Given the tensions, wars and massacres spreading around the world, the clown show over the budget vote was pushed into the background. But that is now coming to an end. The haggling is over, and the leader of the Socialist Party (PS) says he is prepared not to censure the government using “progress on social issues” as a pretext.
How can he talk about social progress when all budgets are being slashed? Hospitals are being put on a strict diet, and patients who cannot afford to go private healthcare centers will have to wait to receive treatment. The same austerity measures apply to public education, social housing, employment, etc.
However, in exchange for the Socialist Party’s support for Lecornu, it has secured a few measures that will disguise these new cuts: the activity bonus will be increased; students will be entitled to a €1 meal in university cafeterias; housing benefits will keep pace with inflation; an additional €400 million will go to social housing, MaPrimeRénov will be relaunched and income tax won’t go up.
These measures prove one thing above all: it is becoming increasingly difficult for millions of women and men to provide a decent living for their families because prices have skyrocketed and wages remain very low.
How can you make ends meet when you are paid the minimum wage, €1,400 to €1,500 net per month, like nearly three million workers? In the private sector, 50% of workers earn less than €2,100 per month. That money quickly disappears once rent and loans, electricity, water, insurance, telephone and internet bills, health insurance and car expenses have been paid.
The CGT has identified 483 job-cut plans over the past 18 months, with more than 100,000 jobs threatened or eliminated. Workers whatever their status, after 20 or 30 years in a company, find themselves laid off overnight. And unlike the shareholders who have profited from their labor, they don’t receive lifetime pensions!
Just like farmers, factory workers, care workers, warehouse workers and security guards know all about poor working conditions, getting up in the middle of the night, spending hours on the road or crammed into public transport. They know all about speeding up and sacrificing their health on assembly lines, construction sites, in warehouses. They could speak at length of the sacrifices they make in their social and family lives by working nights, Saturdays or weekends.
So Lecornu’s half-measures won’t change anything about our increasingly harsh living conditions. They won’t even allow workers to keep their heads above water.
Saying anything about victories or social progress is outrageous. And it’s especially ridiculous when the whole of society is moving towards war.
Becoming obscenely rich by exploiting workers isn’t enough for capitalists. They are now openly fighting over who will get their hands on Greenland's riches; who will have access to Ukraine's fertile lands; who will control the coltan from the mines of Kivu in the Democratic Republic of Congo; who will exploit Venezuela's oil... These rivalries can only end badly if they are given free rein.
The whole world is marching toward widespread conflict. And here again, as in all capitalist wars, it is the working classes who will be the cannon fodder.
These setbacks and threats haven’t come out of nowhere. They are the consequences of the capitalist system. Every day, Trump's brutality and unabashed greed remind us of the basic rule of capitalism: nothing must stop the bourgeoisie and bankers from accumulating billions of dollars, not respect for people or the planet nor any moral values whatsoever. And if capitalists need to wage war to gain the upper hand in competition, to open up markets or gain access to certain raw materials, then war it is.
But another rule governs capitalism: workers produce everything. Without them, there is no creation of wealth, no creation of profits and capital. It therefore depends on them, on their consciousness and their fighting spirit, that society follows a different path.
That is why workers must neither resign themselves nor remain silent. Those who reject the future of blood and tears that our leaders have in store for us must come together. Capitalists are strong because they are organized. Workers must do the same and build a party that truly defends their interests, a real communist and revolutionary party.
Nathalie Arthaud