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THE CHANGE
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30 COMMITMENTS FOR CHANGE
KICK-STARTING FRANCE AND PROPOSING A NEW DEVELOPMENT MODEL EMPLOYMENT, COMPETITIVITY, INVESTMENT, DEBT REPAYMENT: MAKING FRANCE A LEADING NATION ONCE AGAIN
1 To boost French competitiveness, we will create a Public Investment Bank which will invest in research and innovation, support small businesses, acquire shareholdings in strategic activities and the industrial sectors of the future. Its resources will be deployed in the form of regional funds jointly managed along with the regions and their elected representatives.
2 To ensure that the economy takes precedence over finance, and to regulate the financial system, we will reduce corporation tax from 33% to 20% for companies who reinvest all of their profits and will increase it up to 40% for those who prefer to pay dividends to shareholders. On a Europewide level, we will introduce a tax of 0.05% on financial transactions. We will fight to dismantle tax havens. We will separate the banks’ current-account and investment banking activities. We will set up a European public credit rating agency.
3 To help Europe move forward, we will be proposing to our partners that we should issue euro bonds in order to finance investments for the future (energy transportation networks, digital networks and the biotechnologies, etc) in addition to Europe’s future industrial champions.
4 Where youth employment is concerned, we will create 300,000 «future-focused» jobs in the environmental and social innovation fields.
5 To protect employees, we will introduce a professional social security system, taking the form of a «time-training» account enabling everyone to take time out to study, to undertake a personal project or to look after their families and to select the terms for their retirement. We will take action to dissuade companies from carrying out stock market driven redundancy programmes with financial penalties for companies who pay out dividends to their shareholders at the same time.
6 In order to protect Europe’s interests and its know-how and employees in a globalised world, and to be better able to regulate trade we will take action to increase customs duties on products from countries which do not meet international social, health or environmental standards.
7 To reduce France’s debt, we will devote half of the financial margins which we generate to debt repayment.
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AGRICULTURE, THE ENVIRONMENT & ENERGY: A NEW MODEL FOR BETTER LIVING
8 To encourage environmentally friendly behaviour, we will make the VAT «eco-variable» (lowering it on non-pollutant products and increasing it on products which generate pollution).
9 To ensure that our food is healthier and that farmers can make a living from their work, we will have local authorities source their supplies from high-quality local agriculture and fishing (including milk and dairy products, meat, fruit and vegetables).
10 To wean ourselves off our dependency on nuclear power and oil, we will massively expand the quest for energy savings and the use of renewable energy sources and will propose that our partners introduce a European Energy Community. We will organise a national debate on energy transition in 2012.
PURCHASING POWER, WAGES & PENSIONS: MAKING LIFE LESS EXPENSIVE
11 To reduce the French population’s energy bill, we will invest part of the massive profits from the oil companies into Insulation aid and the development of renewable energy sources. We will introduce progressive pricing for gas, electricity and water.
12 In order to stop the surge in rents, we will cap the levels of rent rises for the first rental or subsequent rental, particularly in areas affected by property speculation and we will finance the construction of 150,000 low rent homes each year.
13 In order that the equality of the sexes becomes a reality where wages and careers are concerned, we will make this a condition for any company wishing to retain exemptions from employers’ payroll taxes.
14 To help young adults succeed during their studies, to find housing, to obtain health care and to get a job, we will create a means tested study allowance as part of efforts to guarantee greater independence for young people. A right to deferred basic training will be granted to those who have left the educational system early.
15 For a fairer distribution of wealth benefiting employees, we will organise an annual tripartite salary conference and will revalue the purchasing power of the minimum wage. We will limit abusive pay policies including variable remuneration which does not exceed the fixed portion, pay differentials of 1 to 20 maximum in companies in which the public has a shareholding, the presence of employees on the executive boards or supervisory boards and pay committees.
16 Regarding retirement pensions, we will re-establish the legal retirement age at 60 (to enable those who began working earlier or who have had stressful and strenuous jobs to be able to leave at the same age as was possible before the 2010 law) and the retirement age with no loss of pension at 65. We will introduce the pensions reform promised to the French population based on collective guarantees allowing for individual choices and guaranteeing the future of the retirement schemes through the provision of 100% financing.
FISCAL REFORMS: FAIRER AND MORE EFFECTIVE
17 For a fairer taxation system, we will merge income tax and the CSG contribution in a more progressive «citizens’ tax» which will be deducted at source.
18 To ensure that work is sufficiently valued, we will ensure that income from capital, bonuses and stock options are subject to the same taxation levels as income from work, which is not currently the case.
REDISCOVERING JUSTICE TO CREATE REAL EQUALITY SERVICES: EDUCATION, HEALTH AND PUBLIC SECURITY ARE THE NEW PRIORITIES
19 To ensure the educational success of every youngster, we will initiate a new educational pact between teachers and the nation: priority will be given to ensuring success in the primary years, including a review of lesson times and syllabuses (with a common bedrock of knowledge and skills), greater customisation for teaching, improved supervision and measures to improve the standing of the teaching profession. We will also encourage access to culture and the practising of sports.
20 For both higher education and research, we will be focusing in particular on success in the undergraduate years, boosting educational supervision and providing the long-term resources needed to guarantee the autonomy and reputations of teams, laboratories and universities.
21 To maximise the self-fulfilment of our youngest citizens, access to a crèche and the possibility to start school at the age of two will be extended.
22 In the health field, we will be placing public hospitals back where they belong at the very heart of our system and will be asking young independent doctors to begin their careers in areas lacking physicians.
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23 To improve the lives of elderly people suffering a loss of autonomy, whether living at home or in a care establishment, we will call upon the French spirit of national solidarity. To ensure access for all to urban life, we will guarantee the inclusion of a «disability clause» in every law and we will gradually increase the disabled adults allowance.
24 To improve the security of the French people and public order in general, we will boost the resources of the police and the gendarmerie, in particular through the creation of 10,000 gendarme and local police posts. For a more effective justice system, we will seek to «catch up» the resources the system is missing. Every act of delinquency will receive an immediate, fair and proportionate response.
REUNITING THE FRENCH PEOPLE AND REDISCOVERING FRANCE’S REPUBLICAN COMMITMENTS 25 To fight discrimination, we will ensure the widespread use of anonymous CVs featuring neither a name nor photo, and will experiment with a system of certificates to be supplied by police when carrying out identity checks.
26 To guarantee gender and family equality, we will extend the right to marry and adopt to all couples.
27 For a fair and effective immigration policy, every three years we will vote through a steering and planning law which will be drawn up in consultation with the social partners and the regions which chiefly handle the reception and integration of migrants. We will reinforce the fight against employers using illegal immigrants as labour and against people traffickers. We will create a genuine reception and integration contract based on reciprocal obligations and stressing the need to speak the language and to understand the rights and duties of the Republic. We will grant the right to vote to foreigners at local elections.
28 To ensure the existence of sufficient checks and balances, we will guarantee the independence of the justice system (no more individual investigations and the careers of magistrates will no longer be subject to the whims of the political authorities). We will have a law voted through to guarantee effective plurality in the media and the managers of the public audiovisual sector will no longer be chosen by the President.
29 For greater democracy, we will strengthen the role of the parliament, introducing a degree of proportionality in Parliamentary elections, and converting the Constitutional Council into a genuine independent Constitutional Court. We will remove public funding for parties which fail to meet parity objectives. We will combat conflicts of interest and will impose limits on the accumulation of elected mandates.
30 To encourage local democracy and regional cohesion, we will repeal the regional reforms imposed by the UMP. We will introduce a third round of decentralisation guaranteeing financial autonomy and management for local authorities, an equalisation process benefiting disadvantaged regions, a new “pact of confidenceâ€? and between the state and local authorities, active citizenship, a guaranteed presence for the public services, a determined and ambitious programme for the overseas dĂŠpartements and territories, including social housing, infrastructure and transport aimed at boosting economic development and access to employment.
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