The formation of a government in France ran into growing tensions on Wednesday between Prime Minister Michel Barnier and the camp of President Emmanuel Macron, who is demanding “clarification” on his place in the future team and the line that the former European Commissioner intends to follow.
Two meetings postponed one after the other, the question of possible tax increases in the sights of the parties and a vagueness that persists two weeks after his nomination: while he promised to appoint a team in the coming days, Michel Barnier seems forced to temporize in his consultations.
Although the Prime Minister went to the Élysée during the day to speak with Emmanuel Macron, according to a source within the executive, a meeting with Macronist leaders from Ensemble pour la République (EPR) planned for the morning was postponed indefinitely.
A meeting with leaders of his own party, Les Républicains (LR, right), planned for the evening, has also been cancelled.
For LR, the reason for the postponement was not provided. As for the meeting with the Macronists which was to be led by the head of the EPR deputies, Gabriel Attal, program reasons were officially put forward.
Michel Barnier — the former European Commissioner responsible on September 5 for forming a government by Mr. Macron — delivered a statement to AFP in which he stressed that he “discovered” a “very serious budgetary situation,” directly targeting the former government team led by Mr. Attal.
“This situation deserves better than little phrases. It demands responsibility,” he recalled, saying he was “very focused on the upcoming formation of a balanced government” to “methodically and seriously address the challenges” of the country.
Significant deficit
” We are […] faced with a public finance situation that I consider to be truly worrying. […] The 2025 budget will probably be the most delicate or one of the most delicate of the Ve “Republic,” declared the first president of the French Court of Auditors, Pierre Moscovici, a former socialist finance minister, on Wednesday.
The objective set by the outgoing government to reduce the public deficit to 5.1% of gross domestic product (GDP) in 2024 will “not be achieved”, he estimated.
Mr Moscovici, who was also a European Commissioner, considered it “neither possible nor desirable” to bring the public deficit below 3% of GDP by 2027, an objective recently reaffirmed by Paris.
This would require making too many savings which would penalise growth, according to him.
“It is imperative to tell the truth to the French through the draft finance bill” for 2025, which is supposed to be presented to Parliament at the beginning of October, “then the national medium-term budget plan, which the government must transmit to the Commission [européenne] a few days later,” Mr. Moscovici stressed.
Very relative majority
The country’s budgetary situation also concerns the chairman of the finance committee of the National Assembly, Éric Coquerel (far left) and the general rapporteur Charles de Courson (centre), who sought in vain, on Tuesday and Wednesday, to obtain preparatory documents for the 2025 budget.
Michel Barnier currently says he is “very focused on the upcoming formation of a balanced government” to “methodically and seriously address the challenges” of the country. With the Macronists and LR, he would only have a relative majority.
In a message on Tuesday evening, Gabriel Attal deplored “not yet having a clear visibility on the political line – in particular on possible tax increases – and on the major government balances”. In other words, the place reserved for the presidential camp in relation to the Republicans, Mr. Barnier’s party.
The new Prime Minister is said to have discussed an increase in tax revenues with several people.
His entourage denied this on Tuesday, saying it was “pure speculation” and referring to his first television interview, in which he mentioned “tax justice” without giving further details.
“We are already the country with the highest tax burden,” Michel Barnier noted in his statement to AFP on Wednesday.
The outgoing (Macronist) Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin, said on Wednesday that it was out of the question “to participate in a government which would increase taxes or even to support it”.
While the Prime Minister refers his interlocutors to his general policy statement at the beginning of October – including on potentially divisive subjects such as immigration – “we are not going to enter a government without knowing what is going to happen”, he noted.
“Because if we don’t agree, what do we do?”