Patrick Ollier

Patrick Ollier (born 17 December, 1944 in Périgueux, Dordogne) is a French MP for the UMP party and the Mayor of Rueil-Malmaison. He was briefly the President of the National Assembly in 2007. He is the partner of Michèle Alliot-Marie, French Minister of Defence in the governments of Jean-Pierre Raffarin and Dominique de Villepin.

He was elected on 16 June 2002, representing the Hauts-de-Seine, near Paris. He is president of the French National Assembly's committee on Economic Affairs, the Environment, and Territory. He is interested in renewable energies, and Africa, being head of the French-Libyan friendship group in the National Assembly.

On January 14, 2007 he announced that he would be candidate to the presidency of the National Assembly, replacing Jean-Louis Debré, who would join the Constitutional Council. He ended up as the only candidate, as the opposition refused to take part in the vote, and was elected on 7 March 2007. However, and although he had expressed the wish to remain President of the Assembly, he was not chosen by the UMP group as its candidate for the presidency after the legislative election, and was succeeded by Bernard Accoyer on June 26 of the same year.

Private life

He is also the partner of Michèle Alliot-Marie, who is ministry of the Interior in the Government of Francois Fillon since May 18 2007.Mr Ollier is an Honorary member of the Rotary Club of Rueil Malmaison and a public officer.

Public life

In the same time Ollier is assistant-Mayor in the city of Rueil Malmaison. Rueil is a high-class suburb of Paris, and a municipality which does not respect the "SRU law" (see chapter hereunder), a French law forcing municipalities to build 20% of social apartments. He is also, since March 2007, the President of the Parliamentary Chamber in France.

Parliamentary work

Ollier, following General de Gaulle's social positions, is the inventor of the "Work's dividend" who has been taken back in many Government decisions and parliamentary works.

Renewables energies

In 2005, during a debate on energy law, Patrick Ollier presented an amendment on wind power known as the "Ollier Amendment." It aimed to raise the minimum electrical output of wind farms that qualify for automatic electricity repurchase by the EDF to those that produce more than 30MW (from the previous 12MW.) It also limited construction of wind farms to designated areas that were to be defined later. This caused an outcry from various environmental organizations. When faced with this opposition, the amendment was withdrawn.

SRU Law

* M. Ollier constantly worked to amend the SRU law (solidarité et renouvellement urbains) (solidarity and urban renewal) of December 2000, and specially to amend and decrease the quota of 20 % of social apartments forced to the French municipalities ["L'assouplissement de la loi SRU revient devant les députés", Le Monde, 29 mai 2006] .

* Ending January 2006, the SRU law was decreased by the National Assembly of the French Parliament by the adoption of a Patrick Ollier and Gérard Hamel's amendment, in first lecture (which means in the Parliamentary procedure that it has the governmental support) on a law project (loi ENL). This amendment Ollier-Hamel allowed to consider some real-estate operation to social accession to property as some social apartments. The French Senate suppressed these measures on April 2006.

* On May 30 2006, in the National Assembly, on a second-lecture of the law project (ENL), Patrick Ollier deponed again one amendment against the 20% quota of social apartments ("logements sociaux") forced to 740 French municipalities.

Africa

* Patrick Ollier was head of the France-Libya friendship group of the French Parliament. He made several visits in that country, sometimes for the Élysée or the Quai d'Orsay. He has been officially visiting other Arab countries like Tunisia.

* Following Réseau Voltaire, he would have helped Elf to plant in Nigeria.

* In the Clearstream affair 2, his name has been cited in the meeting of the 9 janvier 2004 between Dominique de Villepin, Philippe Rondot and Jean-Louis Gergorin in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Jean-Louis Gergorin cited then «"excessives links"» of Patrick Ollier with Arab countries. Le général Philippe Rondot aurait délibérément caché au ministre de la Défense que le nom de son conjoint avait été mentionné. Selon son témoignage, il avait reçu comme consigne de Dominique de Villepin de «"ne rien communiquer au ministère de la Défense"». Toutefois, il semble que son nom ne figurait pas dans les listings truqués de Clearstream. Patrick Ollier s'est constitué partie civile dans ce dossier.

Official positions

Patrick Ollier took often clear position: signature of the anti-PACS petition (civilian agreement of common life for hetero- and homosexual), opposition to the ("IVG" - Voluntary Pregnancy Interruption) (abortion) reform in 2000. He refused to acknowledge the date of 19 march 1962 as " [http://www.assemblee-nationale.fr/11/dossiers/journee_nationale_souvenir.asp Journée nationale du souvenir et de recueillement à la mémoire des victimes civiles et militaires] de la guerre d'Algérie et des combats du Maroc et de Tunisie". (National Remembrance Day in memory of civilian and military victims of the Algerian war and the combats in Morocco and Tunisia)

In June and July 2006, he worked actively for the privatization of the French public company of gas Gaz de France and its fusion with Suez to form GDF Suez.

References

External links

* [http://www.patrick-ollier.com Patrick Ollier's official website (in French)]