1 – Last Council of Ministers before a studious vacation
The last Council of Ministers will be held on Friday at the Élysée, before a four-week summer break. But it is not yet quite the holidays for the members of the government: they have been urged by Matignon to follow the work of the National Assembly until August 6, the date of the end of the parliamentary session. . They must also, as usual, remain reachable and follow the news of their respective sectors. The back-to-school Council of Ministers will take place on August 24. The return to parliament will only take place on October 3. Contrary to custom, the government has chosen not to organize an extraordinary session, in order to allow time to prepare in advance the major pieces of legislation planned for the fall: unemployment insurance, energy, immigration and of course the budget.
Read also – Emmanuel Macron and the holidays of power
2 – Great summer crossover on the rails
Friday will be the busiest day of the summer for the SNCF. The company expects 400,000 passengers on its trains on Friday alone. Over the weekend, 1 million people will take a TGV or an Intercités. This remains less than the weekend of July 8, 9 and 10 with 1.3 million travelers and that of the July 14 bridge (2 million people). Good figures for the SNCF, which says it is having a record summer: 18 million main line tickets have been sold, and we go up to 22 million with the TER. This is 10% more than in 2019, and 20% more for TERs alone. The most popular destinations are the Mediterranean, the South West and Brittany. For cities, these are Paris, Lyon, Bordeaux, Marseille and Avignon.
3 – Tribute to the firefighter who died in Tarascon
On Friday, a tribute will be paid to Martial Morin, a volunteer firefighter from Drôme who died after becoming unwell while fighting a fire in Tarascon (Bouches-du-Rhône) in mid-July. His death, which occurred after ten days of hospitalization, was announced on Wednesday. Medical examinations after his illness on mission revealed that he “suffered from a bacterial infection of the epiglottis” (tongue of cartilage at the level of the larynx), indicated the direction of the departmental fire and rescue service of the Drôme. Admitted to the intensive care unit, he died Monday afternoon following a heart attack. The Minister Delegate for Local Authorities, Caroline Cayeux, will preside over this tribute located in Tain-l’Hermitage, where the chief warrant officer lived.
Read also – After the fires in Gironde, the displaced are back, between amazement and resilience
4 – The Constitutional Council decides on the working time of the municipalities
Can civil servants of local authorities work below the legal working time? The Constitutional Council will answer tomorrow, after having been seized of this question by elected Communists of Val-de-Marne. The mayors of Vitry-sur-Seine, Fontenay-sous-Bois, Ivry-sur-Seine and Bonneuil-sur-Marne refuse to apply the law on the transformation of the public service, which since January 1, 2022 imposes a time minimum working time of 1,607 hours per year for municipal administrations. They believe that this measure is contrary to Article 72 of the Constitution, which allows “the free administration of local authorities and contractual freedom”. This law is contested by several administrations all over France, including that of the town hall of Paris, where civil servants usually work 1,552 hours a year.
5 – Towards zero growth in the second quarter
INSEE will unveil tomorrow the first estimates of French growth for the second quarter. After an initial contraction in GDP of 0.2% in the first quarter, growth between April and June should probably be sluggish or even nil, given the persisting inflation. In their latest forecasts, the Banque de France and INSEE have forecast growth of 0.2% and 0.25%. INSEE will also unveil the new price increase for the month of July, which could cross the 6% mark, after an increase of 5.8% in June. The figures on household morale published by the National Institute of Statistics are not reassuring either. For the seventh consecutive month, the morale of French consumers is declining, according to figures released today.
6 – Six years later, Beyoncé is back
It is tonight, at midnight, that Beyoncé’s seventh album will be unveiled on music platforms. Since June 16, we already knew its title, Renaissance. A first single, Break My Soul, posted online on June 21, also gave some indications of the musical aesthetic of this opus rooted in 90s New York house. As for her cover, it was unveiled on July 1, showing the haughty diva riding a crystal nag. So much information distilled in dribs and drabs by Queen B (one of Beyoncé’s many nicknames) to better heighten the excitement around this event album, the successor to Lemonade (2016) sold 2.5 million copies worldwide. This ultra-locked communication nevertheless experienced a hiccup on Thursday with leaks on Twitter revealing the album’s inner booklet, its tracklisting (16 titles) and a handful of songs…
We are delighted – French people are developing a tiny DNA-based robot
A feat that looks like science fiction: researchers have succeeded in building a DNA-based “nano-robot” that will help to better understand different processes at the microscopic scale in our cells. To achieve this, they relied on the so-called “DNA origami” technique: 3D nanostructures self-assemble in a predefined shape, with the DNA molecule serving as construction material. This work, published in Nature Communications, was carried out by a team from Inserm, CNRS and the University of Montpellier, at the Structural Biology Center of Montpellier.
With unprecedented precision, this tiny robot can apply and control a force of the order of one piconewton. That is one thousand-billionth of a Newton, knowing that one Newton corresponds to the force of a finger on the plunger of a pen… Thanks to its size compatible with human cells, it will be able to explore the mechanical forces which are exerted on these and which activate signals involved in the functioning of our body (touch, hearing, perception of pain, etc.) or in the development of diseases such as cancer.