The head of the Medef (French employers' association) calls for "correcting" conventional terminations without banning them

Medef boss Patrick Martin called on Tuesday for the "correction" of the conventional termination system in the face of "deviant behavior," without, however, banning it, for example by reducing the duration of unemployment benefits.

"We need to correct the system without fundamentally calling it into question," Mr. Martin said, interviewed on Franceinfo, in response to a question about the government's desire to address it as part of the unemployment insurance reform.

Created in 2008, the mutual termination agreement is a form of amicable divorce between an employee and their employer. Before the creation of this system, the employee had to either resign—and lose their unemployment benefits—or be fired, which requires a reason and can be stigmatizing.

A mutual termination agreement allows a permanent contract to be terminated by mutual agreement and therefore entitles the employer to unemployment benefits (provided the employer has been employed for at least six months). The employer also pays compensation that cannot be less than the statutory severance pay.

The number of mutually agreed terminations has jumped by 17% since 2019, rising from around 440.000 to 514.000 in 2024 (compared to around 2 million resignations in 2024, according to Dares).

According to Patrick Martin, "I would say there is deviant behavior, but just as there can be with unemployment insurance, just as there can be with work stoppages, these are minorities of people who ultimately penalize the community."

"Let's not throw the baby out with the bathwater," he said, recalling that this system "is a Medef initiative" which has helped to "calm" the job market: "we see that the number of industrial tribunal disputes has dropped significantly thanks to these conventional terminations," he said, proposing, for example, to "reduce the duration of compensation."

U2P president Michel Picon, interviewed on RTL, also considered it necessary on Tuesday to "toughen up" the conditions of the mutual termination agreement, in order to make it "less attractive than it is today for the employee."

But "we must keep conventional termination agreements because they respond to a reduction in the backlog of legal disputes, particularly in industrial tribunals. They also calm contentious situations in the world of work," said the representative of small businesses.