Macron has no regrets after forcing through bill to raise pension age, insist aides

EMMANUEL MACRON “regrets nothing” after short-circuiting parliament to ram through a deeply unpopular pension reform, his aides have said, as protests outside parliament were banned amid fears of a new “yellow vest” movement.

Demonstrations took place in cities across France yesterday, while a further rally was slated in Paris, refinery workers continued to picket and railway workers went on strike.

However, crowds were banned from gathering at the capital’s Place de la Concorde, across the Seine river from parliament, after protests the two previous nights derailed into violence.

Paris police said the ban was “due to serious risks of disturbances to public order”. The unrest over the last three days is reminiscent of the Yellow Vest protests which erupted in late 2018 over high fuel prices, and which forced Macron into a partial about-turn on a carbon tax.

Unions, united in coordinating their protests, called for a ninth strike day next Thursday, but many expressed fears they could lose control of the protests as more radical demonstrators set the tone. One MP from Mr Macron’s Renaissance group told Le Parisien: “We were sitting on a powder keg and we’ve just lit the fuse.” The political fallout risks turning the French president into a lame duck, say commentators.

His minority government this week failed to cobble together enough support to put his flagship manifesto bill of raising the retirement age from 62 to 64 to a vote, forcing him to push it through without one. It now faces the prospect of a no-confidence vote tomorrow, although it is considered unlikely to pass. Yet the message from the Elysée yesterday was totally unrepentant, according to Le Monde.

The president “has no scruples and no regrets”, aides told France’s newspaper of record. He didn’t want to use article 49.3 which bypasses a parliamentary vote, they said, but had “no choice”.

David Amiel, MP and former Elysée advisor, said: “He is perfectly conscious that the decision is a Pyrrhic victory.” He chose the interests of the country over his own political interests.”

Elsewhere in the French capital yesterday, a group of students and activists from the “Revolution Permanente” collective briefly invaded the Forum des Halles shopping mall, calling for a general strike and shouting “Paris stand up, rise up”, videos on social media showed.