The debate was tense between the right and the left in the Senate half on October 25 about the conditions for access to unemployment insurance during the consideration of the bill on “emergency measures” for full employment. The upper house, dominated by a right-wing and center majority, voted for an article added last week during the work of the social affairs committee.
This limits unemployment rights in the event of repeated refusals of permanent employment. A job seeker who, during the last 12 months, has refused three CDI proposals at the end of a CDD, for the same job with equivalent remuneration, will not be entitled to the payment of unemployment benefits. However, the case of persons employed on permanent contracts during the same period will not be affected.
An amendment closing unemployment insurance from the first refusal by CDI, rejected in extreme cases
The semi-cycle almost hardened this article by adopting an amendment by the senators LR, carried by Laurent Duplomb and Bruno Retailleau, which deprives an employee of the allowance from the first refusal of a CDI at the end of a CDD in similar conditions. “The sense of history when you make a CDD and when behind it is offered a CDI, it is more an advantage than a disadvantage”, exclaimed Laurent Duplomb. Senator Jocelyne Guidez of the Centrist Union said her group would not support the measure. It was rejected on the thread: it received as many votes for as against, according to the count announced by the chairman of the session Alain Richard (Renaissance). A tie does not allow adoption.
The left fought against the article that closed the unemployment insurance benefit after three refusals of the CDI in one year. “This article does not extend the policy of permanent suspicion against job seekers who are allergic to work, dependent on benefits”, said Raymonde Poncet Monge. “I want to know what statistics you’re basing it on,” added Socialist Monique Lubin, who worried the article would penalize people who refuse to commit indefinitely to jobs that wouldn’t suit them. For the communist Laurence Cohen, this article constitutes a “particularly regressive grip on the senatorial majority”.
The rapporteur (LR) Frédérique Puissat mainly justified this provision of the Labor Code, according to which the benefit of unemployment insurance is open to workers whose “deprivation of employment is involuntary”. “We cannot make life choices that are paid for by insurance systems,” she argued.
Fear of “gas plants” in government and among marchers
The government opposed the measure, which was defended by the senatorial majority. “There is no reason to sanction” this type of employee “if he refuses to continue or extend as soon as he himself has complied with all the obligations that were given in the first place”, objected Olivier Dussopt. The Minister of Labor also revealed practical difficulties, citing an “extremely cumbersome procedure for companies and for Pôle Emploi in terms of declarations”. “We are establishing a gas plant for the employers,” added Senator Martin Lévrier (Rally of Democrats, Progressives and Independents, group of the senatorial majority).
The argument did not sway the senatorial majority. “At some point, when you have ambitions, the will, the somewhat operational side, is a detail. It is up to us to solve it,” replied rapporteur Frédérique Puissat. According to the Senate’s text, the employer must notify the employee of the CDI proposal in writing and send it to the Pôle emploi. According to the Senate report, “this transmission could be carried out in a dematerialized way via the termination of the contract in order not to create too heavy an administrative burden for the companies”.
Temporary workers who refuse a CDI at their job, deprived of daily allowance
The half-cycle adopted a change by Emmanuel Capus (Les Indépendants) to “secure the unit”, valid only in the event of a proposal for a permanent contract with equivalent remuneration. The amendment clarifies that this term must be understood as equivalent working time. By thinking that such a proposal made sense, the government does not rule out the scenario where the deprivation of compensation for refusal of CDI would survive the debates in the National Assembly. “If, in the case of the parliamentary shuttle, these provisions were to be maintained, the clarification given by Emmanuel Capus could be useful”, acknowledged Olivier Dussopt.
After this article, the Senate then adopted another amendment from the LR group. It excludes from the benefit of the unemployment benefit those temporary workers who would not accept a CDI that a company would offer them in the position they occupy.