Parliament on Thursday approved a draft resolution requesting the Court of Auditors to assess the budgetary impact of aligning cohabitant allowances with single-person ones.
In 1945, when social security was created, it was shaped around a family model based on direct rights granted to the head of the family, i.e. the breadwinner, and derived rights for family members who shared his or her life and were not engaged in any professional activity.
This model corresponds increasingly less to today’s society and penalises people according to their life choices, its critics say.
“The individualisation of rights is a question of justice, and the abolition of cohabitant status is the first essential step to achieve this,” Socialist parliamentarian Sophie Thémont stressed.
“We want to benefit from the expertise of the Court of Auditors to find out how much abolishing this cohabitant rate would cost,” added PS group leader in the House, Ahmed Laaouej.
“Indeed, we are often told that it would be far too expensive … it is time to have objective figures to open a real debate and achieve an ambitious reform,” Laaouej noted.
