Updated at 6:45 p.m. with the press release from Joël Guerriau
A meeting between the President of the Senate and Joël Guerriau is planned for September 25, a meeting whose nature Gérard Larcher clarified the same morning on France Inter.
“As of November 2023, I asked Joël Guerriau to resign from his position and no longer come to the Senate. I had agreed that I would see him again before the start of the parliamentary session, to remind him of the need to resign from his functions, in particular as secretary of the Senate and vice-chairman of the foreign affairs committee,” the president said. of the upper room.
“Only the Constitutional Council can dismiss a parliamentarian from his mandate”
According to information from Ouest FranceJoël Guerriau nevertheless intends to make his return. The senator is “very determined and very clear about his desire to return to the Senate,” another parliamentarian from Loire-Atlantique told the regional daily.
On France Inter, Gérard Larcher therefore affirmed to think “personally that his place is no longer in the Senate”, while adding that it was not his responsibility to prevent a return of Joël Guerriau to the Senate. “I remind you that only the Constitutional Council, after a court decision, can dismiss a parliamentarian from his mandate,” he clarified.
The environmental group requests referral to the Senate ethics committee
Gérard Larcher is not the only one to want the senator to be sidelined. The hypothesis of his return also caused the environmentalist group of the Senate to jump, which requested in a press release the referral to the Senate Parliamentary Ethics Committee. A position shared by colleagues from other groups, such as socialist senator Laurence Rossignol, who affirms in a tweet that many elected officials will refuse “to sit with an elected official suspected of having drugged a colleague”.
This Wednesday evening, Joël Guerriau announced in a press release to AFP that he “disputes the facts” but that he wants to “preserve the serenity” of the Senate by withdrawing.
As a reminder, Joël Guerriau is accused of having drugged MP Sandrine Josso without his knowledge, in order to abuse her. He is currently under investigation. The investigation is ongoing and he remains presumed innocent.
