As the start of the parliamentary term approaches, the MoDem is putting forward its first proposals by pressing the government to listen to its proposals on the budget and the housing crisis, and by very publicly advising against the idea of ​​a 49.3 on immigration.

“We don't want to break everything but I think our proposals deserve attention from the Minister of the Budget,” said Jean-Paul Mattei, president of the MoDem group in the Assembly, on Monday. At his side Thomas Cazenave smiles, as does the audience.

The tone between the minister and the deputy member of the presidential majority is relaxed, but the message has been sent. “We also play politics a little,” smiles Mr. Mattei.

One month before the budgetary marathon, the MoDem invited the minister to its parliamentary days in Vienna to find points of agreement on the state budget, which seems promised this year again at 49.3, and therefore to arbitrations of the government on the amendments in fine.

The 32 proposals, kept secret, "will all be examined by the Bercy services", assures the minister, promising an "offensive" budget, without forgetting to recall the need to "reduce public deficits".

The MoDem, ally of the presidential Renaissance party in the relative majority in the Assembly, promises once again to support the government in an inevitably intense parliamentary year, but intends to win arbitrations for more "social justice" and fight against the crisis of accommodation.

“We think that there is a difference between the profits which remain in the company and those which leave the company,” Mr. Mattei still insists, a year after having fought against the government's advice for a taxation of superdividends.

On the tax side, the group could propose this year to review the income tax scale and possible indexation to inflation, for a certain average income bracket.

For housing, according to parliamentary sources, the MoDem will notably put on the table a real estate investor status, proposals to promote long-term rental to the detriment of short rentals (Airbnb type), or even mechanisms to encourage return to the vacant housing market.

The group should also propose maintaining the zero-interest loan system, given the current market situation.

While waiting for Elisabeth Borne on Tuesday, another member of the government made the trip on Monday: Gérald Darmanin.

Arriving at dessert time, the Minister of the Interior conscientiously shakes all hands before going to debate with the centrist senator Philippe Bonnecarrère, the director of the French Office of Immigration and Integration (Ofii) Didier Leschi and the general director of France Terre d'Asile Delphine Rouilleault.

Engaged in tense negotiations with the right, opposed to the measure of regularization of undocumented immigrants working in professions in tension with the immigration bill, the minister renews his attachment to the principle: "without Moroccan seasonal workers a part of French agriculture does not work anymore".

A welcome statement for François Bayrou, defender of this measure, who came to listen to Gérald Darmanin who, like him, is believed to have presidential ambitions for 2027.

At the end of the debate, the boss of the MoDem did not fail to remind journalists that he is not in favor of using 49.3 to get the text out of the parliamentary rut.

“On this immigration text, if the agreement is not there, we take note of it and we will continue to live anyway,” he pleads.

But a failure of this text would be much more detrimental to Gérald Darmanin, who mentions avenues of compromise by passing part of the measures via a circular, or by extending the duration necessary to claim regularization.

“Once the senatorial elections are over, I think we will find the path to collective intelligence,” assures the minister, also pressed by the left wing of the majority to keep these regulations in a forum co-signed by deputies from the left and the majority , including MoDem elected officials.

11/09/2023 21:08:19 -         Chenevelles (France) (AFP) -         © 2023 AFP