{"id":3468,"date":"2017-09-02T11:11:48","date_gmt":"2017-09-02T11:11:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chief-exec.com\/?p=3468"},"modified":"2017-10-17T11:24:29","modified_gmt":"2017-10-17T11:24:29","slug":"marcon-returns-to-reform","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chief-exec.com\/?p=3468","title":{"rendered":"Macron returns to reform"},"content":{"rendered":"

C\u2019est la rentr\u00e9e. It is the time when France sees the annual migration of its people returning from rural or maritime retreats to the great conurbations. John Egan<\/em> describes a sense that times are changing \u2013 in France and Europe.<\/span><\/h4>\n

France\u2019s president Emmanuel Macron has made his rentr\u00e9e with energy and aplomb. His goals, and those of his parliamentary majority led by Prime Minister \u00c9douard Philippe, are no less than a total structural transformation of French society.<\/p>\n

It will be \u201cr\u00e9volution copernicienne\u201d <\/em>President Macron has promised.<\/p>\n

At its centre, this revolution has a vision of a Europe in which social protections are tightly interwoven into the fabric of a free market economy. It will be a Europe that protects its citizens and, for this to happen, Brexit is more an opportunity than a threat.<\/p>\n

The first domestic manifestation of the new regime is a wide-ranging revision of French labour laws<\/a> \u2013 fundamentally freeing up the labour market, particularly for small and medium enterprises. The aim is to reduce unemployment from the 9 per cent level above which it has stubbornly remained, despite all the policies of the previous president, Fran\u00e7ois Hollande, to address this issue as his number one priority.<\/p>\n

Labour reform has captured this week\u2019s headlines, but a visit to Luxembourg where Macron met with Prime Minister Xavier Bettel and Prime Minister Charles Michel of Belgium, speaks louder as an indication of what may follow.<\/p>\n

Bettel and Michel are among a new generation of pro-Europe leaders that Macron wishes to galvanise to pick up the mantle of the European Union (EU) project founders and deliver reforms on a grand scale, starting with a profound political and economic integration of the eurozone \u2013 something that has long been resisted by London.<\/p>\n

For Macron, the leaders of the EU have a choice \u2013 to manage the disintegration of the Union through long discussions on Brexit and perhaps with other departing countries, or to be part of a political generation that rebuilds Europe. It is either a race to the bottom in terms of social protection through unfettered competition between nations or a harmonisation of social and fiscal practices across Europe.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe eurozone over the last five years has never dared to come together as an entity. Why? It was thought that this would have angered the United Kingdom and Poland. Have they thanked us? Are they any more attached to Europe?,\u201d asked Macron. The rhetoric weighs heavily on the Brexit outcomes and recent conflict between Warsaw and Brussels<\/a> over the independence of Poland\u2019s judiciary.<\/p>\n

Better integration across Europe in the social, fiscal and security spheres is where the new initiative is heading. Attacking \u201csocial dumping\u201d by reforming EU \u201cPosted Work<\/a>\u201d legislation, harmonisation of tax and co-ordination of the controls of European borders are some of the initial steps. Macron has proposed a dozen in total to relaunch the economic and monetary union through the deep integration of the eurozone.<\/p>\n

It is not expected that 27 member states can move together. Europe will advance at varying speeds and the eurozone should be in the vanguard.<\/p>\n

Of course, it is essential to have Germany on board, whatever the outcome of the federal elections in three weeks\u2019 time. Initial signs are positive, though Macron has had to prove his euro-credentials with plans to bring the French budget deficit to below 3 per cent of GDP.\u00a0 This task is made all the more painful by the need to fill an \u20ac8 billion hole discovered in the French national accounts in June – requiring a change of tack that has lost Macron 24 percentage points in his approval ratings as well as the leader of his armed forces.<\/p>\n

One might even interpret Macron\u2019s domestic policies as moves to make France better prepared for a closer European integration. The change to the labour laws, for example, moves the country closer to the normal practices of neighbouring economies. Next on the domestic list for reform are unemployment benefits, security and terrorism, access to higher education and housing and public finances.<\/p>\n

The transformation of a retirement and pensions system that Macron has described as complex and unjust promises to be particularly thorny when it is introduced next year.<\/p>\n

Progress in many of these domestic areas may be facilitated by Macron\u2019s ambition for Europe. His longer term strategy may be to recognise this synergy and orchestrate effective European integration as a means to achieve his domestic aims of improving the French economy and the security of his citizens as part of a greater Europe.<\/p>\n

The stakes are high. By constructing a win-win outcome for Europe and its nations, the European project will be delivered and many will be proud to be part of the European family. Failure is likely to result in a profound anti-Europe backlash.<\/p>\n

In relation to all of this, Brexit is a sideshow. It cannot be expected that the UK will receive any special treatment unless it can contribute positively to Europe\u2019s future.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Headline Photo Credit: \u00c9lys\u00e9e Palace<\/h6>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

C\u2019est la rentr\u00e9e. It is the time when France sees the annual migration of its people returning from rural or maritime retreats to the great conurbations. John Egan describes a sense that…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":3469,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,14,115],"tags":[153,50,99,154,23],"class_list":["post-3468","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-beyond-brexit","category-chief-exec-eu","category-featured-news","tag-belgium","tag-european-union","tag-france","tag-luxembourg","tag-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chief-exec.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3468","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chief-exec.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chief-exec.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chief-exec.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chief-exec.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3468"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/chief-exec.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3468\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3495,"href":"https:\/\/chief-exec.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3468\/revisions\/3495"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chief-exec.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3469"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chief-exec.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3468"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chief-exec.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3468"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chief-exec.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3468"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}