The refusal of the Insoumis Thomas Portes to apologize for a tweet against the Minister of Labor Olivier Dussopt interrupted the examination of the pension reform on Friday February 10. The deputy was, in the process, sanctioned with a 15-day exclusion from the Palais-Bourbon.
The Insoumis, girded with his tricolor scarf, was staged Thursday on the social network Twitter, his foot resting on a ball bearing the image of the Minister of Labor. After an altercation in the hemicycle about this tweet, the president of the Assembly Yaël Braun-Pivet had summoned the office of the National Assembly, the highest collegiate body, which demanded the sanction of the deputy for 15 days.
“Censorship with temporary exclusion”, the most severe disciplinary penalty for deputies, entails a ban on appearing at the Palais-Bourbon for 15 sitting days, and deprivation of half of the parliamentary allowance for two months.
boos
As Thomas Portes began to defend an amendment in the hemicycle on Friday, the presidential majority covered his remarks with boos. “Calm down colleagues, there is no ball here,” the MP told them.
“Do not be surprised, dear colleague”, Yaël Braun-Pivet then told him. “I believe that the hemicycle asks you to apologize,” she added, to the applause of the majority, the right and the far right. Demanding “impartiality” from the perch holder, the boss of the LFI group Mathilde Panot asked for a suspension of the session.
Second break
On the resumption, the reminders of the rules were linked. “We demand an apology from you. We will never let anything pass, ”said in particular the leader of the Renaissance group Aurore Bergé. “We are not on the head-cutting side”, also declared Jean-Louis Thiériot (LR). On the other side, Raquel Garrido (LFI) accused the majority of “obstructing” and “obstructing the right of amendment” of an elected official.
Thomas Portes still could not defend his amendment, and a second break was ordered by the president. “I will withdraw my tweet the day you withdraw your reform which will sacrifice thousands of people,” said Thomas Portes. “It is neither more nor less a call to murder”, launched Éric Woerth (Renaissance), about the tweet of the elected LFI.
“You may hate what we want to do, but we’re not hateful. No proper name deserves to be smeared, no face even symbolically deserves to be trampled on,” tried to calm Frédéric Descrozaille (Renaissance).
Penalty incurred
Yaël Braun-Pivet then announced the convocation of the office of the Assembly “in the face of the absence of an apology from Thomas Portes which clearly causes an uproar”. Mathilde Panot said she was in favor of it so that “we can continue on the pension reform”.
A Deputy incurs four types of “disciplinary penalties” for his behavior within the precincts of the hemicycle: simple call to order, call to order with entry in the minutes, censorship, or censorship with temporary exclusion, which is the heaviest penalty. For the two most severe penalties, the decision must be approved by a vote of the Assembly.