Modem President François Bayrou says he has "no desire to embarrass the government" by reviving his old proposal for a referendum on pension reform, which has been called for by several opposition parties. "I have always, throughout my life, defended the idea that, faced with the extreme difficulties of a pension reform, deciding on it by a referendum of the French people was the best method to avoid blockages," he adds during his greetings to the press, but "you can see that this is not the approach that the government has chosen today." IMAGES AND SOUNDBITES