Sébastien Lecornu says he is in favor of renouncing the freezing of retirement pensions and social minimums

Speaking before the Assembly, the Prime Minister said on Friday that he was ready to give up one of the most contested measures of the budgetary sequence, while a coalition of oppositions voted to this effect in the Social Affairs Committee.

The Prime Minister spoke to deputies on Friday October 31, in the middle of a debate on the 2026 budget. He notably responded to criticism from the left who accuse him of not making enough concessions. “The government is in favor of looking at all the amendments which will unfreeze our country’s retirement pensions (and) social minimums”launched the head of government. Turning towards the socialist benches, he nevertheless recognized that “the question of freezing pensions” was not “not acceptable“East “accepted by our fellow citizens”.

Sébastien Lecornu also assured that he did not want to “to scroll” on the question of social revenues, citing in particular the increase in the CSG on assets, voted by the deputies in committee in recent days in the Social Security budget.

The government text provides at this stage for a “freezing of all basic pensions” in 2026 as well as a freeze on social benefits such as family allowances, Active Solidarity Income (RSA) or Personalized Housing Assistance (APL), usually indexed to inflation. The draft budget also provides for longer-term savings, under-indexing retirement pensions by 0.9 points in 2027, then by 0.4 points for the following years, until 2030. The larger cut in 2027 is justified, according to the government, by the suspension of pension reform, added in the text to try to find a non-censorship agreement with the PS.

This intervention by Sébastien Lecornu to the deputies comes as the deputies are voting on the first reading of the text of the 2026 draft budget. At the same time, the social affairs committee of the National Assembly is discussing the Social Security finance bill (PLFSS), another large part of the budgetary discussions in which the suspension of the pension reform must be included.

In committee, a coalition of oppositions, ranging from the left to the RN, removed the freeze on social benefits for 2026, appearing in the Social Security budget. This text will arrive in the hemicycle on Tuesday.