Will she still be able to take pictures of the “invaders” tomorrow, these video game heroes hidden in the streets of Paris, as she liked to do with her two children? Probably not. He will also have to agree to put aside knitting and half-marathon shoes, two other of his passions. Marylise Léon will also not be able to continue to cut off her professional laptop on weekends and during holidays, as she has done until now, which had the gift of driving her collaborators crazy.
This Wednesday, the 46-year-old (46) officially becomes secretary general of the CFDT, taking over from Laurent Berger, who has decided to shorten his term. Contrary to tradition, the transfer will not take place during a congress but at the Zénith de Paris, in a festive atmosphere, in front of thousands of activists gathered for the occasion. The outcome of the vote is not the shadow of a doubt, as Marylise Léon is unanimous within the reformist central. “She has a strong understanding of the world of work, sometimes finer than mine,” likes to repeat Laurent Berger. “He is a calm person whose arrival went extremely satisfactorily,” agrees Luc Mathieu, national secretary in charge of salaries and purchasing power.
Outside, too, his qualities are praised. “Marylise Léon is an interlocutor with whom we have already worked and exchanged a lot in the past. She has a great knowledge of the working world. The fact that she succeeds Laurent Berger is a sign of continuity,” said Prime Minister Élisabeth Borne. She is “in the same vein (as Laurent Berger). At the same time very determined, with listening, a reforming will, a form of requirement (…) I think that it will count, as Berger counted”, greets the president of the Senate and former Minister of Labor, Gérard The Archer. “With her, it’s not trench warfare,” says CPME vice-president Éric Chevée. It is very much in tune with the image of the CFDT. She is a trade unionist of compromise and not of compromise. Difficult to find dissonant voices.
Far from being an unknown, the new number one is recognized for her work. It has been more than five years since she grew up under the wing of her predecessor, because the latter did not leave without neglecting to prepare the sequel. On the contrary, the native of Guérande, who himself benefited more than ten years ago from a smooth arrival planned by his predecessor, François Chérèque, wanted in turn to anticipate the passing of the baton.
Over the years, Marylise Léon has been entrusted with delicate files, such as the discussions on the 2018 unemployment insurance agreement, for the first time limited by a framework letter from the State which set the main orientations. . But also the subject of relations with external partners which gave birth to “the pact of living”, a gathering of associations around environmental, social and democratic issues. All with a popularity rating always at the zenith: as proof, she was, at each congress, the best elected national secretary of the office, with approval rates well above 90%.
To refine her future stature, she has not hesitated to show herself as often as possible with Laurent Berger in recent months. She was by his side in the front square during each day of mobilization against the pension reform. Except one. Taking advantage of the number one’s trip to Albi on February 16, she took the lead of the Parisian procession alone. “Basically, there is not a gap of a sheet of cigarette paper between her and her predecessor”, underlines Marc Landré, partner at Sia Partners and specialist in social issues.
However, this proximity does not mean a total absence of change. The incarnation will be different. Marylise Léon arrives with her own sensitivity. The one who landed her first job in a motorway company specialized in pollution control issues very early on. Two years after the drama of the AZF accident in Toulouse, which occurred in 2001, she chose to join the CFDT chemistry-energy federation to “help activists contribute to risk prevention through their work, for example by checking that the reality is in line with what is planned on paper”, she confides to the Telegram.
Appreciated as a lieutenant, will she have the ability to hold the helm as a captain? “A good trade unionist is not necessarily someone who is easy, especially in negotiations”, she underlined in 2019. This is good because there will be no shortage of subjects after the pension episode. The fourteen days of mobilization will not have succeeded in bending the government on the decline in the legal age of departure to 64 years. After bringing the troops to the streets, Marylise Léon will have to manage their disappointment at having obtained little or nothing. A challenge.
And this, even if the unions regularly claim to be “in a position of strength”. It is true that they are in a more offensive position than at the end of 2022. First overtaken by the “yellow vests”, then doubled by collectives on social networks and spontaneous strike movements, such as that of the controllers at the SNCF during Christmas celebrations, the unions seemed to be struggling. Turnaround with the pension reform. The CFDT, rather inclined to dialogue, did not hesitate to move the fight to the street. Laurent Berger has won a record popularity rate and 43,000 additional memberships, which he leaves as a legacy to Marylise Léon. “Contrary to the political landscape, there is a social majority in France and the unions have succeeded in making themselves their spokespersons”, deciphers Raymond Soubie, former social adviser to Nicolas Sarkozy and president of the Alixio group.
Wishing to turn the page on the protest, the government has decided to put the issue of work at the top of the political agenda. A delayed victory for the CFDT, which had adopted as its slogan: “To talk about pensions, let’s talk about work first.” Governance of unemployment insurance, purchasing power… The subjects will not be lacking for the leader of the first union in France to defend her convictions.
As a central reformist, the CFDT seized this outstretched hand. But the executive does not intend to sacrifice its program on the altar of dialogue. The recent file of the conditioning of the RSA, a red line for the new boss of the CFDT as for the other organizations, shows it. On the trade union side, the promises of renewed social dialogue are received with skepticism. “We are ready to discuss but we want guarantees on the reality of the negotiations and on the room for maneuver”, has not ceased to remind in recent weeks Marylise Léon.
Another subject: the future of the inter-union. If Laurent Berger has whistled “the end of the game” on pensions, Marylise Léon will have to continue working together to influence issues such as salary increases or to oppose the degression of unemployment benefits. Unity is strength: it gives a greater ability to mobilize, to weigh, a better image for the unions presented as “responsible” and “capable of getting along”… But this sacred union could quickly become a handicap for the CFDT. The large common assemblies risk quickly turning into an exercise of cross-monitoring, especially during multilaterals with the government, while fundamental divisions continue to oppose reformists and radicals. “The inter-union was built on opposition to pension reform, not on unity of thought”, thus raises Raymond Soubie. An opinion partly shared by Marylise Léon. “We don’t know if we will find common positions on all subjects and we will also continue to carry out our own work,” she warned at the end of May.
The question of his relationship with his CGT alter ego, Sophie Binet, will be widely scrutinized. In the game of the seven differences, the power grabs of the two women remain a model of the genre. Where the arrival of Marylise Léon was like a letter to the post office, that of Sophie Binet is the culmination of a series of reversals of which only the Montreuil power plant has the secret. Following a tumultuous congress, the current secretary general of the CGT was appointed at the end of March after no other contender managed to attract enough votes.
This late propulsion of the cégétiste on the front of the stage explains that the two numbers one still know each other badly. They planned to meet in the next few days. With the opportunity to create an iconic duo like the union world has not seen for a long time. “Together, they will renew the image of trade unionism”, assures Antoine Foucher, former chief of staff of Muriel Pénicaud. Both feminists and attached to environmental issues, they should push trade unionism out of its comfort zone, the world of work, to interfere more widely in societal debates. Exactly where the President of the Republic considers that he is not in his place. Relations between the number one of the CFDT and the head of state, which we knew were icy under Laurent Berger, could not warm up much.
