the Constitutional Council will make its decisions on April 14

The Constitutional Council will make its decisions on the controversial pension reform on Friday April 14, “at the end of the day”, he announced Wednesday March 29 in a press release.

The Elders will render “two decisions”: one on the constitutionality of the bill adopted in Parliament after an appeal to 49.3, and the other on the admissibility of the request for a referendum of shared initiative (RIP) launched by the left .

The Prime Minister, Elisabeth Borne, had directly seized the Constitutional Council on March 21 for an examination of the text which pushes back the legal age of departure to 64 years. Left-wing deputies and those of the RN each filed appeals to challenge the reform, and left-wing senators did the same.

Validation or censorship

The Constitutional Council will receive deputies from the left for a hearing on Tuesday April 4 at 2.30 p.m., according to parliamentary sources. The RN group did not ask to be received, considering that its arguments were already included in its referral.

Opposition parliamentarians denounce in particular the use of an amending budget for Social Security and the review deadlines imposed by Article 47.1 of the Constitution. They believe that the “urgent” procedure has been “hijacked”.

These parliamentarians also raise the issue of the senior index in companies, a “legislative rider” which would have no place in a budget text in their eyes. On April 14, the Elders can decide to validate the whole text or to censor all or part of it.

Shared initiative referendum

They must also decide on another procedure initiated by the left: the request for a referendum of shared initiative, a complex process which has never succeeded so far. About 250 opposition parliamentarians propose to submit to a referendum the fact that the legal retirement age “cannot be set beyond sixty-two years”.

The Council must verify its admissibility, by looking at whether the consultation relates to the areas of “the organization of public powers, reforms relating to economic, social or environmental policy and the public services which contribute to them”.

Then could open the collection of citizen signatures. The quota to be reached corresponds to one tenth of the voters, or around 4.87 million signatures, within nine months, to open the way to a referendum.

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