Haunted by ‘yellow vests’, Macron looks to defuse fuel price anger

Almost three years since the start of “yellow vest” protests that rocked his presidency, Emmanuel Macron is desperate to defuse growing anger in France about record fuel prices.

Like all countries across the world, France has been hit by a surge in oil and gas prices since the middle of the year caused by a spike in global demand and supply shortages.

But Macron has particular reason to worry: the violent antigovernment protests of 2018 by low-income voters in florescent yellow safety vests were sparked by anger over rising fuel prices and attempts to tax heavily polluting vehicles.

In six months’ time, the 43-year-old head of state is also set to seek a second term — and was hoping to build his campaign around his record on job creation and tax cuts.

“Every time there’s a concern about people’s livelihoods, we’ve responded,” Aurore Berge, the head of Macron’s party in parliament, claimed on Franceinfo radio on Thursday.

“We obviously want to protect French people, above all those people who work hard and are taking the full force of these price rises,” government spokesman Gabriel Attal told journalists on Wednesday.

“Work is under way and measures will be announced in the next few days,” he added.

Last weekend, small protests were held in some rural areas and small towns — the heartland of “yellow vest” discontent — suggesting the first rumblings of dissent over recent rises.

Average diesel prices hit an alltime record last week of 1.5583 euros ($1.8152) a litre, while petrol was at nearly a 10-year high at 1.6567 euros a litre, slightly below the all-time record reached in April 2012, official data shows.

The price of diesel has risen 29 per cent over the last year — 7 per cent just in the last month — while the cheapest unleaded petrol is up 25 per cent on the year and 5 per cent in the last month, according to the website carbu.com.

POLL CALCULATIONS

Having already announced price controls for natural gas and pressured retailers to cut their profit margins, two other ideas are now under discussion.

The first proposal is a general cut to taxes on diesel and petrol, which make up more than half of the price paid by consumers at the pump.

This has the advantage of being simple and quick to implement.

But it is also costly to the treasury — reducing tax by one cent causes a loss of 500 million euros — at a time when the government is seeking to bring order to its books after an unprecedented spending splurge during the Covid pandemic.

Economy Minister Bruno Le Maire called a tax cut “unfair,” because it benefits rich and poor alike and “is a subsidy for fossil fuels, which is exactly what we want to avoid.”

The second, increasingly favoured solution is to hand out targeted subsidies to low-income consumers for whom energy costs make up a large proportion of their expenditure.

The government already distributes subsidies in the form of an “energy cheque” to 5.8 million poor households — and this system could be enlarged.

But as Environment Minister Barbara Pompili pointed out on Monday, “We don’t have a database of people who need their car to go to work for example.”

For Macron, who remains the favourite for next April’s election, the response to the energy crunch could be vital ahead of an election in which his far-right opponents are already campaigning on immigration, Islam and French identity.

Eight out of 10 households have a vehicle, according to official statistics.

IN SIX MONTHS’ TIME, THE FRENCH PRESIDENT IS ALSO SET TO SEEK A SECOND TERM — AND WAS HOPING TO BUILD HIS CAMPAIGN AROUND HIS RECORD ON JOB CREATION AND TAX CUTS