that they consider «climaticides», such as «the reopening of coal-fired power stations», via the increase in authorized emissions, or the floating LNG terminal project in Le Havre.
The 16 deputies of the composite Liot group do not necessarily vote with one voice. «If we obtain some satisfaction, we would move towards a vote for», nevertheless affirmed its co-president Bertrand Pancher, citing in particular the need to «give the means to the communities» to find counterparts to the increase in social minima. And his colleague Christophe Naegelen to observe that «in a boxing fight, it’s round after round»…