Negotiations concerning the abolition of two national holidays in France will have to be concluded no later than September 30, said Prime Minister François Bayrou, according to an article in the newspaper Les Echoswhile the executive seeks to reduce its repeated budgetary deficits.
François Bayrou, long -standing supporter of budgetary rigor, whose minority government is evolving on a narrow political line, had formulated this shock proposal in July. He then presented a series of deficit reduction measures valued at 43.8 billion euros ($ 51 billion) for next year, in order to reduce the country’s debt.
The Prime Minister asked the various stakeholders, including unions, government representatives and other actors, to let him know before September 1 if they wish to initiate open negotiations, according to an internal document cited by Les Echos But not verified by Reuters.
As part of his recent budgetary proposal, Bayrou said it wanted to remove the holidays on Easter Monday and the May 8 victory festival, arousing an outcry both on the left and the far right of the political spectrum.
Les Echos Specifies that the letter also mentions that the choice of public holidays concerned could be the subject of discussions.
The main unions-CFDT, CGT, FO, CFE-CGC and CFTC-signed a joint declaration on Saturday denouncing the Bayrou budget proposal and announced that they would meet on September 1 to decide how they intend to organize in the face of this measure.
The Prime Minister’s office did not immediately respond to a comment request.
Bayrou has already compared May to Gruyère cheese – “full of holes” – and says that reducing the number of holidays would have positive economic benefits, even if recent experience abroad and various economic studies suggest that reality could be more nuanced.
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