Macron vows tax relief for workers, pensioners
PARIS — President Emmanuel Macron broke his silence Monday on the exceptional protests shaking France and his presidency, promising broad tax relief for struggling workers and pensioners — and acknowledging his own responsibility in fueling the nation’s anger.
Macron pleaded during a brief televised address for a return to calm after almost four weeks of protests that started in neglected provinces to oppose fuel tax increases and progressed to rioting in Paris.
“We are at a historic moment for our country,” the French leader said from the capital’s presidential Elysee Palace. “We will not resume the normal course of our lives” after all that has happened.
Protesters spent days demanding that Macron speak publicly about their concerns, but it’s unclear whether the responses he offered will be enough to quell the dissatisfaction. Some protest representatives have said more demonstrations will be held Saturday, following the ones in Paris that turned violent during the previous two weekends.
Macron declared an “economic and social state of emergency,” ordering the government and parliament to take immediate steps to change tax rules and other policies that hit the wallets of working class French people.
He responded to several of the protesters’ demands, promising measures that included:
■ A government-funded 100-euro (about $114) increase in the minimum wage starting at the beginning of the new year.
■ The abolition of taxes on overtime pay in 2019.
■ Asking profit-making companies
to give workers tax-free year-end bonuses.
■ Slashing a tax hike on small pensions, acknowledging it was “unjust.”
“I take my share of responsibility” for the anger gripping France,” Macron said, an unusual admission for a president accused of being out-of-touch. “I might have hurt people with my words.”
However, the centrist leader insisted that the protesters’ “malaise” is as old as he is — 40 years — and coincides with France struggling in recent decades to keep up with globalization.
He denounced the protest-associated violence that led to hundreds of injuries, more than 1,000 arrests and the ransacking of stores in some of Paris’ richest neighborhoods.
Authorities will show “no indulgence” to those behind the vandalism and rioting, Macron said, adding that “no anger justifies” attacking police or looting stores.
The president’s long silence since the first protests last month aggravated that anger. Many protesters hoped only to hear one thing Monday from Macron — “I quit.”
He showed no signs of giving in. Instead, he defended his political independence and described his devotion to serving France. No French presidential or parliamentary elections are scheduled until 2022.
Graffiti scrawled throughout the French capital singles Macron out for criticism, reflecting a national sense that the former banker is arrogant and removed from public concerns.
But he has appeared to be determined to continue trying to make the French economy more competitive globally.