Three weeks on from France’s snap parliamentary election and a new government is still nowhere to be found, with caretaker ministers expected to stay in place until after the Paris Olympics. We look at how this situation arose and why it is likely to continue.
However, since then confusion has reigned over the political direction of France – including the problematic question of who will be its new prime minister.
However, they only are staying on to ensure key day-to-day tasks are carried out until at least the end of the Olympics on August 11.
The president traditionally names a prime minister from the largest parliamentary group – this is the NFP, which after much hesitation agreed on Lucie Castets as its choice – but he is not obliged to do so.
He could opt for a figure presented as politically neutral but would require the support of a broad bloc of MPs for the candidate to survive.
More than half (54%) of people polled on July 21 said they did not want an NFP prime minister (Odoxa survey of 1,000 people for Le Figaro).
The French parliament is now split between the three blocks of NFP, President Macron’s group Ensemble!, and the far-right Rassemblement National (RN) and its allies.
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None hold an absolute majority. President Macron has hinted that it might still be some time before the next prime minister is chosen, saying that there is no deadline.
He said he was “giving [parties] a little time to build” coalitions before they present nominees for his final choice.
His parliamentary group had no absolute majority prior to the snap elections, a situation that led to the prime minister invoking the Constitution’s controversial article 49:3 to force through laws on several occasions – to protests from the left in particular.
Many key positions in the Assemblée have now been decided, with the RN the big losers, despite the fact it won the most votes in the first round of the legislative elections. Other parties have allied against it, claiming it is ‘anti-republican’.
Centrist appointed in key position
Yaël Braun-Pivet, a centrist MP from Macron’s party who was re-elected by MPs as the Assemblée’s president, has pledged to ensure the party’s views are heard.
Her role is to preside over debates on legislation, including what issues are to be debated and how much time is to be spent discussing them. “We have to be able to talk to each other, to listen to each other, to move forward,” she said.
One challenge facing the caretaker government is the need to start drafting the 2025 finance law, which sets the budget for next year, though it should remain as politically neutral as possible while doing this. It must be finished by mid-September.
France faces EU sanctions over its budget deficit of 5.5% of GDP, compared to a target of 3%, and demands to find cuts of around €20billion a year.
Some economists warn that NFP’s electoral programme, including rolling the retirement age back to 60 and increasing the minimum wage to €1,600 net, will not help to meet this objective.
Nonetheless, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, leader of the largest NFP member-party, the far-left La France Insoumise, promised to “implement our programme, nothing but our programme and all of our programme”.
The far right cast out but not adrift
Having lost this election, the RN is reportedly turning its eyes to the 2027 presidency.
Until then, leader Jordan Bardella is expected by many commentators to frame the RN as an underdog held at bay by what he describes as “alliance of dishonour” pushing policies of “uncertainty and instability”.
He will not have to confront his own party’s policy shortcomings or expose his inexperience, but rather seize upon the failings of the new government.
The RN’s ‘parliamentary leader’ Marine Le Pen says she will gather support for a measure of censure against any government that does not include her MPs.
If passed, it would oblige the PM to offer their resignation.
As Mr Macron enters his final three years as president, his alliance, Ensemble!, is seen as increasingly moribund after it failed to win both the EU and parliamentary elections. However, none of the other parties can push forward their own agendas either.
