Shaken by five months of often-violent “Yellow Vest” protests, Emmanuel Macron will announce a package of measures that could include lower taxes and the abolition of France’s elite Ecole Nationale d’Administration to quell the unrest.
THREE MONTH LONG NATIONAL DEBATE
The street rebellion erupted over planned diesel tax hikes but morphed into a broader backlash against inequality and a political elite perceived as having lost touch with the common person. Protesters clashed with police for a 23rd straight week on Saturday.
Macron’s policy response is the result of a three-month-long national debate, during which he rolled up his sleeves on a weekly basis to discuss issues from high taxes to local democracy and decaying shopping streets with local mayors, working parents, students and workers.
For Macron, whose monarchical governing style early on prompted accusations of arrogance among voters and contributed to a sharp drop in his popularity, his first news conference at the Elysee Palace will be crucial to regain lost ground with voters.
“He wants to break the image of someone who’s stubborn and who never listens to anybody,” Arnaud Mercier, an expert in political communication at the Institut Français de Presse at Assas University in Paris, told Reuters.
Macron is expected to relaunch a reform drive that started with a bang with an easing of labor regulation in the first months of his mandate but which was derailed by the protests.
The president wanted 2019 to see an overhaul of pensions – unifying into one myriad of different pension systems including deficit-ridden ones at state-owned companies and unemployment insurance. But little progress has been made on these.
Instead, Macron had to pour 10 billion euros into raising benefits for the poorest workers and halting tax rises on fuel in the face of the yellow vest protests.
“It’s also a symbol that he wants to launch the start of Act Two of his mandate,” Mercier said.