The CFDT did not call to demonstrate this Friday against the reform of unemployment insurance, but it has decided to join the other unions which are preparing to attack this text again before the Council of State. In their sights: the new method of calculating the daily reference wage (SJR), which determines the amount of the allowance. As of July 1 and for 1.15 million job seekers, the latter could be 17% lower than what they would have been entitled to with the current system. Deputy Secretary General of the CFDT, Marylise Léon represents the union in discussions with the Ministry of Labor.
Laurent Berger announced that the CFDT, like the CGT, Solidaires, FO and the CFE-CGC, would lodge an appeal with the Council of State against the reform of unemployment insurance. On what grounds ?
The appeal will relate to the effects and principles of the reform. On the one hand, we consider that there is still, despite the introduction of a floor to limit the effects of the new method of calculating the SJR, an inequality of treatment between job seekers. On the other hand, we will raise the fact that this reform targets the most precarious, by implying that job seekers have a part of the responsibility in the fact that they take short contracts. It is a principle with which we strongly disagree.
The Minister of Labor says for her part that the reform aims to restore equity between certain workers, such as those who work part-time every day and those who work every other day and who, according to her, would receive very different allowances. …
She compares incomparable things! There is a difference between someone on a part-time permanent contract and someone who doesn’t know what they’re going to do in three days. Workers who do two and a half days every week knowing that they will work the following week, it exists, we call it “ongoing relationships”, but it is extremely rare. You just have to go to a Pôle Emploi agency to see it. A job seeker does not say to himself: “Over a month, how many days will I do with such and such an employer ?» He reasons in hours: “How many hours am I going to be able to do to obtain rights?” It’s daily snacking. So yes, on a table, there is a gap. But behind the scenes is what people experience and how it really happens in companies. And the principle of the unemployment insurance system is to take into account what people are going through.
Do you also plan to attack the perverse effects of the new method of calculating the RLS for people who have been placed on short-time work or who have taken parental leave? ? The Minister of Labor said she was ready to correct the situation on this point.
It is also one of the criteria that we intend to attack. If the ministry wishes to take into account the alerts that we have been making for many months, it is up to them to find solutions and remedy this situation.
Elisabeth Borne denies having been warned for several months.
I know that Unédic’s services have informed the DGEFP [la Direction générale à l’emploi et à la formation professionnelle, qui est rattachée au ministère du Travail, ndlr] since November. For our part, we alerted on this subject during multilateral and bilateral meetings with the advisers of the ministry. We have notes dating from 2020 and which confirm that the alerts were issued before this month of April. In addition, we also warned against other subjects, which were not taken into account. For example, on rechargeable rights: this mechanism made it possible, when you returned to work, to recharge your rights after one month of work. The reform has almost eliminated that, since the reloading conditions have been reduced to four months. So job seekers start almost from zero every time. We were also alerted to the fact that the combination of employment and unemployment, which allows people to gain a foothold in the company by receiving a supplement from Pôle Emploi, will no longer have any interest tomorrow with the new calculation of the SJR. We have also been alerted by Pôle Emploi advisers, who already know that it will be very complicated to encourage people to return to work with this new system. Not because job seekers do not want to work, but because they cannot afford to have an insufficient allowance while working.
Why is the CFDT filing an appeal now, and not last fall when the other unions led a first offensive?
At the time, it was felt that there was no legal matter to attack. But today, the “soft” reform comes in another context. Its consequences are even more serious, given the economic situation and the uncertainties surrounding the economic recovery. If we listen to the government, on July 1, employment is picking up again. It is an extremely risky bet.
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