Deputies from every bench agree on one thing, which is that none of them wrote this, even though all of them did.
PARIS, France (The Paris Fool) – In a moment of national harmony not seen since the last time everyone complained about the weather, the Assemblee nationale has rejected the revenue half of next year’s finance bill without a single deputy defending it, and the prime minister’s office has described the result as “a text that has now been read by everyone.”
The vote, which sent the government’s original draft on to the Senate, was covered at length by the parliamentary channel LCP, and it capped weeks in which deputies adopted a cognac VAT cut, a reduced rate on public transport, and a levy on internet traffic, all against a backdrop of 758 amendments still waiting for their turn on the Monday before.
A Budget With No Authors
Under the Fifth Republic, a bill rejected by all sides is traditionally considered to have been “authored by the weather.” The Assemblee’s Bureau of Collective Innocence confirmed on Wednesday that 100 percent of deputies who voted against the revenue section had earlier voted for at least one amendment inside it.
“It is like a restaurant where every diner ordered a different dish, tasted the combined result, and demanded to see the chef,” said Gaspard Lemaitre-Fournier, a constitutional lawyer who has been billing the parliamentary canteen for coffee since 2009. “The chef is all of them. The chef is also the waiter.”
The Ordinance Option Nobody Has Ever Tried
With the Assemblee out of the way, attention has moved to the one lever no government of the Fifth Republic has ever pulled, which is governing the budget by ordinance once the 70-day clock runs out in mid-December, according to the Senate’s own calendar of possible scenarios.
Officials at Matignon are said to be approaching the option the way a family approaches the good tablecloth: admired, discussed at length, and kept in a drawer in case of a wedding. A leaked internal checklist reads in full:
Ordinance procedure. Step 1: find out what an ordinance is. Step 2: find out who has the form. Step 3: ask the Senate to be calm. Step 4: ask the Senate again. Step 5: lie down.
The Senate Prepares to Fix Everything
The upper house, meanwhile, will take the original government text and give it the full attention for which it is famous, namely a few weeks of scrupulous amendment before a joint committee that, as the budget timetable published by LCP reminds readers, has a track record of failing to agree on anything.
Senators from the conservative-centrist majority have already warned of a vacuum with no parachute, a phrase one aide described as “the most honest thing said in the building since the lifts were installed.” Another senator, speaking on condition that nobody ask him anything, said the chamber was “calm, confident and looking for the fire exit.”
- Deputies who voted to reject a text they had amended: all of them.
- Deputies who can name the author of the cognac amendment: a pleasant 1 in 5, mostly the cognac producers.
- Times the phrase “responsible compromise” was used at the microphone: 412.
- Compromises reached: zero, confirmed twice with a ruler.
What Happens at the Joint Committee
If history is a guide, seven deputies and seven senators will sit in a basement room, trade gloomy looks for three hours, and conclude that the real problem is the other chamber. Marguerite Delacroix-Vidal, a stand-up comedian who performs a monthly set called Budget Open Mic at a bar near the Palais Bourbon, says the format is the same as her show. “Fourteen people, no agreement, and everyone leaves convinced they were funnier than the guy before. The difference is that my crowd pays for the drinks. The Republic pays for theirs.”
Observers at Bohiney have noted that a bill supported by nobody at least has the advantage of offending nobody in particular, which is the nearest thing to consensus available in the current legislature. The Assemblee has until midnight on 17 November to finish the first reading, and officials are confident it will be finished early, or at any rate before the next budget.
SOURCE: https://bohiney.com/
