The elected opposition cannot take it any longer. Since the start of the Covid-19 crisis, the government has played “we take care of everything, you do not take care of anything” with Parliament. “Macronie already had this contempt and sectarianism in it, but with the pandemic, it has taken on unheard-of proportions”, alarms André Chassaigne (PCF). The president of the GDR group (Democratic and Republican Left in the Assembly) is not the only one. Even the right cannot stand it any longer. “The crisis does not allow everything. We said yes to the state of health emergency, but no to the state of parliamentary emergency ”, worries the LR vice-president of the National Assembly, Annie Genevard. “Since March 2020, I have at no time had the impression of being associated with crisis management and of having been able to participate in decision-making,” chokes LR MP Sébastien Huyghe.
“Precipitation and improvisation”
Containment? Deconfinement? Wearing a mask? The testing strategy? Curfew ? Reconfinement? The vaccination plan? “Everything happens at the last moment, in haste and improvisation. Most of the time, there is not even a debate or a vote. Macron or Castex address the French directly by stepping over the Assembly. And when there is debate and vote, it is only for the form, because the texts are already tied up without being able to touch them, “laments the rebellious deputy of France Éric Coquerel.
At each major stage of the device to curb the circulation of the virus, parliamentarians had to watch the trains go by. “The executive only turns to us during compulsory passages, almost reluctantly, and often to ask for powers which then allow it to do without Parliament,” adds the rebellious. This is the case with the state of health emergency, extended until 1er June, followed by a transitional regime maintaining some of its prerogatives until the end of 2021.
Power, in the absence of strategy …
“Such a state of emergency, so confiscatory of the rights of Parliament and over such a long period, is not admissible. Without any review clause, it would be unique in Europe! »Asserts the president of the LR group, Damien Abad, who seeks to make the executive listen to reason. “You can’t sign a blank check until December. Parliament is not a doormat. We need a clear contract and continuous monitoring of government action. The proposals of deputies of all stripes and local elected representatives must also be heard, ”adds Philippe Gosselin, member of the same group.
Many deputies LaREM have fallen from the sky and see no problem in transferring all powers to the Elysee. Sebastian Huyghe LR deputy
Ulcerated from one end of the Chamber to the other, the opposition deputies nevertheless face the soft underbelly of an ultra-disciplined majority. “The new world is the junction of all that was worst in the old. Many LaREM deputies have fallen from the sky and see no problem in transferring all powers to the Élysée ”, regrets Sébastien Huyghe, who recalls the constitutional principle according to which any imperative mandate is void. “So the mandate of several elected Macronists is null, because they vote as the president tells them to vote. “
Parliament “rump”
In the end, the Assembly turns into a “recording chamber”, or even a “rump” Parliament, annoys Boris Vallaud. “We can warn them, warn them, ask them to anticipate, offer them solutions on masks, tests and vaccines even before hiccups and fiascos, they do not listen,” continues the elected. PS.
“If the government still had good results… But it doesn’t. Crisis management is catastrophic. By dint of being vertical, it deprives itself of all the collective intelligence, of all the know-how of local elected representatives and territories, ”laments François-Michel Lambert (ex-LaREM). At a time when Macronie calls private management firms like McKinsey to the rescue, and draws lots for 35 citizens to follow the vaccination campaign, the parliamentarian from the Libertés et Territoires (LT) group invites the rebuilding of “a state administration, to trust Parliament and communities ”. The reverse of the start-up nation, in short. “We do not protect ourselves better from a pandemic by privatizing all-out, by despising local and national elected officials, by locking up in the Defense Council and by restricting the rule of law, quite the contrary,” Tance Éric Coquerel .
It remains to be seen whether Emmanuel Macron will listen to reason or will always sink further into his isolation. “Why does he need to concentrate all the powers so much?” Because he has no strategy. So he asks for maximum powers, to adapt from day to day, believing that he will be able to overcome the ordeal, ”observes Sébastien Huyghe. Parliamentarians and local elected officials call on it to co-develop as much as possible: it is more democratic and… more efficient.
