What are their rivals’ intentions for the next five years as French voters decide on Sunday?
Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen envision quite different futures for France.
Priority national vs. total
The cost of living has been the election’s top concern, and far-right candidate Marine Le Pen has made it her top priority. To combat Islamism, she plans to make social housing, jobs and welfare a “national priority” for French citizens.
Her moderate opponent has used the phrase “We All” to rally votes. After five years in power, Emmanuel Macron promises “total renewal” to appeal to both left and right supporters.
Expenses
Marine Le Pen has promised to cut expenditures if elected. Reduce fuel VAT from 20% to 5% and abolish VAT on 100 other requirements. She wants firms to pay their employees 10% extra tax-fee, and schools to pay 3% annually for five years. She wants to privatize public broadcasting and renationalize road tolls
Whereas, Macron’s Government has already spent billions on energy bills. He offers a €6,000 tax break and wants to abolish the TV license charge for better teacher pay. His views, not Pen’s, will lead France into a rut, say bosses’ group Medef.
Pensions
Emmanuel Macron wants to raise the pension age from 62 to 65. Due to public disapproval, he aims to increase it by four months per year. “It makes sense.” And he’ll raise the state pension from £785 to £1100.
For people who started working at 20, Marine Le Pen favors retaining the pension age at 60. Her opponent seeks a €1,000 minimum state pension.
Borders and security
Marine Le Pen proposes a vote on immigration to eliminate “anarchic and huge immigration” and impose tight entry and citizenship criteria. She also wants French nationals to get preferential housing and social services over foreigners, with 620,000 homes for foreigners put on the market for families with at least one French parent. She supported a referendum on the death penalty before realizing it was “unconstitutional.”
Emmanuel Macron accuses her of an “authoritarian” trend and disregard for the law. He called Le Pen’s “nationalist programme” unpatriotic. While, he pledged to increase police and gendarmes’ numbers on the street by 2030, with 11 new mobile units and 200 gendarmes’ brigades (military police). Marine Le Pen promised 20,000 new prison beds and 7,000 new cops.
Headscarves
Marine Le Pen wants to jail hijab-wearing women. She labelled the veil a radical Islamist “uniform.” In the first round, 69 percent of French Muslims voted for far-left candidate Jean-Luc Mélenchon.
For Macron, Prohibition of headscarf may cause “civil strife.” He thinks lacité, France’s secularism ideal, is pro-religious. Instead, he praised a young hijab-wearing feminist. “The best solution,” he said.
Voting Reform
So, if Marine Le Pen wins, she has to figure out how to implement all her No genuine government choices, relying on national unity claims. Her national rally has only six assembly seats, making a June majority doubtful. In order to balance the electoral system, she favors proportional representation in legislatures and a seven-year presidential term. In her signature citizen referendums, 500,000 individuals can propose legislative changes without going via parliament.
Emmanuel Macron says his opponent’s referendum proposals demonstrate that she thinks she’s above the constitution and can change the rules.
Europe
While asserting that Europe protects France from crises and violence, Macron accuses his opponent of trying to “Frexit” without saying so.
Marine Le Pen has changed her position about leaving the EU, notwithstanding what Macron says. “No one is against Europe,” she stated later. Her support for France leaving the EU in 2012
was discarded in 2017 when she declared her support for leaving the euro. It’s now a European nation-state alliance.
That would be against EU legislation, which she would execute by vote. She’d be in trouble if she tightened border controls, reduced French contributions to the EU budget, or prioritized French law.
She has committed to halt military tank and warplane projects, citing France as a “big power that counts.” She backs Brexit but denies wanting a Frexit.
Russia-NATO
“No one has forgotten that Marine Le Pen relied on Russia for bank loans and that she was close to Vladimir Putin before the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2014. So, when she talks to Russia, she’s talking to her banker,” Mr. Macron said. In advance of the 2017 election, her campaign had to deny pulping 1.2 million election flyers with a photo of her shaking Vladimir Putin’s hand and she wants France to leave Nato while keeping its “integrated command” as it was from 1966-2009. She believes that after the conflict, NATO and Russia should “strategic approach”.
Environment
Néo-Nazi, no one knows Marine Le Pen, but she wants to stop building windmills and start demolishing them. Her goal is to end renewable energy subsidies. For school canteens, she wants to prohibit non-standard imports and mandate 80% French agriculture.
Only Green presidential candidate Yannick Jadot backed Macron. The French nuclear energy mix now comprises 75% nuclear power stations. In his opinion, Marine Le Pen’s opposition to renewable energy is a “complete aberration”.
Published by: Gargi Sharma
Edited by: Aaradhana singh
