French government survives no-confidence votes over budget

The French government survived two votes of no-confidence in parliament on Friday over its decision to ram through the income part of the 2026 budget without giving the National Assembly the final say.

A total of 269 lawmakers voted in favour of the no-confidence motion presented by the hard-left France Unbowed together with the Greens and Communists, whereas 288 votes were required to bring down the government. Even fewer backed a second no-confidence motion, brought by the far right.

Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu will now again invoke article 49.3 of the constitution to force the expenditure part of the budget through the National Assembly – a move that will almost certainly trigger further votes of no confidence.

President Emmanuel Macron’s government is having to circumvent parliament after months of negotiations failed to deliver a deficit-taming finance bill that would pass in a lower house where no party has a working majority.

In the hunt for a budget, Macron lost two governments and saw France plunged into turmoil rarely seen since the 1958 creation of the Fifth Republic, the current system of government.

With France depending on an emergency rollover budget from last year to keep afloat, Lecornu made last-minute concessions earlier this month to secure the agreement of Socialists to not topple the government if it resorted to using the special constitutional powers.

Far-right leader Marine Le Pen said government opponents who supported Lecornu in the confidence vote would pay the price in future elections, including local elections in March and presidential elections in 2027.

“Don’t think that no one is watching you. The French people see you, and they will make you pay for it at the ballot box,” Le Pen told lawmakers ahead of the vote. “Not only for the (budgetary) bloodletting you are inflicting on them, but also for the humiliating process you are using.”

Lecornu says the budget deficit will not exceed 5 per cent of GDP, below the 5.4 per cent hit in 2025 but still well above the European Union’s 3 per cent cap.

The government expects the entire budget to be definitively adopted in the first half of February, one government official said.