The decision to pass the pension reform without a vote on the text is making headlines in major British, Spanish, German, Belgian, Italian and American newspapers. Their reading of the French situation is at least pessimistic.
“64 is not enough”: The sign held up by the rebellious MPs in the hemicycle was featured on the front page of many foreign newspapers
on Friday, March 17th, from the American New York Times to the Spanish El PaÃs and the British Daily Telegraph and Belgian newspaper Le Soir. The latter headlined it as “a power play” in reference to the use of Article 49.3 of the Constitution to pass the pension reform without a vote in the National Assembly.
The Guardian across the Channel is referring to a “power play” while Le Temps de Geneve speaks bluntly of the “nuclear button of Article 49.3”. According to the Swiss newspaper, “democratic violence is tolerated in budgetary texts, but not on such a sensitive and important issue for the French as pension reform.” The Tageszeitung, for its part, calls it a “reform imposed with a club”. The German newspaper wonders why in France “a word from the executive rather than a vote in proper form in Parliament is enough to pass, legally, a bill that the population clearly rejects”.
Macron uses special powers to force through plan to raise pension age https://t.co/1RbB4ta7vr
— The Guardian (@guardian) March 17, 2023