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France’s new prime minister, François Bayrou, has selected Eric Lombard, head of the state-backed financial group Savings Bank, as finance minister, giving him a key role in shaping next year’s budget.
Lombard is tasked with crafting a tax and spending plan for 2025 that can be approved by France’s raucous parliament, while also starting to repair the country’s worsening public finances.
Bairou’s predecessor, Michel Barnier, was ousted in a vote of no confidence in the National Assembly earlier this month due to opposition from left-wing and far-right parties to the deficit-reducing budget.
Bayrou set an ambitious target on Monday to bring France as close as possible to Mr Barnier’s goal of reducing the budget deficit to 5% of gross domestic product (GDP) by the end of 2025, from more than 6% this year. .
“I think we need to find a number around 5 (as a percentage of GDP), a little more than 5, where we can reach an agreement and find a balance,” he told BFM TV.
“Reducing unproductive public spending should be a priority,” Bairou said, adding that businesses could be required to “temporarily” raise taxes.
After days of bickering between Prime Minister Baillou and President Emmanuel Macron, the cabinet was announced on Monday, with Macron formally nominating the ministers on the prime minister’s recommendation.
Mr Macron and Mr Bayrou are under pressure to survive a divided parliament, form a government capable of passing key legislation and end France’s political turmoil.
France is on its fourth prime minister this year, experiencing an unprecedented level of defection in France’s Fifth Republic, which was founded in 1958.
Barnier’s government lasted only three months, making him the shortest-serving prime minister.
Brussels and financial markets are scrutinizing France over whether it can begin to cut its budget deficit well above the European Union’s 3% of gross domestic product (GDP) limit.
Mr Bayrou, who heads the small Modern Party, which has been aligned with Mr Macron’s centrist bloc in parliament since 2017, does not have enough votes to pass a budget.
If Mr. Bayrou, like Mr. Barnier, tries to ignore the opinions of MPs and invoke provisions of the French constitution to pass the budget, he will be vulnerable to a vote of no confidence.
Congress approved a stopgap emergency budget last week to avert a government service shutdown in January.
Mr. Lombard, a 66-year-old former banker and technocrat, has been leading the Deposit Fund since President Macron appointed him in 2017 to run the group, which invests in social housing, infrastructure and green projects. is leading.
Although national defense and international diplomacy are considered the domain of the president, not the prime minister, Macron opted for continuity by keeping defense minister Sébastien Lecornu as army minister and Jean-Noël Barrault as foreign minister. did. Both served in the Barnier administration.
Roughly half of Barnier’s cabinet members remain on similar briefings with Bairou.
Among them is Bruno Retailault, a right-winger who made a name for himself as interior minister with his harsh rhetoric on immigration and crime.
Former Prime Minister Elisabeth Born, also from Macron’s centrist wing, will return as education minister.
France’s political turmoil began when Macron called early parliamentary elections in June, but lost, further dividing the National Assembly.
The left-wing bloc, made up of Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Assembly party, the far-left France Enboud, the Socialists, Communists and the Green Party, voted to oust Barnier.
For Le Pen, the largest party in parliament, Barnier’s refusal to concede on the budget sealed her fate.
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In order to avoid benefiting from the Rassemblement Nationale, Mr. Bayrou sought to gain support from moderate left-wing MPs by offering concessions and posts to the government of national unity he advocated.
The Socialists, Greens, and Communists initially seemed open to such an agreement, but then decided that Bayrou’s proposals were not good enough, and none of them joined his government.
“This is a provocation, not a government,” said Socialist Party leader Olivier Fauré.
In a sign that the National Party still has influence, Mr Baillou was forced to abandon his bid to nominate Xavier Beltran, a right-wing politician and a longtime opponent of Mr Le Pen, as justice minister. She suggested that his presence in Bayrou’s government would displease the party.
Mr Baillou chose Mr Macron’s ally and former interior minister Gerard Darmanin as justice minister instead.
Political analyst and author Chloe Morin said: “This government’s inability to come to terms with the left leaves it in the same vulnerable position as the previous one.”
