Borne supremacy: Can Macron’s astute PM solve France’s pensions crisis?

Cakeism – gâteauisme – has crossed the Channel. A new poll, published this week, suggests that 53 per cent of voters believe pension reform, as proposed by President Macron, has to be a priority for the French government. At the same time, and in the same poll, 40 per cent of respondents said the retirement age should actually come down, while 25 per cent favoured leaving it at 62. Less than a third of those polled were ready to accept an increase.  

It is all of a piece. Inconsistency is the only certainty in contemporary French politics. Macron was first elected in 2017 on a promise to enact pension reform. In fact, he won in a landslide. But as soon as he put forward the necessary legislation, France took to the streets. First came the gilets-jaunes – the provincial working class – whose objection to a rise in the price of diesel was quickly subsumed into an assertion that early retirement, in some cases at the age of just 52, was one of the Rights of Man.   

They were followed by the trade unions and the anarchists, backed by the extremes of Right and Left. Paris became a battleground, obliging Macron to beat a hasty retreat.  

Five years and one hard-fought re-election later, he is having another go. This time, however, in acknowledgement of the fact that he has lost his majority in parliament, he has opted to leave the heavy lifting to his prime minister, Elisabeth Borne. It may just be the best decision he has made since entering the Élysée.  

Borne, aged 61, is widely respected. She is a politician only in the sense that she has spent her entire working life in the corridors of power, first as a fonctionnaire (rising to be Prefect of the department of Vienne and of the region of Poitou-Charente), then head of the Greater Paris public transport network. Having caught the eye of several Socialist ministers, she became a key government adviser, appearing on the radar of Emmanuel Macron just as his plans to overturn the established order were taking shape.  

During Macron’s first term as President, Borne served successively as minister for transport, minister for the environment and climate change and minister for labour and employment law, acquiring a reputation for getting things done without fuss.  

Macron in the meantime had worn his way through two prime ministers – Edouard Philippe and Jean Castex. Philippe was competent, but unexciting, and suffered from having ambitions of his own. Castex, a dealmaker with no axe to grind, was drafted in to enforce the government line on Covid (which he did). But French presidents entering their second term invariably delegate more and, with a view to their legacy, tend to look outward, to the wider world. Casting around for someone with the requisite experience who could be relied on to do the hard work without seeking to outshine her boss, Macron fastened on Borne, whose motto, if she had one, was Get it right, but get it done.  

Six months on, at the start of what promise to be the most vital 12 months of Macron’s mandate, it is Borne who is digging in. Part Jewish, with a Polish father and a French mother, the current PM might be thought of as either dour or serious – probably both. There is a hint of Margaret Thatcher about her. She reads everything that crosses her desk and expects her ministers – several of whom regard themselves as at least her equal – to keep on top of their briefs.  

Meetings of the Cabinet are usually presided over by Macron, but in-between times it is Borne who keeps everybody in line, reminding them that politics is not about show, but about performance.  

This week, she has kept France’s so-called social partners – union bosses and employers’ representatives – waiting in turn to be interrogated about what they will and won’t accept when it comes to pension reform. It is tempting to think of them sitting on chairs outside the headmistress’s office, but in fact Borne has been clear that she is keen above all to come up with a solution that can be adopted by all sides.  

She has the advantage of heading an administration under which, despite Ukraine and the energy crisis, unemployment has fallen and inflation has been held at 6 per cent. The nuclear scare – the fear that France’s 54 atomic reactors were about to run out of steam – has been seen off, at last for now, and economic growth, though minimal, is on an upwards trajectory. How many other European prime ministers can claim as much?  

On pension reform, Borne told journalists at the end of this week’s first round of talks, discussions continue. “The age of 65 is not a totem. There are other solutions that can achieve our goal. We are continuing to discuss with employers’ organisations and unions … these consultations are useful … each time, we listen to the questions, the observations, the remarks.  

“We will not go after the 43 years of contributions provided for in the [existing system] in order to qualify for a full pension. When I hear people say they will have to work 47 or 48 years, they are wrong … our objective is the presentation of the reform on January 10 before a presentation to the [Cabinet] on January 23 for entry into force at the end of the summer”.  

Fighting words, yet laced with realism. Borne’s problem is that those opposed to reform – mainly the trade unions and the Left – are to date showing no signs of compromise. Not a single one of France’s 26 unions has said yes to change. If anything – egged on by Jean-Luc Mélenchon, France’s Jeremy Corbyn – they are in favour of a cut in the age at which workers can claim a state pension, from 62 to 60. And with the French at large adopting a cakeist stance on the premise that what must be done doesn’t need to be done yet, or ever, it is hard to see a way forward.  

Decades of liberally applied social protection have led the French to believe that the state exists primarily to lift from their shoulders all responsibility for their health and well-being, especially in their old age, which in their view can’t come soon enough. They expect to be cossetted. The idea that the state might go bankrupt is seen as a nonsense. Specifically, in the present context, they refuse to regard reform as a budgetary issue, but rather an attempt, after years of economic and societal hardship, to leave them at the mercy of the boss class.  

Macron when he started out saw himself as the perfect foil to this view of society. As a banker himself, with an eye always to the bottom line, he hoped to put forward an argument so logical and so persuasive that not even the Left could oppose it. Instead, he has been forced to the margins of the argument, employing only rhetoric and finger-wagging, while Elisabeth Borne, as his representative on Earth, gets on with the task of somehow coming up with an agreed package.  

Will the result be 63 instead of 65? Will the 35-hour week have to extend to 38, or even 40, in order to yield a full pension? Or will Macron drive a hardline Bill through as proof of his authority, relying on centrist allies and most of the 89 votes of the conservative Republicans to secure a majority in the Assembly?   

If the latter, expect a robust response not only from the far Right and the Extreme Left, and the unions, but from those who consider themselves heirs to the sans-culottes. Expect mass protests. Expect tear gas and riot shields. But before that, expect Elisabeth Borne to sit down with Macron over one of their weekly lunches at which she spells out for him, in detail, the consequences of going for broke. A late winter of discontent would almost certainly be accompanied by a complete breakdown of parliamentary business, leading to calls for fresh elections, which Macron could not ignore but could easily lose.  

If ever the President needed a calm and sensible voice at his side, this is the time and Elisabeth Borne is that voice. But who will speak for France?