Jean Castex repeats it over and over again.
He, Prime Minister, intends to take on his role as leader of the majority.
Its roadmap is clear, clear.
“Result, result, result.
It is the alpha and the omega.
The Prime Minister is the leader of a team and he must manage so that there is something concrete, visible, this automatically requires an organization with the National Assembly which is efficient and fluid ”, summarizes a close friend of the President .
"He sees himself as a COO, a chief operating officer," adds the LREM deputy, Roland Lescure.
A challenge that he will be able to tackle again in the flesh after having tested negative for Covid this afternoon.
The LREM group is divided, scalded by a relationship deemed too vertical to the government, undermined by departures (around forty!).
Its new leader, Christophe Castaner, was elected in pain.
Relations with the Modem, accused of thriving on the defections of Walkers, are also polluted by friction.
Recently, Jean Castex reread “Le Nœud gordien”, the political testament of Georges Pompidou.
The book, which sits on his desk, “theorizes quite well the role of the Prime Minister under the Fifth” underlines his entourage.
He also evokes the difficulty of governing ...
"It is not enough to say it to be it"
How, the one who still had his LR card a few days before his appointment to Matignon, intends to win at the head of this composite majority?
Because, recalls an LREM deputy, "it is not enough to say it to be it".
According to its main interlocutors, the Castex method is first of all to multiply exchanges with the tenors of the majority.
"He takes the time to do this job" assures Patrick Mignola.
More often than not, an overloaded schedule requires, "on its early mornings and nights" slips the president of the MoDem group.
"No SMS goes unanswered", abounds the boss of LREM Stanislas Guerini, received at length before his general policy speech, at breakfast time on July 14.
In small groups, it is not uncommon to hear parliamentarians imitate his Southwestern phrasing.
"But contrary to what his accent suggests, he has a lot of authority," warns Mignola.
With him, the questions are more closed than open ... "
"A pact of confidence"
His speech at the LREM Summer Campus, in Amiens (Somme) on Friday evening, was to be the high point of his tour of parliamentary days, spent by those of Agir and the Modem.
Alas, confined to Matignon (because he was a contact case with the coronavirus), his first exchange with the Walkers was virtual.
"What do we remember?
What worries us as Walkers, confides one of them, is what place do we have, what is our identity in the common house?
"A case that the Prime Minister hears, assures a relative, to follow" very closely "with Stanislas Guerini, François Bayrou and Richard Ferrand.
If he still has not joined LREM, he also intends to participate each month in the executive office of the party.
Friday evening, the head of government still purposely distilled some messages likely to speak to LREM deputies.
On the merits, by evoking in particular equality of opportunity.
And on the method, offering them "a pact of confidence".
"The place that is rightfully yours and the listening that we owe you", he promised.
The elected representative of Prades (Pyrénées-Orientales) also wants to put an end to these missteps that anger the deputies for not much.
Like the trips of ministers organized without warning the local parliamentarian.
Be careful, too, to involve them in the recovery plan, to support them in this period of high social risk.
“When a business closes in a constituency, you cannot leave a deputy stranded for information and answers,” sums up a member of the government.
The troops expect "gestures of love"
Place the practical work Tuesday, with the resumption of the breakfasts of the majority.
He has so far only held two.
“The round table had not changed, except him.
He took it with humility, saying I'll try to do this well, ”relates one participant.
Tuesday, according to our information, will be especially the day of a large meeting with three groups, LREM, Modem, Agir-Ensemble, from 10:30 am to 12:30 pm in the party room of the Hôtel de Lassay.
An unprecedented meeting, conceived as “the first incarnation” of the famous “intergroup”.
A baptism of fire.
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After the words, the troops are now waiting for "gestures of love", warns Roland Lescure.
"Now we must do", engages a minister.
The next few weeks will be crucial.
It is there, notes a pillar of the majority, that "its capacity to make the whole majority walk in the same direction will be tested".
To come, in particular, the law separatism and the vote of the Budget.
“For him, notes the same, this will be a political crash test.
"