Transcription
My friends, my friends, my friends, my friends, behold my friends, behold the moment when we will launch this campaign for France. To say who we are, what we want to do, how we want to do it, how we want to do it, and with whom? To say where we want to take France. That is what a presidential campaign is, the rest is accessory. Here, with all of you, today, we are launching this presidential campaign. And it is not starting at any moment in our history, this presidential campaign. It is starting in a country that is worried. Angry, tired of seeing problems pile up without solutions following. A country that often doubts itself, that doubts its school, its state, its elites, its past choices, and sometimes even its ability to make choices for tomorrow. But this campaign, it is also starting in a country that has not given up. A country, ours, that has everything to succeed. A country that builds exceptional airplanes, high-speed trains, wonderful wines, luxury goods sought after all over the world. A country that still has an exceptional film industry. A country that abounds everywhere with human, cultural, heritage, productive, industrial gems. A country that knows very well, I believe, that all is not lost if we tell it the truth, if we show it the way, and if we finally make this compromise. Here, now, we are launching the collective effort that will allow us to take back control of our country's destiny. We will, my friends, take power! We will, we will take power democratically, that goes without saying, but it is better to say it. Peacefully, that goes without saying, but it is even better to say it. Resolutely, to decide, to act, to repair when necessary, to move forward when it is necessary, so that France stops enduring and starts choosing again. We will do it together with all of you who are here today, with all the friendly faces on whom I have known for so long that I can count when the stakes get higher, with all those who have joined us and whom I greet amicably and to whom I say you have made the right choice. And with all those who will join us, when the time comes. With our friends from overseas whom I ask you to applaud. With a special mention for the Polynesians who have come here today, with the very many mayors who are present here, whom I want to congratulate, whom I greet as colleagues for their re-election, my friends, you can applaud the mayors of France. With all of you who come from the four corners of France. Wherever you come from, it is a joy to see you here, and with a special word, you will understand, for the Normans who must be some in this who will play out in this campaign, it is not just the choice of a president. It is the choice of a direction. It is the choice of faith in France, of trust with the French people. Beyond you, I would like to address all French people but tell them that the methods of avoidance that have so often circumvented problems rather than tackling them will not work any more tomorrow than they worked yesterday. Anger is not enough to govern a country. I believe, for my part, in another path, truth, lucidity, work, effort, freedom, trust. A demanding path, a French path, a path that does not promise everything but commits to doing what matters. This campaign is launching. So I will start with what is least interesting. I will talk to you about I will not parade my private life or my family life, that is not the style of the house. And I think that a political leader is much more what he is than what he claims to be on social networks. But I seek the trust of the French people and they have the right to know who I am and what constitutes me. I believe it was Saint-Exupéry who said that we are of our childhood as we are of a country. Me, I am Norman, born in Rouen. Born in Rouen in 1970, my parents were French teachers. I am a son of the middle class. My great-grandfather, Louis-Philippe, I swear it's true, my great-grandfather, Louis-Philippe, was a Docker, the real CGT. CGT, communist and proud of it. CGT, communist and proud of it. And my grandfather, his son, Charles Philippe, started his professional life working on the docks, until tuberculosis prevented him from doing incredibly physical work. As he could no longer be a docker, he became a driver, a courier, then a cotton sorter. My father, Patrick, was the first Philippe to get his baccalaureate. In my paternal family, we knew the grandeur of Le Havre, its complete destruction, its slow reconstruction, the work on the port, social advancement. My mother, she is in the room, I embrace her tenderly. My mother, therefore, comes from a family from the North, from French Flanders. From Lille, from this North that I love so much where we love work well done and cold beer. From this North where we do things seriously without taking ourselves seriously. Both my parents were French teachers. We were not rich, but we were not poor either. I grew up in a social housing unit in Hauts-de-Royant, I learned in public school and at the conservatory, I played at the La Grand-Marre football club, where the first photo of me that appeared in the local press was taken when I was 9 years old. This photo is of no interest, no one will ever find it. I lacked nothing as a child. That is a blessing. Even better, I grew up in a family in which I knew I was loved. Absolutely and no matter what. It was not always exuberant or perhaps quite modest in the But it was the most beautiful thing parents could pass on to their children. The assurance of being loved and supported. As for thousands and millions, as for millions of middle-class children, the only way, or at least the most obvious way to progress, was to work at school. I wanted to progress, so I worked and I worked hard. I was lucky. First because we loved books at home and books were my first homeland. Novels, history books, comic books, all books were good to read. And you didn't have to choose, you had to read them as much as possible and grow up with books. Then I was lucky because I It is thanks to them, it is thanks to Mr. Pinguet in CM2 who always wore a three-piece suit at the end of the 70s, which was severe, demanding, and at the same time incredibly. It is thanks to Mr. Prier at college, an extraordinary history teacher who also taught me that one could be serious without taking oneself seriously. It is thanks to Messrs. Cabanel and Lardic, two exceptional history and philosophy teachers whom I had in my final year. The first of the rope, my friends, the first of the rope, it was them. The first of the rope, it was them. These teachers of literature, music, sports, math, science, history, thanks to whom the son of two teachers from the Rouen suburbs passed his exams and competitions. Not always the first time, sometimes just barely, but thanks to whom I became a civil servant, a magistrate at the Conseil d'État, then a lawyer, then a mayor, then Prime Minister, a Prime Minister from the right. Besides, well, they have nothing to do with it. In three generations, my family has gone from the docks of Le Havre to the steps of Matignon. This is an immense honor for me. It is an immense honor for my parents. And it is an immense honor for my teachers. And what I tell you here is not a personal success, it is a collective success, that of public school, to which I owe everything. To whom I owe everything, and in the France of the 80s, it was still working, not everything was rosy at the time, if I may say so. The crisis was there, inflation was high, deindustrialization was beginning to be felt, but my parents had a conviction that as long as they worked hard at school and walked straight, their children would have a better future. This conviction, this trust, this attachment of the French people to their school, has been at the heart of the Republic for a century, from 1880 to 1980. A century of republican destiny, of scientists, of engineers from the peasant world, of writers and entrepreneurs, sons of cleaning ladies or war widows, of presidents, of generals, of academicians, of industrialists from all corners of the country and sometimes from all corners of the world. This is the France of Péguy, the France of Camus, the France of Zola, the France of Félix Éboué, it is the France of Marie Curie, it is the France of Suzanne Lacorre, daughter of a carpenter from Korea, a teacher and one of the first three women to be minister in Léon Blum's government. It is the France of Lucie Samuel, later Lucie Aubrac, daughter of a gardener and bistro owner, history graduate, resistance fighter, writer, and grand officer of the Legion of Honor. It is the France of Claudie Hénuré more recently who started her schooling in Le Creusot, at the University of Dijon before becoming a brilliant scientist and the first French woman in space. This trust that was the strength of the Republic, it is today, eroded, corroded, weakened, and challenged. And it is up to us to rebuild it with determination and without wavering. This is the condition for the Republic, for its survival and its development. The second thing that constitutes me is that I am the father of three children. Anatole, Léonard, and Sarah, 23, 21, and almost 16 years old. I love them and I do not pretend to be objective when I talk about them. They must smile when they hear me, I am a father too little present and far from perfect. I say they must smile when they hear me, but they are not here. They wish me success, I believe, and I believe I would have had trouble doing what I have been able to do without their support and that of their mother, Édith, who is also somewhere in this room, and we have decided never to expose them, and they stay away from politics. You will not see me posing in Paris Match with them, they are young adults. They have their lives and I respect their desire for discretion, as I hope everyone in this campaign will respect it. Three children, therefore. Charles Péguy said that fathers were the last adventurers of the modern world. Because fathers, as soon as they are fathers, stop worrying about themselves and start worrying about their children. He should have said, good Charles Péguy, that the greatest heroes in the history of the world were mothers. Because when I see those around me, my mother, my wife, my sister, my friends combine professional activities, personal life, family obligations, I am admiring. And not only admiring, but grateful. And not only grateful. Convinced that our society will be better when women have ever more means for their freedom, ever more authority in decisions, ever more authority in collective decisions, ever more opportunities to shine in the scientific, industrial, entrepreneurial, political world. I was not born with this conviction. It came to me rather late, but I have the voice of a convert. On this subject, I will not let go of this fight that I propose we all lead. The first, worry, restlessness, is the mark of parents. Studies, love life, risks related to bad encounters, addictions, difficulties in orientation, difficulties in professional integration. Being a parent is being worried. I am not naturally worried and I trust my children, but I know what we all think when we project ourselves and try to guess what our children's future will be at 5 years old, at 10 years old, beyond. What profession will they practice with artificial intelligence that is coming, that is here, and that is infiltrating all areas of production, thought, and exchange? It is wonderful, technology. But what will this revolution imply for our children? In what state will they find the planet on which they live? How will they live if the summer of 2026 is indeed the coolest of the next 50 years? In what environment will they raise their own children? What first homes will they buy or rent? Will they have the means to buy one? It's not going well. Will they have the desire, the means to welcome children themselves? Will they live in peace and security? And like millions of parents, I wonder about the way our society treats its children. How it protects them. How it prepares them. How it grants them priority or not. And what I see often appalls me and even more revolts me. Because every time a choice must be made, we sacrifice the future. Every time, the debt is abysmal. The debt is abysmal. Abysmal. Not so serious, Marine Le Pen, Olivier Faure, or Jean-Luc Mélenchon tell us. We will finance it very well, it doesn't cost that much. Our children will repay it, moreover. Must it really be repaid? We don't want to reform to reduce public spending? So we cut future spending. Apprenticeship, youth integration, research, innovation, environment. Our school is declining, no one denies it anymore, but no one is moving forward except to propose gadgets. And no one sees that other countries facing at least as considerable challenges in their own educational system, Germany, Finland, South Korea, Singapore, have managed to reverse the trend. The truth is that we are not making difficult decisions and we pretend to believe that our children will not pay the price. And what to say, my friends, what to say about the worst of sexual crimes, domestic violence, Parisian after-school care, child social services that cannot cope, the sexual exploitation of minors that is developing at full speed, our collective failures are terrible. When school malfunctions, when justice is not up to par, when the programs that support youth are the first to be cut from the budget. When we give up adapting our cities and our facilities to the coming climate change, when we prefer to keep for ourselves rather than build for them, we are not up to our responsibilities. None. No parent would say for their children, let's do nothing, it will be worse, but too bad for them. No one. No parent says. And yet, collectively, that is what we too often accept. The truth is that we are not doing enough for our children. We are not doing enough for the France of tomorrow. We are not doing enough to train them and prepare them for the world to come. We are not doing enough for their financial independence and their ability to invest. We are not doing enough for their social protection, they who, with a declining birth rate, will necessarily be different from ours. We are not doing enough to prepare them for climate change, for the development of artificial intelligence. We are certainly not doing enough for their defense in an increasingly dangerous world. So do not count on me to point fingers, that is the solution of those who have no solutions. I prefer to look for solutions rather than to look for culprits. Furthermore, my friends, I am not the candidate of class struggle. That has escaped no one. But I will not be the one for age-class struggle either, because a nation divided between these age classes is a nation in danger. I especially want the 2027 election to be the opportunity to settle the most important question. The question we should have asked ourselves in 2022, is our project to preserve the current situation by having our children finance it, or are we ready, determined to help them build their future? A future in which they can live better than us. That is the question. That is the only question that matters. And that is the only question that interests me. What interests me is not the France of yesterday. I loved it, the France of yesterday. It is wonderful. It was not only glorious, but I loved it in its entirety. And I do not want to see it replaced by the so-called New France, by those who trivialize ethno-communal delirium, who stir up anger, who pit French people against each other. My obsession is the France of our children, their studies, their successes, the consequences of AI on their jobs, the consequences of climate change on their cities. I said it, I will say it again because that is the stake of the election. Their freedom to have children, their fulfillment, and yes, my friends, their happiness. The happiness of our children must remain our ambition. Their happiness comes well before our comfort. Let's get that into our heads. That is why the interest of our children must be the compass of the new five-year term. Every major decision, every choice my government makes will be passed through this sieve. Are we preparing the future of this youth or are we abandoning them? Are we protecting them or are we once again looking away as when we delayed the pension reform to finish the current term in peace? Are we giving them back freedom or are we passing on to them debt, fear, dependence? I would like this time for no one to take this presidential election hostage, no one to reduce it to a war of identities or a war of generations. No one to reduce it to a comparison of posts on Instagram or TikTok. I would like, for once, to talk about France, about our children. So yes, I have three children and I refuse that at the second round of the upcoming presidential election, they only have the choice between two angers, between two lies, between two dead ends. The National Rally will tell us, as it does every time during campaigns, that everything is the fault of foreigners, of Europe, of the rich, of the lazy, of the cities that despise the countryside. No, no, no, no, no, no, come on, what's gotten into you? We don't boo others here. We fight for our ideas. We have no need to boo others, none. They are in democratic debate. I disagree with them. You do too, by the way. And that's very, very good. Continue. But we believe in respectful democratic debate. Democracy is strong. The Republic is powerful. And if we don't believe in it by casting anathema on others, then we won't get out of it. So we don't boo, but we fight. And we fight inch by inch. I was telling you, the National Rally will tell us that everything is the fault of foreigners, of Europe, of the rich, of the lazy, of the cities that despise the countryside, of the elites who no longer understand the people. Mr. Bardella's National Rally is, apparently, converted to liberalism, to Europe, to capitalism, and perhaps even, we don't know very well yet, to pension reform. Mrs. Le Pen's National Rally is the opposite. The National Rally is an "at the same time" that does not admit it. Social in the North, liberal in the South. Claimed mouthpiece of the working classes in the countryside but greedy for canapés in Monte Carlo. For public spending but against it. For taxes. For the euro, but against Europe. For sovereignty, but so benevolent with Mr. Putin. For Ukraine when necessary, but never present there and never present when it is necessary to help Kyiv in its fight against Russia's brutal aggression. La France Insoumise, for its part, wants to conquer power by pouring salt on our wounds, by choosing community division, by often flirting with the most rancid anti-Semitism, by deliberately feeding the hatred of cops, the hatred of the rich. And I know very well that Jean-Luc Mélenchon, after having drained the social democrats who should never have allied with him, will now present himself as a unifier. You will see that he will soon present himself as the heir of François Mitterrand. He has already started. I hope, my friends, that the country will not forget, will never forget who he really is. The one who wants conflict everywhere to stir up anger. The one who shouts "The Republic, it is me." The Republic, we serve it. We do not appropriate it. How, my friends, how dare, how dare to claim that European countries that have made so many efforts to put their accounts in order will agree to cancel our debt. LFI, I tell you my friends, it is peril for democracy and in two years the IMF. It is written. I will not campaign by celebrating a fantasized France of yesterday or an indoctrinated new France. I will speak to the French of today who want to build a France faithful to itself. The truth is that we know the problems and the truth is that we often know the solutions. We have the choice, we have the possibility to act. Today, thanks to you, I have this possibility. Your presence, your trust, your commitment, your encouragement give me immense strength. Thank you for being here. Thank you for refusing the easy way out. Thank you for fighting hatred and cynicism. Thank you for fighting hatred and cynicism. Thank you for seeking to unite rather than divide. Thank you for loving France as she deserves, with ambition, with respect, and with rigor. Thank you for looking far ahead and thank you for committing yourselves. And like you, exactly like you, I am here to fight. To fight for what a nation has that is richest and most precious, its own children. To fight with their parents to offer them a safe country, master of its destiny, respected and faithful to its values. A free and united nation, served by a strong state, an envied and proud country again. A country faithful to its European commitment, to freedoms in Europe, alongside Ukraine. Without compromise, without ambiguity. A France, a France of engineers and industrialists, in both masculine and feminine forms. And yes, I repeat, in feminine forms, because in this France, I want my daughter to have the same salary, the same career, the same responsibilities, the same opportunities as her brothers. And what is true for my daughter is true for all the little girls of France, whatever their origins. I believe, ladies and gentlemen, in equality of merit! And we must fight to return to merit. So, I will fight. I will fight, I will fight again and again with my reason, with my heart, with my guts. I know the state of the country very well. I know that nothing great in our country is built on denial, that we will not lift France up by pretending that everything is fine. But then, we will not lift it up either by repeating every morning that it is doomed. We will win by having a happy, joyful, optimistic campaign. A campaign that speaks neither of fear nor of anger, which are always bad counselors. A campaign that will combine the enthusiasm of the soldiers of Valmy with the calm of the old troops. A campaign that speaks to the best in the French people, their ability to unite, to bounce back, to surprise, to amaze the world even when we think all is lost. This fight goes beyond the interests of a camp or a party, it goes beyond the deadline of an election, it goes beyond the ambition of a man. It is the fight of a generation for the following ones. The fight of France today for the France of tomorrow, the fight of a father, the fight of a citizen, the fight of a lifetime, it is our fight. So yes, I am a father and a mother. That is the third thing that constitutes me. I am the mayor of Le Havre and I was Prime Minister. Almost everything I learned in politics, I learned in Le Havre. In a town hall, there are not many punchlines. We listen, we think, we roll up our sleeves. For nine years before becoming mayor, for 16 years that I have been mayor, I have listened, I have built, I have designed the future, security, the fight against incivilities, the closure or construction of new schools, urban renovation, the construction of three tramway lines, the adaptation of the city to climate change and demographic aging, the promotion of books and reading, a thousand other things, and like all mayors, I have rolled up my sleeves to convince factories to set up. The largest French offshore wind turbine factory operates in Le Havre, to develop the port of Le Havre which is an asset for France, to make the hospital of Le Havre a university hospital. And ladies and gentlemen, behind this complicated word that I stumbled over but which I will take up again, "universitarization," you see, I was very good there, behind this complicated word there is an absolutely essential issue of modernization of hospitals that are not CHUs. An absolutely considerable issue of attractiveness for interns, for doctors, for territories, and this fight we have waged in Le Havre and we are on the verge of winning it, to invest massively in higher education and in solidarity with the elderly. And my city has been transformed, it has been beautified, it attracts more and more tourists each year. I know very well that not everything is perfect there, I know it. That there is still much to do, I know it. But I know that it is a good place to live and that the people of Le Havre are proud of their city and confident in its future. It is not entirely impossible that over there, there might be some. Like all mayors in France, like all mayors in France, I have spent thousands of hours among my constituents. I know them and they know me. They do not spare me, but they trust me. I tell them what I believe and they have never failed me. Only those who have been elected and re-elected know the strength of this bond between a mayor and his constituents. And I know of no better political school than a town hall, or perhaps even better schools in general. It is not the school of television studios, it is not the school of headquarters, and it is certainly not that of social networks. It is the school of daily life. And then I was Prime Minister too, for three years. Like all prime ministers, I have experienced crises, I have made difficult decisions. I have initiated reforms and I have faced opposition. Like all prime ministers, I have not done everything well. But I have achieved things that I am proud of. And I have learned. I learned about the state, its strengths and its limits, its exceptional capacity to hold during crises and its conservative heaviness that is complicated to manage. The formidable commitment of the vast majority of those who serve it and who serve their fellow citizens. Of these police officers whom I saw determined to restore order, of these soldiers ready to give their lives for the mission, of these soldiers ready to give their lives for the mission, of these courageous firefighters on the towers of Notre-Dame as in all the streets and all the forests of France. I have seen, as we all have, the medical staff from doctors to caregivers, focused, meticulous, relentless, and humane in saving children and the elderly from illness. I have seen teachers in Saint-Laurent-du-Maroni, in Guyana, preparing their students, some of whom have only known the forest and the river, for studies in Paris with a faith and a desire that allow them to overcome all obstacles. I have seen, ladies and gentlemen, the best and the worst. And I have been confronted with impossible choices, choices where all options are bad, and you have to choose the least bad. During Covid, I made dizzying decisions knowing they would have terrible consequences. Closing nursing homes to protect residents, but cutting them off from their family ties, limiting the number of people who could attend funerals. Closing schools to confine children at home. Throughout this crisis, I said what I knew and I said what I didn't know. Saying "I don't know" is not something I learned during my studies. It's in Le Havre, with my fellow citizens and with my wife, because she hates those who pretend to know. And yes, indeed, she sometimes becomes quite critical of the political world. Crises are hard. But they are part of the mandate. They shape, they forge. I have sometimes made mistakes. I have no trouble admitting it. I leave arrogance to those who think they have already won the presidential election and who claim to solve everything with simplistic solutions. But at the end of these three years, I believe I have ensured that the state was brought to a safe harbor, with a deficit down and significantly down, with a debt stabilized and slightly down, with unemployment down and... Friends, all here, all this gives me no right, no privilege, except perhaps that of experience. And during all these years of doing, proposing, managing, I have learned. I have learned to hold a course over time, to trust my teams. I have learned to delegate and to respect everyone's skills. One does not govern alone, one does not lead alone, one does not succeed alone. I have learned that public authorities must concentrate on what they can do and leave the French free to invent the life that goes with it. I have learned to define priorities. Because in 6 years in a city or 5 years at the head of the state, you cannot do everything. This is my ambition for this presidential election. I will tell the French what I believe is good for the country and dangerous for it, even if it is unpopular, even if it costs me. I will present myself without a mask. Life and also illness, and mine, I am lucky, it is very, very visible but not serious. But life and illness have taught me the weight of others' gaze. A gaze can sometimes be cruel, but I no longer fear them. And I say to all those who, in their intimate lives, in their flesh, see their bodies transform, no longer really recognize themselves in the mirror. To all these young children, to these young women or young men who told me that cancer or alopecia or vitiligo were disrupting their lives because of others' gaze. I tell them that they are not their illness, that they are not the gaze that is cast upon them, that what they are experiencing forges them and strengthens the metal they are made of. I tell them that I understand them and that feeling this and feeling this has undoubtedly made me better and certainly freer. I will not play a character, I will not promise what I do not believe, I will not manufacture spontaneity, but when the French have decided, I will do what I said. I will not change direction at the first difficulty and I will not change priorities every six months. A course is set and then it is held in the storm as in calm weather. Nothing is built without coherence or constancy, and I will be this president of constancy. I will renew, I will renew with the sense of priorities. It is me! It is me! It is me! I will renew, my friends, with this sense of priorities. The State promises everything, takes care of everything. When you have 1000 public policies without a priority, you no longer have a priority and you fail these public policies. So we manage, we patch up, we buy tranquility before elections. Meanwhile, problems accumulate, they worsen, and we postpone them. I want a state focused on its missions: protecting its children, educating, ensuring order, managing accounts, securing pensions, guaranteeing healthcare, preparing transformations, defending the country, building infrastructure. And if we just did that well, it would be perfectly sufficient. To do, ladies and gentlemen, fewer things, but to do them well and to the end. Just after 1968, Georges Pompidou, before becoming president, had written a formidable book that I recommend on the Gordian knots of the time. Each era has its problems that appear so tangled that one must not untangle them, but cut them to get out of them. Well, I propose one thing, not to solve everything, but to tackle the knots that paralyze France and condemn our children. Everyone knows these knots, even those who pretend not to see them. I will name them, I will cut them, one by one. They are not so numerous, they are very tight, it is true, but we will cut them. Subtitling Société Radio At 55 years old, I know where I live. I know what I believe in. And I believe that we can put France back on the right track. I believe that a majority of French people think like me and aspire to have the state do its job and for politicians to prepare the future, and for the rest, to be allowed to live the life they wish. For that, we must put order back in our home. I believe, my friends, in republican order, which is not the law of the strongest and which is not the power of the richest. Republican order which allows everyone to be free, because one is never free when one is afraid to leave one's home or only when one is afraid to be oneself. When the republic is in crisis, and it has happened, it is up to republicans to re-establish order. That is what Gambetta did at the beginning of the Third Republic, that is what Clémenceau did in 1906, that is what General de Gaulle did in 1958. Today, it is up to all of us to put order back in France's affairs. Order in the streets first. And for that, police and justice must function better. Justice is the first sovereign mission of the state. And it is the symbol today of a popular trust that is cracking due to dysfunction, repetition, overload, slowness, lack of financial resources, digital lag, and mistrust of the police. 21st-century justice.
cannot any longer be rendered with the reflexes, methods, and traditions of the past century. So yes, justice needs many more financial, human, and digital resources. And yes, this catch-up was initiated when I was Prime Minister under the authority of the President of the Republic and has accelerated since, thanks in particular to the action of successive Keepers of the Seals, including that of Gérald Darmanin, and we must continue this effort. But it is not just a question of resources; justice also needs changes. Not necessarily numerous, but crucial for restoring order. Strengthen cooperation with the police and gendarmerie first. Too many proceedings are abandoned, and too many criminals escape punishment because the formalism of procedures is too heavy and information systems do not communicate with each other. They do not communicate! Recruit magistrates differently next. Older magistrates, who have had more diverse professional experiences. Because to judge well is certainly to know the law well, but it is also to know society well. Ensure that it is possible to impose very short, systematic prison sentences very early on, without waiting for the umpteenth relapse, which is always one too many. Strengthen the authority of the Keeper of the Seals. Strengthen the authority of the Keeper of the Seals over the public prosecutor's office as well. Because, as everywhere, there must be a pilot and levers. And one of these levers is the possibility of issuing individual instructions to the prosecutor, in writing and obviously available in the file. You know, 20 years ago, we decided to cut the link between the public prosecutor's office, which prosecutes criminals in the name of society, and the government, which is responsible to Parliament. Because in a few cases per year, perhaps a dozen out of the 80,000 handled by the justice system, we were rightly wary of possible conflicts of interest. I believe that was a mistake. I will give the Superior Council of the Judiciary very extensive means to absolutely prevent conflicts of interest. But in all other cases, which are the vast majority, the government's authority over the prosecutor's offices will be re-established, and I will take responsibility for modifying the Taubira law on this point. And I also want to give mayors criminal sanctioning power to punish offenses that are ruining the lives of millions of French people and that justice does not have time to sanction. I want a justice system that is swift, with guarantees, swift and fair for minor offenses. Republican trust is weakening, and disorder is setting in permanently. It is by reassuring them that justice is served, always, well, firmly, by hearing the parties, that we will regain civil peace. It will be necessary, and it is also necessary, to re-establish France on the right path and to restore order at our borders. This is the second point. France is obviously sovereign when it comes to saying who has the right to stay on its soil. It is, in my opinion, an honor. It is the honor of our country and its history to grant the right of asylum on our soil. But this right cannot be perverted, and yet it too often is. It will be up to Parliament to vote each year on a list of safe countries, which will allow procedures to be accelerated and an end to abuses, because these abuses are literally killing our ability to deal as we should with those who come to France to benefit from a just, ancient, and historical right of asylum. We must save this right of asylum by firmly excluding all those who use it against our employment. Regarding immigration, independently of the right of asylum, we will need, and let's say it, to welcome students, doctors, nurses, and engineers from abroad in the coming years. Let's not pretend otherwise, but let's ensure we control this flow rather than being subjected to it, by welcoming those who respect France, its values of liberty, equality, and fraternity, who come to work in areas we need, and by respecting the values that are at the heart of our republican promise. And in this regard, we can draw inspiration from what other European countries, of all political colors, have done: Denmark, governed by social democrats; Sweden, governed by the center; or Germany, governed by a right allied with the left. Let us take the necessary measures to ensure control of these flows. These countries have not modified their constitutions; they have not withdrawn from the European Convention on Human Rights; they have not withdrawn from European treaties. Well, we will do as they have done, ensuring in particular that delinquent foreigners are expelled and no longer have the right to social benefits. Applause Applause Applause Applause And my friends, because I am a republican and because I am a mayor, I have not given up on the integration into our national melting pot of those who become French. Yes, France must continue to make French people. We have failed in many things over the past decades regarding integration, but this too is a republican battle that must be fought, and I will not give up anything in terms of ambition and demands on this front. Putting France back on the right track also means restoring its accounts. Because with exploding debt and public deficit that we can no longer control, we will soon no longer be able to decide anything at all. Solutions exist, here again. Others in Europe have implemented them, and they are doing better than us. We are perfectly capable of doing so too, by reducing spending rather than increasing taxes and by working more. So I know, they will tell you, his project is blood and tears. That's the big phrase. As soon as we talk about effort, they say blood and tears. Let's get back to the essentials. Churchill uttered this phrase in 1940. When England had to fight alone against Nazi Germany. When bombs fell on London. When thousands of heroic young Englishmen, 20 years after their fathers, risked their lives and sometimes lost them in the Battle of Britain. Friends, let's be serious. This is not about blood or tears. It's perhaps about a little sweat, yes, effort, seriousness, determination, and I want to be clear, my friends, I will ask for efforts, but fair efforts, shared efforts, efforts spread over time. I want to protect workers, modest employees, the self-employed. I will not tax companies that already pay too much tax any further, and I repeat, we must reduce the sums and tell managers and employees in the public and private sectors that they will have to work longer, the wealthiest categories that we do not need to invent idiotic taxes to ask them to contribute to national recovery, to the State, to its agencies, to the local authorities that the French expect them to tighten their belts and set an example. So, they will tell me that's a lot, that it's not popular, perhaps, but as I promised to say what I believe, to trust the common sense of the French, as I am convinced they are ready for a surge. If our project makes sense, if it is clear that we are doing this for our children and not to finance the bottomless pit. Subtitling Société Radio I am sure that the French are ready for this surge if our project makes sense and if it is clear that we are doing all this for our children and not to finance today the bottomless pit of our renunciations. Friends, General de Gaulle said that the French want order and progress. He was right. He was right. To put France back on the right track, to put France back on the right track, to put France back on the right track, to put France back on the right track, is not only to restore republican order; it is to prepare the future. And preparing the future, as I was telling you earlier, is refounding the school. It is there that everything begins. It is the first battle. It is the school that must reconnect with its republican ambition: to instruct, to elevate, to demand, to value, to progress. And to achieve this, everything will have to be rethought. First, let's give freedom to institutions. Freedom to adapt methods, hours, teams to the needs of students. Freedom to impose, or not, if they wish, the wearing of a uniform. Freedom to set rules for discipline according to the institution. Freedom to choose and evaluate teachers, with the responsibility for principals, who must become the new school heads and who must have the means to be these heads, to be accountable in school councils that we need to renovate so that they no longer only talk about the canteen and building maintenance, but also about educational results, because freedom goes with responsibility. Next, let's make the teaching profession, my friends, a profession that is envied, honored, and respected. Let's ensure that teachers are recruited differently, better trained, better supported when they start their posts, much more supported in their fight against all forms of obscurantism, and above all, much better paid. Let's be logical: if the priority is school, if that's what we believe is most important, then we must ensure we do it with the best, and the best are paid, they are paid. Let's invest heavily in fundamental knowledge. Reading, writing, arithmetic, not because we should return to the school of the past, but because reading, writing, arithmetic, these fundamental skills, are the skills through which one is able to learn other things. No other knowledge is accessible if one is below what is needed in terms of fundamental knowledge. But let's also bring school into the 21st century, by integrating artificial intelligence into pedagogy, for example. Our children spend hours and hours on screens, and all parents are overwhelmed by this phenomenon. So let's protect the youngest by setting limits everywhere. In Le Havre, I see in nursery schools teachers telling me that children, nursery school children, spend hours in front of screens, can no longer position themselves in space, have considerable delays in language development because they are left for hours and hours each day in front of screens. If we do not protect our children, if when they are very young we do not regulate the use of screens, and when they are older we do not teach them to use the formidable potential of new technologies, then we fail everything. We give them the worst of both worlds. This pedagogical transformation must be at the heart of the refounding of the school. And I wish that every student in France has access to universal tutoring, combining personalized AI assistants and brigades of teachers, or perhaps even former teachers and volunteer students, so that no one is left behind. Let's make, my friends, the demographic transition, which will see our school lose a million students in the next five years. Let's make this demographic transition an opportunity to better pay teachers, to review the functioning of extracurricular activities, to renovate our school buildings. Finally, let's adapt the school to the needs of children, not the other way around. It may seem trivial, but this is also at the heart of the refounding of the school. Starting with school rhythms, shorter days that include more sports, more culture, homework to be done. Vacations, shortened summer vacations so that knowledge is not lost between June and September. We have chosen the most practical solutions for parents, the most practical for teachers, the most practical for the tourism industry, and the most disadvantageous for children. And we should be proud of it! And we should not change anything. And we should be content to say that it is a question of resources. We can always, my friends, lament the decline in school performance, the rise in incivility, the rise in violence, the return of obscurantism, the rise of conspiracy theories, and stop there. Because it is difficult, because there are many actors, because there is a lot of conservatism, because there are some taboos. I propose that we design and implement a massive overhaul of the school, perhaps the most important since Jules Ferry. This is the key to French recovery. ... I will be, my friends. ... I will be, my friends, the president of the return of the school to the heart of the Republic and of the student to the heart of the school. And I speak of school, but we must. We must obviously have the same ambition for secondary education, for vocational training, for university, and for apprenticeships. Preparing for the future also means equipping our children for the major transformations underway, for the issues that are here, for these transformations that are impacting our country, as indeed all other European countries, as indeed all other countries in the world. Climate transformation, artificial intelligence, demographic aging. I would like to talk about the first two today. Climate transformation first. It is useless, I think, in this room to draw you a picture. The heatwave has temporarily stunned climate skeptics, at least I hope so. It will have served at least that purpose. I said it and I stand by it: I will make ecology a campaign issue with my words, my themes, my vision. My ecology will not be an ecology of symbols; it will be an ecology of impact. Decarbonized energy with nuclear and renewable energies. The transformation of our cities to reduce heat islands. The renovation of housing, hospitals, schools. The undertaking is immense. I am not lecturing anyone by saying this. But the undertaking is immense. And when the priority is there, when the phenomenon is not going to disappear, when we have an immense built environment that was not designed for this, conceived for this, that needs to be adapted, we must say that it is a priority and allocate considerable resources. And if we want to maintain or allocate considerable resources to this essential subject, we will have to act strongly on spending elsewhere. This is what I am saying here, for a country, this is what each of us experiences in our daily lives. When a chosen or imposed priority arises, we must adapt. Audiard said, "When it changes, it changes, we must adapt." Well, he said it all. And we must adapt to this climate transformation. We must adapt our cities, our societies, our agriculture, our schools, our buildings, our rhythms, our uses to this transformation. We must implement a major rail freight plan to remove millions of trucks from our roads. We must design much better access to water for all uses. We must fight at the European level to demand the same environmental requirements from our trading partners outside Europe as those imposed on our producers. We must invest in technology to reduce our emissions. I would quite willingly tell you, my friends, that the French have no reason to be ashamed of what they are doing for their environment. I do not believe we should let those who claim otherwise have their say. Constant guilt-tripping is getting old. We have understood that there is a problem, and we are moving forward. We must go faster, it is true. We must go further, it is true. So let's equip ourselves, let's prepare ourselves, let's adapt, let's invest, let's preserve what must be preserved. Let's do it intelligently, as close to the ground as possible. Let's decentralize this competence. Let's trust local authorities. Let's trust businesses. Let's trust the actors who have already committed and who have done a lot. I can testify to this; I am the mayor of an incredibly industrial city. And I can say that in this incredibly industrial city, adaptation to climate transformation has begun. Businesses have done a lot. Have they done enough? Probably not. Have households done enough? Probably not. Do we need to help them further? Of course. But let's be proud of what has been done and be confident that we only need to accelerate and not fight over symbols that have been amplified but have no real impact on limiting greenhouse gases or adapting our society to climate transformation. And my friends, we will achieve it. Subtitling Société Radio The second transformation I want to mention is artificial intelligence. It is no longer a specialist issue. It has become a political issue of power, prosperity, and freedom. It has also become a social issue. We are far from being at the forefront. But Europe has finally woken up, perhaps a little brutally, and it is still time to react. Still time for us, as 27, to equip ourselves with sovereign infrastructure and assert our power, to adapt our higher education, our training, our industrial processes, and our safety nets in France. Because every French person is irreplaceable. Social partners must talk so that everyone, student or senior, can train, retrain, and find their place in this new world. It is quite illuminating to talk with the major bosses of these technologies, the great adventurers of this modern technological conquest, or the major bosses who are transforming their way of producing thanks to artificial intelligence, because they all see the opportunities and all the risks. All the capacity to produce better and faster, and all the potentially very destabilizing impact on populations. Both of these things are true, and we can bury our heads in the sand, like the proverbial ostrich, but this subject must be taken seriously and treated seriously. It is also time today to put artificial intelligence at the service of the State, to transform our State through AI to have more efficient public services, to have decisions made in half a second instead of six months, to have fewer agents stuck behind a desk and more in the field, in contact with the public. In France? In France and in Europe, we have all the intelligence to do it. We have the engineers, we have the energy, we have the market size. We lack the ability to mobilize funding, it's true. We lack less burdensome regulation, it's true. But we have everything we need to succeed in seizing this formidable technology that is emerging and is already here. I believe we can make it a collective tool for our happiness, and we will achieve it again. We are not doomed to failure. And to put France back on the right track, we must finally, I was going to say finally, but it is almost the most important thing, we must trust the French. And we must give them this freedom. This freedom for businesses to simplify their lives, to simplify their relations with taxes, with URSSAF, with administrations, to let them produce. We must, I say, my friends, resume the supply-side policy interrupted in 2020. It had yielded excellent results in terms of investment, unemployment reduction, and economic growth. We need more freedom for local authorities, more freedom for social partners, to build the world of work of tomorrow with them, to let them discuss within companies the rules and ways of producing and to determine the right way to keep their company moving forward. More freedom for associations to participate in national cohesion and support for the most vulnerable, and more freedom for the French to lead a happy, generous, overflowing life, because they are all at once. It is often said, my friends, that the French no longer believe in much, well, I do not believe that. I believe they are a great people, not only intelligent but proud, generous, willing. My friends, I have faith in France, in this nation of a thousand years, a thousand times in danger, a thousand times saved. A nation that has experienced everything, suffered everything, and overcome everything. Starting with itself. France loses itself when it abandons itself. I do not want it to abandon itself. I abandon it and I will never abandon it. Yes, I believe in France. And yes, I believe in the Republic. I believe in the Republic, in our secular, social, fraternal, ... universalist Republic, the one that knows only one community, the national community, and in which the only difference that counts is that of merit. I believe in the strength of these founding principles. No religious belief takes precedence over the law of the Republic. And yes, clear limits must be imposed. The Republic, my friends, will not lower its head, nor its eyes, nor its guard in the face of fundamentalism, infiltration, separatism, L'obscurantism. The Republic is not up for discussion! It is not negotiable. It is a block! A block from which nothing can be removed. And if I have one certainty, it is that with me, the France of my children will be secular. It will be generous with those who share its ideal and bring it their talents. It will be implacable with those who hate it or France. And yes, like you, I believe in the political Europe that we are building with our partners. I believe in a strong Europe, a strong Europe that refuses decline and silent vassalization. A Europe that we must deepen to remain free in terms of artificial intelligence and technology, in terms of defense, in terms of energy, in terms of financial markets. We must dare to build integral European sovereignty, otherwise we will always be at the mercy of the most numerous or the strongest. And I know, my friends, that Europe will never be powerful if France remains weak. So I believe, my friends, in the rebound of France. I know its history. And I look it in the face, this history. For one does not understand France if one forgets Louis XI and his reassertion of state control. If one is ignorant of Richelieu or Turgot, of Bayard or Turenne, of Joan of Arc or Jeanne Hachette. One does not understand France if one conceals the St. Bartholomew's Day massacre or the Cévenol dragonnades. If one sets aside, out of convenience because one does not want to acknowledge it, the Vel' d'Hiv roundup or the Sétif massacre. If one is not moved at Mont-Saint-Michel, which is in Normandy by the way. If one does not tremble at the Wall of the Federates or the Devil's Island penal colony. If one does not vibrate all together at the mention of the Sunday of Bouvines, the sun of Austerlitz, or the oath of its professors, in all those who work. I believe in these doctors, these nurses, these caregivers, these business leaders, these engineers, these workers, I believe in these farmers, these fishermen, these civil servants, these police officers, I believe in its army, I believe in its mayors and its elected officials. I see everywhere in France exceptional assets of vitality on which to restore our These talents are meant to serve. They are there to build and even to rebuild. I believe in this French pride that whips our faces in the face of adversity. I think the country knows where it is and that the French want to react. So nothing, absolutely nothing will make me lose faith in my country. My friends, France is not condemned. The French are not resigned. Our children are not reduced to living less well than us. Our country is not forced to endure history written by others. The destiny of France is still in the hands of the French. It depends on our effort, it depends on our courage. It depends on our effort, it depends on our courage. It depends on our constancy, our imagination. It depends on us. So yes, in this decisive moment, I call on you to believe in France. I call on you to act for our children. I call on you to believe in what we can do together. I call on you to believe in us. Long live the Republic and long live France.