First Employment Contract - Legislative Process

Legislative Process

CPE was introduced by the Government as an amendment (n°3) to the "Statute on the Equality of Opportunities" law. This law was proposed by Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin allegedly to tackle a 23% unemployment rate among the young, and also as a response to the civil unrest in October 2005. The reasoning of the government for introducing CPE was that unemployment was one of the major causes of lawlessness in poorer neighbourhoods, that workforce laws putting the burden of proof for valid reasons for dismissal on the employer discouraged hiring, especially of people with "risky" profiles, and thus that making dismissal easier would improve the employment prospects of such youngsters.

The bill was examined by the French National Assembly between January 31 and February 9. The amendment was adopted by the Assembly around 2 AM on February 9, 2006, after much heated debate. On the same day, in the afternoon, Prime Minister de Villepin announced to the National Assembly that he invoked article 49-3 of the Constitution of France on that text; this meant that the law would be considered adopted in its current state, without being approved by the National Assembly, unless a motion of censure were adopted by the Assembly. Since Villepin's UMP party had an absolute majority in the Assembly, there was no chance that such a motion could be adopted. Predictably, a motion of censure was proposed by the left-wing opposition and was rejected by the Assembly on February 21.

The Law was then examined by the Senate between February 23 and March 5, at which date the Senate approved it. Since the texts from the Assembly and the Senate were different, and the law was deemed urgent by the Prime Minister, the bill was sent before a mixed Assembly/Senate commission charged with the drafting of a compromise text. The law was then adopted on March 8 by the Assembly, and on March 9 by the Senate.

Because opposition members of the Assembly and the Senate requested constitutional review of the text, the law was sent before the Constitutional Council. The Council considered the law constitutional, but made a number of reservations, on March 30. Those reservations impose guidelines under which the law was to be applied.

Meanwhile, the law was disapproved by a sizable proportion of the French population. Massive street protests began, mostly by students from high schools and universities, and Prime Minister de Villepin's approval rate began to plummet. The protest movement was certainly the biggest seen in France since 1968.

The whole act was signed into law on March 31 by president Jacques Chirac. However, Chirac paradoxically asked for a delay of application of the law (which he is not constitutionally empowered to do), to allow the conservative Union for a Popular Majority (UMP) to prepare a new law modifying the "Statute on the Equality of Opportunities" law (changing, in particular, the two years "probationary period" to only one year).

The student movement as well as all trade unions (including the CGT) and the Socialist Party asked not only for the suppression of the CPE but also of the CNE, a similar contract passed in November 2005 by the same government. On April 10, as the protests were still getting bigger, the government completely withdrew the law, and substituted for it fiscal incentives to firms employing young people.