France politics: Macron sets 100-day target to relaunch second mandate
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Transcript
00:00 "We have made commitments to the French people.
00:03 We respect them.
00:04 We rely on a solid track record and solid results.
00:08 The unemployment rate is down by three points compared to the end of 2016.
00:14 1.7 million jobs have been created.
00:17 And we have lowered the tax for the companies as well as for households.
00:23 Whilst many tried to bring us to a standstill and bring blockages, the pace of reforms has
00:27 not slowed down."
00:30 That comes as Bourne's boss, the embattled President Emmanuel Macron, is emerging from
00:35 months of protests against him and is moved to raise the retirement age in France from
00:40 62 to 64.
00:41 To take this all apart with me now, let's bring in Andrew Smith in London.
00:46 Andrew, thanks for speaking to us as always.
00:48 What do you think we'll see in these 100 days of apaisement, of peacemaking efforts that
00:53 the Prime Minister was announcing today?
00:55 Well, he's going to hope that it's a little more successful than a Napoleonic 100 days.
01:00 This is an attempt at a relaunch which is designed to recognise where there have been
01:06 problems, designed to show that the presidency is listening and to inject some energy into
01:12 what right now seems to be really an administration which has stalled.
01:17 It won its panic victory on pension reform, but the worry is that it has burnt so many
01:21 bridges in doing so, that it has raised so much public anger, that it has alienated so
01:26 many potential supporters within Parliament and the Assembly and beyond, that really it
01:32 will struggle to pass any further reforms.
01:35 So this is a big relaunch.
01:37 There are four pillars to the government's strategy on work, ecological transition, public
01:42 services and justice and order.
01:45 But importantly, one of the things we saw, really the headlines of the Prime Minister
01:49 Sven Borg's speech earlier today, was really the postponement of the big reform around
01:56 the immigration bill.
01:57 And I think that is a symptom of just how weakened the presidency is at the moment.
02:02 100 days to turn around the presidency, to relaunch the second mandate, but really difficult
02:08 to see where some of that dynamism is going to come from, I think.
02:11 And the protests against Macron and his government are calmer, but they are still there.
02:15 We saw a lot of people out banging pots and pans yesterday.
02:19 Tell us a bit more about how the protest movement's evolving.
02:22 Yeah, I think it's an interesting one.
02:25 Again, we're seeing another big symbol of protest.
02:28 We know, of course, we saw early on in Emmanuel Macron's first mandate, there was the big
02:33 yellow vest movement.
02:35 And that took an everyday symbol, something everyone was forced to carry in their cars.
02:40 It grew from a motoring protest into something much more wild and uncontrollable, but also
02:45 kind of all-encompassing.
02:46 Actually, this is something where we can see a similar kind of crystallization of protest
02:50 around an everyday household object, something that people are drawing from their homes,
02:55 everyday things that they bang, disrupt, create noise because they want to be heard.
03:00 This seems like a dialogue of the deaf, where really the presidency is not listening.
03:04 We see the government is, the majority is not really trying to carry favor, but instead
03:09 forcing through its measures with these constitutional, sure, but really quite anti-democratic measures,
03:16 like of course the very famous 49.3, which enabled them really not to try and build support
03:22 for their reforms, but instead just to force it through.
03:25 So I think this is something which crystallizes once again popular dissatisfaction.
03:30 Emmanuel Macron has record low levels in his popular support.
03:35 And this is really the reason for this need to appease and to relaunch the second mandate.
03:42 So I think it is quite important.
03:44 There really have been mixed messages coming from government.
03:47 On the one hand, we can see this idea with Elizabeth Warren's speech today.
03:51 There's an attempt to listen and to show awareness.
03:53 But we've also seen spokesmen like Gabriel Attal, of course, went down to the ERO where
03:58 Emmanuel Macron had his appearance earlier on in the week.
04:02 And we saw really this idea where he was saying, you know, the people of France who are working
04:07 don't have time to come out and protest in the afternoon on a weekday.
04:10 Now, that's not something which is conciliatory.
04:14 That's not something which is bringing people along with them.
04:16 Emmanuel Macron, when he says, you know, pots and pans won't build France's future, that's
04:21 not something which recognizes public anger, but instead tries to dismiss it as the rabble,
04:26 as a noisy minority.
04:28 And that's where I think that disconnect comes from.
04:30 So really quite challenging to see a way around and how they can show an openness to responding
04:35 to people's quite legitimate concerns about the substance and the method of the government's
04:40 program.
04:41 So just a few days from now, next Monday is May 1st, which is traditionally a big day
04:46 of marches, strikes, rallies here in France.
04:49 It is a bank holiday, so people can turn out.
04:52 Do you think that people are going to turn out again against Macron?
04:55 Or do you feel like that marching movement is starting to wane?
04:59 Well, as we saw with the big Inter-Saint-Denis, the big inter-union movement against the pension
05:04 reform, it really drew supporters from right across the union landscape.
05:09 The CGT and CFDT and Forces Ouvrières, of course, very key institutions which helped
05:14 organize this.
05:15 But we saw with those big marches, it moved beyond the unions themselves from membership
05:19 into something that was a social movement, drawing in much broader sort of constituencies
05:24 of people really quite frustrated with government policy.
05:27 Now, as you say, we have this kind of focal movement.
05:30 We have the unions mobilizing and agitating to bring people out onto the street to say
05:35 that the 1st of May represents an opportunity and in fact an invitation for the government
05:40 really to listen to what the people are saying.
05:43 I think it will be a very lively day on the streets.
05:46 I think it will likely come down to hopefully some controlled policing.
05:50 We've seen in the past some extremely heavy-handed policing coming from the CRS and the French
05:57 forces of order.
05:58 And I think really this is the hope that if it is a lively day, if there is a lot of movement,
06:03 a lot of protest, a lot of legitimate representations of popular anger with the current government's
06:09 program and its method of governance, that this will be met really in a measured and
06:15 appropriate way by the forces of order.
06:18 We're calling for calm policing as much as calm protest as well.
06:21 And I think that's an important emphasis on this.
06:23 Andrew, thanks so much for taking the time to speak to us as always.
06:26 Thank you.
06:27 Thank you.
06:27 Thank you.