French government faces collapse as left and far-right submit no-confidence motions

[Vinson]

PARIS, Dec 2 (Reuters) - The French government is all but certain to collapse later this week after far-right and left-wing parties submitted no-confidence motions on Monday against Prime Minister Michel Barnier.
Investors immediately punished French assets as the latest developments plunged the euro zone's second-biggest economy deeper into political crisis, with serious doubt cast over whether the annual budget will be approved.

"The French have had enough," National Rally (RN) leader Marine Le Pen told reporters in parliament, saying Barnier, who only became prime minister in early September, had made things worse and needed to be pushed out. "We are proposing a motion of no confidence against the government," she said.
Barring a last-minute surprise, Barnier's fragile coalition will be the first French government to be forced out by a no-confidence vote since 1962.

A government collapse would leave a hole at the heart of Europe, with Germany also in election mode, weeks ahead of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump re-entering the White House.
RN lawmakers and the left combined have enough votes to topple Barnier and Le Pen confirmed her party would vote for the left-wing coalition's no-confidence bill on top of the RN's own bill. That vote is likely to be held on Wednesday.

The parties announced their no-confidence motions after Barnier said earlier on Monday that he would try to ram a social security bill through parliament without a vote as a last-minute concession proved insufficient to win RN's support for the legislation.
"Faced with this umpteenth denial of democracy, we will censure the government," said Mathilde Panot of the left-wing France Unbowed. "We are living in political chaos because of Michel Barnier's government and Emmanuel Macron's presidency."

The spread between French bonds and the German benchmark widened further and a sell-off in the euro gathered pace.
Since Macron called snap elections in early June, France's CAC 40 (.FCHI), opens new tab has dropped nearly 10% and is the heaviest faller among top EU economies. It closed flat on Monday after dropping over 1% earlier in the day.

Barnier urged lawmakers not to back the no-confidence vote.

"We are at a moment of truth ... The French will not forgive us for putting the interests of individuals before the future of the country," he said as he put his government's fate in the hands of the divided parliament which was the result of an inconclusive snap election Macron called in June.
Barnier's minority government had relied on RN support for its survival. The budget bill, which seeks to rein in France's spiraling public deficit through 60 billion euros ($63 billion) in tax hikes and spending cuts, snapped that tenuous link.

Barnier's entourage and Le Pen's camp each blamed the other and said they had done all they could to reach a deal and had been open to dialogue.
A source close to Barnier said the prime minister had made major concessions to Le Pen and that voting to bring down the government would mean losing those gains.

"Is she ready to sacrifice all the wins she got?" the source told Reuters.
If the no-confidence vote does indeed go through, Barnier would have to tender his resignation but Macron may ask him and his government to stay on in a caretaker role to handle day-to-day business while he seeks a new prime minister, which could well happen only next year.

One option would be for Macron to name a government of technocrats with no political programme, hoping that could help survive a no-confidence vote. In any case, there can be no new snap parliamentary elections before July.
As far as the budget is concerned, if parliament has not adopted it by Dec. 20, the caretaker government could invoke constitutional powers to pass it by ordinance.

However, that would be risky as there is a legal grey area about whether a caretaker government can use such powers. And that would be sure to trigger uproar from the opposition.
A more likely move would be for the caretaker government to propose special emergency legislation to roll over spending limits and tax provisions from this year. But that would mean that savings measures Barnier had planned would fall by the wayside.

ttps://www.reuters.com/world/europe/french-far-right-party-likely-back-no-confidence-motion-against-government-2024-12-02/

 

[Lenny59]

Good, now let's get LePen in there.

 

[Vinson]

Strange bedfellows

Bye Bye Barnier! French Government Collapses as Le Pen Joins Leftist Bloc to Oust Globalist PM over ‘Technocratic’ Budget


The government of France has fallen for the second time this year, as a vote of no confidence in Prime Minister Michel Barnier was passed by the National Assembly on Wednesday, giving the former Eurocrat the ignominious distinction of being the shortest tenured prime minister in modern French history.

Just 91 days after being installed in the Hôtel Matignon by President Macron, Michel Barnier saw his government collapse on Wednesday, as Marine Le Pen’s populist National Rally (RN) party joined onto a censure motion to dethrone the government launched by the left-wing New Popular Front (NFP) bloc, Le Figaro reports.

While Le Pen and her faction gave Barnier’s government benefit of the doubt support following July’s snap legislative elections, in which the National Assembly was left in a three-way split between the leftist NFP, the National Rally, and neo-liberal Macronists, Prime Minister Barnier’s move on Monday to invoke a constitutional loophole in an attempt to push through effective cuts to social security payments to seniors without a vote in the parliament, saw Le Pen revoke her support from the government and announce her support for the NFP’s no confidence vote.

The motion passed the National Assembly on Wednesday as 331 MPs voted in favour of collapsing the government, far surpassing the 289 needed to pass. It marks the first time since 1962 that a government in Paris was ousted by parliamentary vote. Having only served 91 days in the post, former Eurocrat and top Brexit villain Barnier now owns the title for the least time spent as prime minister, behind Pierre Bérégovoy at 362 days, Maurice Couve de Murville at 345 days, Edith Cresson at 322 days, former Macron PM Gabriel Attal whose reign ended at 240 days earlier this year, and Bernard Cazeneuve at 161 days.

In his final speech in front of the National Assembly on Wednesday ahead of his fait accompli removal, Barnier said: “This is reality. I tried to confront it by presenting difficult financial texts. I would have preferred to distribute money, even if we don’t have any. But this reality remains there, it will not disappear by the magic of a motion of censure. This reality will be remembered by any government whatever it may be.”


The collapse of the French government, just weeks after the German coalition government broke down, has left a power vacuum in the heart of the EU. Going forward, President Macron, who returned today from a trip to Saudi Arabia, will have limited options in steering the French state, given a constitutional prohibition on him calling for fresh parliamentary elections until midway through next year and his refusal to resign from the presidency, which would spark a national election.

It is conceivable that Macron could attempt to merely re-instate Barnier, however, the budgetary issues would remain and barring significant concessions, a second Barnier premiership would likely face similar ends to the first. He could also seek a replacement from the so-called centre-right Les Républicains party from which Barnier hailed, however, it is unclear if any capable hand would be willing to lift up the poison chalice that the PM post has become.

Alternatively, Macron could seek to appoint an Italian-style technocratic government staffed with bureaucrats and “experts”, though such an option has never been attempted in modern France. Meanwhile, the NFP bloc, which claims to have won the last election despite securing far fewer votes than the RN, has made noise, calling for Macron to form an alliance and appoint a leftist from their ranks as the next PM. This would potentially cause a revolt among Macron’s centrist allies in the parlaiment, however, given divides on economic and foreign policy, particularly over the staunch anti-Israel messaging from the likes of Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the major far-left power broker behind the New Popular Front.

Although Barnier was pitched to the public as a steady political operator who could navigate the divided National Assembly and pass through budgetary cuts needed to avert the nation’s looming debt crisis, the 73-year-old veteran politician was apparently not up to the task. Stunningly, reports emerged on Tuesday that Barnier believed that Le Pen’s threat to collapse the government over social security cuts was a bluff and therefore decided to abandon negotiating with the RN leader.

Appearing before the hemicycle at the Palais Bourbon on Wednesday, Le Pen said: “Here we are at the moment of truth… which puts an end to an ephemeral government… It is within its ranks that intransigence, sectarianism and dogmatism prohibited the Prime Minister from making the slightest concession, which would have avoided this outcome.”

“The budget we are rejecting today does not just break your promises. It has neither direction nor vision. It’s a technocratic budget that continues to slide downhill, careful not to touch the totem that is uncontrolled immigration,” Le Pen declared.

https://www.lefigaro.fr/politique/en-direct-budget-2025-la-censure-en-ligne-de-mire-macron-et-barnier-appellent-a-la-responsabilite-20241204

 

[Lenny59]

And there it goes ...

 

[Vinson]

And there it goes ...

Macron won't quit, promises another PM