Social partners meet to try to regulate short-term contracts

Having grown significantly between the 1980s and 2000s, fixed-term contracts and temporary work became "the hiring norm" in the 2000s, according to a document provided by Unédic. Of the 21,1 million fixed-term contracts hired in 2023, 81% were for contracts of less than one month.

"These short-term contracts are essential adaptation tools in many sectors of activity," argued Hubert Mongon, the Medef negotiator, to journalists.

He stated two objectives of the employers' organization in this negotiation: to eliminate the bonus-malus system and "to re-examine the functioning of the labor market".

A campaign promise of Emmanuel Macron, the bonus-malus system, created in 2019, involves a modulation, limited to certain sectors, of the employer's contribution to unemployment insurance based on the number of terminations of employment contracts in a company.

"It is clear that in the current context (...), any proposal which would increase the cost of labour would not receive much support from us," Hubert Mongon warned, using euphemisms.

However, unions and employers seem to agree on one point: the need to focus primarily on short-term recurring contracts, even if, as Mr. Mongon pointed out, they can meet the "aspirations" of employees.

The unions would like to consider, in particular, the generalization and increase of precarious employment bonuses and unemployment insurance contributions that would decrease as contracts lengthen.

"To succeed in replacing the bonus-malus system with something else, a high level of social dialogue is needed and the CFDT will be very demanding," warned Olivier Guivarch for the leading French trade union.

"If we put too many standards in place, we know that we will encourage circumvention," with people being pushed towards self-employment, stressed Jean-François Foucard of the CFE-CGC.

While social partners are conducting parallel negotiations on negotiated terminations, at the government's request, the CFTC, through Frédéric Belouze, warned: "We will not commit to anything on negotiated terminations and unemployment insurance if we do not know where we are going with short-term contracts."

On Tuesday, the Prime Minister agreed to the three demands made by the social partners in order to be able to conduct these negotiations on unemployment insurance.

Illustrative image of the article via Depositphotos.com.