Consultations on pensions: Force Ouvrière already slams the door

ByEditor

Feb 27, 2025

Consultations on pensions: Force Ouvrière already slams the door

Consultations on pensions will be without workers’ force (FO). The union announced on Thursday at midday that he was leaving the table, a few minutes after the start of the meeting between social partners who start three months of difficult negotiations on the reform of pension of 2023 today.

“For us it’s over. We will not participate in this masquerade where we want to make us say that indeed the only solution, it is to extend the working hours for employees in this country, “launched the negotiator of FO Michel Beaugas at the end of the meeting.

While the unions are asking for the repeal of recovery at 64 years of the starting age, François Bayrou sent the leaders of employers’ organizations on Wednesday evening a letter asking them to “restore the financial balance of our pension system on a nearby horizon” with a “objective in the year 2030”.

The Court of Auditors evaluated last week, in a report which must serve as the basis for discussions, that the deficit of the pension system should reach 6.6 billion euros in 2025, and “stabilize” until 2030 before widening more. The obligation to find additional savings will not facilitate the task of the “permanent joint delegation”, which met from 2 p.m. in premises of the Prime Minister’s services.

Criticized configuration

This first session was to start with a “return” on the report of the Court of Auditors, to which the CGT notably asked to quantify the cost of a return of the departure age at 62 years. According to a letter addressed to the participants by the host of the debates Jean-Jacques Marette, the negotiators will then have to establish their “work program” for the next three months.

Force Ouvrière criticized the configuration of the consultations, which bringing together the five unions (CFDT, CGT, FO, CFE-CGC and CFTC) and the three employers’ organizations (MEDEF, CPME, U2P) representative at the interprofessional level, but also the FNSEA (Agriculture) and the UNSA union. FO said that he does not see why the UNSA and the FNSEA were invited and not in solidarity, the FSU (public service) or the UDES (employers of the social and solidarity economy).

Michel Beaugas had also displayed his skepticism on the chances of success of the consultation. “On pensions, frankly, if there is no abrogation, I do not see how we can start to discuss,” he asked himself.