Share this on social media
Macron under fire for keeping energy talks at government level
(EurActiv, 2 Sep 2022) Opposition parties slammed President Emmanuel Macron for planning an emergency gas and electricity meeting for Friday that will be held strictly among ministers as he did for the COVID-19 situation during the pandemic.
Usually convened for national security issues, the Defence Council was extended to health issues during the pandemic. Yet these discussions are held within a “tightly knit council of ministers” behind closed doors and are subject to defence secrecy.
This time too, the first Energy Defence Council will only have Macron, Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne, and the ministers who deal with the energy file, such as Energy Transition Minister Agnès Pannier-Runacher, taking part.
Far-right Rassemblement National leader Marine Le Pen asked Borne to convene an extraordinary session of the Assembly to debate and vote on “the measures to be taken to protect the French from the energy crisis”. Le Pen also accused Macron of “bypassing the Parliament” and criticised his “intolerable” attitude.
On the Left, La France insoumise deputy Thomas Portes said he is worried that “the president persists in authoritarianism” by using an “undemocratic tool”.
External link
EurActiv, 2 Sep 2022: Macron under fire for keeping energy talks at government level
