Pierre Mauroy

Pierre Mauroy (2007)

Pierre Mauroy [ pjɛʁ mo'ʁwa ] (born July 5, 1928 in Cartignies , Département Nord , † June 7, 2013 in Clamart ) was a French socialist politician of the Parti socialiste (PS) . He was mayor of Lille for almost 30 years and prime minister from 1981 to 1984 .

Life

Mauroy was born the son of a Franco-Flemish teacher. He attended high school in Cambrai and later the vocational school in Cachan . From 1952 Mauroy worked as a vocational school teacher in Colombes near Paris.

From 1944 he became involved in the old socialist party Section française de l'Internationale ouvrière (SFIO) and was General Secretary of the Socialist Youth from 1949 to 1958. In 1955 he became general secretary of the vocational school teachers' union. In 1961 he became general secretary of the Northern Federation of the SFIO. When the PS was founded in 1971, when the SFIO, the Fédération de la Gauche Démocrate et Socialiste and the Parti radical socialiste were united, he became the coordinating secretary in their national office. Step by step he continued his career. At the suggestion of Augustin Laurent , he reached the second position on the election list of the Socialist Party in the local elections in 1971 in Lille. Augustin Laurent was re-elected, resigned two years later, on January 8, 1973, and Mauroy succeeded him. On March 11, 1973, he was also elected a member of the Northern Department in the National Assembly. In 1974 he was elected President of the Regional Council of the Nord-Pas-de-Calais region . From 1979 to 1980 he was a member of the European Parliament .

As an important pillar of François Mitterrand in the creation of the left coalition in 1981, as a staunch European and resolute opponent of the centralization of France, Mauroy was appointed Prime Minister by him on May 21, 1981 after François Mitterrand was elected President . Mauroy's first coalition government , which was formed after winning the National Assembly election, included four Communist Party (PCF) ministers . In fulfillment of the president's election promises, Mauroy presented an immediate social program and the first steps in an ambitious reform program: introduction of the 39-hour week, five weeks of paid annual leave, recruitment of additional civil servants, decentralization of administration, nationalization of large companies (such as Bull Computer , Rhône-Poulenc , Dassault , Sacilor , Usinor and Thomson ) and banks ( Crédit Lyonnais , Compagnie financière de Suez ), property tax increases, income increases, abolition of various security laws, retirement at 60, abolition of the death penalty , reform of the media, abortion (against the advice of Presidents).

As in West Germany and Great Britain as a result of the oil crisis , the inflation rate and unemployment rose in France . In addition, there was a currency crisis that forced Mauroy a year later to adopt a restrictive fiscal policy ( politique de l'austérité ), personified by Finance Minister Jacques Delors . The indexing of incomes in relation to the price level was abandoned, which enabled a fall in real incomes, and private vocational training was postponed. This fiscal policy was rejected by many voters on the left. The communist ministers then left the government in 1983 after increasing disputes. On March 22, 1983, Mitterrand reassigned Mauroy to form his third government. Two weeks later, on April 6, 1983, Mauroy announced in his government statement emergency ordinances to implement a drastic austerity and restriction program. In particular, the communist union CGT then organized nationwide strikes . On July 18, 1984, President Mitterrand decided to replace Mauroy with Laurent Fabius as Prime Minister.

Mauroy then returned to the north, where he had great political weight. In 1988 he became chairman ( first secretary ) of the PS. He gave up this post in 1992 when he was elected Senator . From September 17, 1992 to 1999, Mauroy succeeded Willy Brandt as President of the Socialist International . In 2001 Jacques Delors ' daughter Martine Aubry succeeded him as mayor of Lille. Until then she had been his "right hand".

On June 7, 2013, Mauroy died at the Percy Military Hospital in Clamart. Just 14 days later, the Lille metropolitan region renamed the Grand Stade Lille Métropole in Villeneuve-d'Ascq to Stade Pierre-Mauroy .

Web links

Commons : Pierre Mauroy  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Entry on Pierre Mauroy in the database of Members of the European Parliament

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Pierre Mauroy: un notable au coeur de l'histoire de la gauche modern . Les Échos . June 7, 2013. Accessed March 6, 2016.
2. ↑ Discours d'investiture de Pierre Mauroy en tant que Président du Conseil Régional Nord-Pas-de-Calais (10 January 1974); Archives régionales ref: 655W1 collection AR NpdC
3. ^ Pierre Mauroy, ancien premier ministre, est mort. In: Le Monde of June 7, 2013 (French). Retrieved June 7, 2013.
4. ↑ France Football, June 25, 2013, p. 11