Spotlight: French gov't mulls "emergency pact" on unemployment after regional runoff

After regional elections during which the Socialist party contenders did less poorly than expected, the government is mulling over "an emergency pact" to inject dynamism into the domestic labor market, widely seen as the springboard for re-election in the 2017 presidential runoff.

With five out of 13 regions secured, the Socialist party and it's allies have limited the loss. However, the score was considered a defeat for the leftist party, which dominated the country's constituencies in 2010.

In the two-round regional elections, the far-right National Front did not obtain any region, but did record a growing appeal of discontented voters disappointed by the Socialists' broken promises of high revenue and more jobs.

"Tonight there is no relief, no triumphalism, no message of victory. The danger of the far-right has not been removed, far from it," French Prime Minister Manuel Valls said shortly after the release of exit poll results.

Regarding the measure under proposal, the government would unveil, by the end of January, "an emergency pact that will include shock measures" in order "to act relentlessly and faster" to improve employment, according to local media.

"Employment, training of people without work, learning for our young people, need more than ever to mobilize all our energy," a source close to Valls was quoted as saying by local media.

In the last election before the race to Elysee Palace, the regional runoff was a fresh test for the Socialist leader Francois Hollande, who is hoping that his numerous attempts to bring down unemployment will set him up to maintain his post as France's top official.

Under fire for his poor economic record, Hollande said he would not seek a second term if he fails to lower a long-term rise in the unemployment rate, currently at 10.2 percent, the highest level since 1997.

"An immediate danger was avoided. But if no answers are made to the French people's concerns, the National Front will continue its rise until the presidential election," warned the left-wing daily, La Croix.

Speaking to iTele news channel, Jean-Marie Le Guen, junior minster for relations with parliament, said "the solution to France's problems is to address its training problems and to give back to work a much greater appreciation than we have been doing for 30 years."

With a 30-billion-euro (33 billion U.S. dollar) cut in payroll charges, and by pumping millions of euros into financing job contracts for poorly-skilled young people without work, the government aims to encourage investment and bring the number of jobless people to less than three million by the end of 2017.

At the end of October, France received jobless claims from more than 3.589 million people, 42,000 more than that of September, hitting a 30-month high, figures released by the labor ministry showed.

"The government is working on a series of new measures for employment to be implemented quickly," a government source told local media without elaborating. Endit