Immigration: Macronist Florian Bachelier calls for a "referendum"

Former deputy (La République en Marche, LREM) close to the former President of the National Assembly Richard Ferrand, Florian Bachelier calls for a firmer migration policy and calls on his camp for a referendum. The objective is to "welcome less but better to give oneself time to integrate", estimates this historic Walker from the Socialist Party, today a lawyer and founder of the "laboratory of ideas" La France unie, while the executive is finalizing its immigration bill.

LE FIGARO. - The subject of negotiations with the right, the Darmanin-Dussopt project on immigration aims to better punish delinquent foreigners while regularizing undocumented workers in "short-term jobs". seize this sovereign dossier?

FLORIAN BACHELIER. - I think so, yes. On this subject as on many others, it is urgent to regain control and demonstrate it factually. The Ocean Viking episode was appalling in every way. All those who are seriously working on it, left and right, have been making the same observations for a long time and converge on most of the solutions.

But the two extremes have turned the cowardice of the past decades into a goodwill: stirring fears for some, postcolonial guilt for others. The duty of a political leader is to look at the realities, those seen by a majority of our people, and to propose a path that goes beyond emotion.

Should we go so far as to limit legal immigration? More than 320,000 first residence permits were issued last year, compared to just over 277,000 in 2019...

Welcoming less but better to give ourselves time to integrate, here is where the responsibility must lie. Welcoming less, because it is the request of the public, but also the interest of the countries of origin which today see their know-how plundered - it is an endless spiral. Welcoming better, because it is in the interest of French society, as people with a vocation to become citizens like the others.

In the world, the resolution of the problems of the South cannot pass only by the influx into Europe of those who are victims of them. This is why we need borders. They are doors that open and close from within. There is no hospitality without a door.

So let's stop the worn-out rhetoric, based on a diptych firmness-humanity void of qualification. Let us return to the law decided by the sovereign people. Let's give him the floor via a referendum. If we don't radically change the model, then the people will decide this issue in 2027 via the presidential election. And this can only be in favor of the Lepenist wall.

Emmanuel Macron has however ruled out the possibility of a consultation in a recent interview with L'Opinion, judging that immigration does not fall within the scope of the referendum defined in article 11 of the Constitution...

The lawyer that I am thinks on the contrary that it falls within the first two fields of article 11. Let us stop infantilizing the voters. Moreover, if there is a political subject in France that excludes reason from the classic public debate, it is the migration question. However, this question clearly refers to the future of our nation. The French know what it is all about concretely, in terms of access to public services, social costs, but also culture, security and humanity.

When we take the trouble to listen to the French, we hear the fear of social downgrading, the end of protection and even cultural dispossession. They know that there is no possible welfare state without a border that delimits it. We are a nation state, not an NGO. And if the children of senior civil servants and politicians of all persuasions attended the same schools as our children, we would have stopped this little part of jokari a long time ago.

What would the referendum text contain?

This text would propose nine clear orientations and above all a full, complete and immediate execution. On asylum, let's entrust Parliament with the task of determining each year the list of so-called “safe” countries, so as to grant asylum only to those who come under it. Let us drastically reduce the delays which remain too long due to the endless appeals.

Let us limit state medical aid (AME) to urgent care, re-criminalize illegal stay in order to facilitate deportations, and assume a dedicated air fleet for deportations. Appoint a prefect per region in charge of these files. Finally, to promote integration through work, refugees who live only on subsistence allowance should be directed towards jobs to be filled, under penalty of sanction, or failing that, towards appropriate training.

Don't you risk being accused of one-upmanship with Les Républicains and the Rassemblement national (RN)?

It wouldn't make sense, and it doesn't matter. Above all parties, whatever they may be, there is the interest of our national community. Let's not fall into this crude trap: we're dying not to get out of the logic of one camp against another.

Behind the files, behind the tweets, behind the figures, there are crushed lives on all sides that deserve at least not to serve as fuel for deficient policies. It is no longer possible to accept that men do deadly trade in other men, and even less that our children are threatened on our own soil. Let's listen to the French, stop suffering, let's act radically. It is about a certain idea of ​​civilization.