A framework for the French pension reform is due to be published by the high commissioner in the coming weeks, the attendees at the World Pension Forum in Brussels heard.

At the eighth annual forum, professionals from the French pensions industry discussed the current environment and could reveal that they have an idea of what the high commissioner for pension reform Jean Paul Delevoye will announce.

Pension fund AGIRC-ARRCO chief financial officer Philippe Goubeault said the announcement to confirm the guiding principles for the French government pension reform framework should come before the summer recess.

“However, we already have some idea as to some of the guidelines, which the French government has indicated in the past few weeks. As of today, we can say that we are moving towards, progressively, an all-encompassing universal regime that could operate for all under the same umbrella.”

The regime would mean that workers in the public sector, workers in the private sector, rail workers and the unemployed could be covered by a first-pillar pension.

Goubeault said: “Everyone would really work together in a regime, and it could be a point-based regime like the French fund AGIRC-ARRCO. We know that in terms of the salary base, it could be triple the French social security at the moment.”

The French first pillar has a social security baseline is roughly €3300, he said. “So triple that, you get roughly 10,000 per month of salary, and that would be the new, all-encompassing regime. It will include 98 per cent of the French population.”

Sorbonne University demographics expert at the institute of geography Gérard-François Dumont explained that France is faced with multiple problems, such as the civil service regime and not having enough resources to provide full access to pensions.

“Raising public debt is also an issue, but there is no other solution. The future may be compromised because the real employment rate is lower than the EU average and in real terms, this may be as low as 10 per cent lower than the German or British employment rate.

“The only positive note and light of hope is that the average for a French woman is higher, which compensates a little bit, but not enough,” he said.

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