{"id":415237,"date":"2024-12-20T18:13:22","date_gmt":"2024-12-20T17:13:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/2024\/12\/20\/francia-bayrou-governo-natale-bilancio\/"},"modified":"2024-12-20T18:52:17","modified_gmt":"2024-12-20T17:52:17","slug":"a-government-by-christmas-bayrous-challenge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/2024\/12\/20\/a-government-by-christmas-bayrous-challenge\/","title":{"rendered":"A government by Christmas: Bayrou’s challenge"},"content":{"rendered":"

Brussels\u00a0– As the French overseas territory of Mayotte tries to recover from the devastating cyclone Chido<\/strong>, work continues in Paris for the new premier Fran\u00e7ois Bayrou<\/strong> to assemble his government team<\/strong>. The premier aims to have an executive in place by Christmas<\/strong> and present a budget bill to the National Assembly in February. Still, he does not seem to have\u00a0enough support among the political forces<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Yesterday (Dec. 19), the premier ministre<\/i> made a round of consultations at Palais Matignon<\/strong>, the seat of the transalpine executive, to sound out the willingness of the parties\u2014all except les extr\u00e8mes<\/i> that is, the ultra-right of the Rassemblement national<\/i> (RN)<\/strong> and the radical left of La France insoumise<\/i> (LFI)<\/strong> \u2014not to sink his next government, which has yet to take shape.\u00a0However,\u00a0<\/span>Fran\u00e7ois Bayrou<\/strong>, the leader of the centrist\u00a0<\/span>Mouvement d\u00e9mocrat<\/em>\u00a0(MoDem) party, appointed by President\u00a0<\/span>Emmanuel Macron<\/strong>\u00a0to\u00a0<\/span>give France stable political leadership<\/a>\u00a0after the historic no-confidence vote by the\u00a0<\/span>Assembl\u00e9e Nationale<\/em>\u00a0to\u00a0<\/span>Michel Barnier<\/strong>\u00a0earlier this month, does not seem to have been very successful so far.<\/span><\/p>\n

According to<\/span>\u00a0French media reports<\/a>, all the\u00a0<\/span>Nouveau Front Populaire\u00a0<\/strong><\/em>(NFP)<\/strong>\u00a0forces\u00a0<\/span><\/span>wanted out, claiming that\u00a0<\/span>there were no conditions<\/strong>\u00a0to take part in\u00a0an executive who<\/span><\/span>\u00a0would continue to pursue Macronist prescriptions.<\/span>\u00a0Excluding the insoumis<\/i> of Jean-Luc M\u00e9lenchon<\/strong>, who were not even summoned to Matignon, socialistes<\/i>, ecologists, and communists<\/strong> also said they were sceptical.<\/p>\n

\"Olivier<\/a>
Socialist Party General Secretary Olivier Faure (centre, photo: Thomas Samson\/AFP)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Socialist Party (PS) Secretary Olivier Faure<\/strong> said he has “found no reason not to censure” Bayrou<\/strong>, appointed by the head of state just a week ago. “We are dismayed by the scantiness\u00a0of what has been proposed,” he admitted to the press coming out of the consultations, reiterating that “we will not participate in this government<\/strong>.” Of the same view, the leader of the Greens (EELV),\u00a0Marine Tondelier<\/strong>: “We had the impression that we were being played<\/strong>,” she complained.<\/p>\n

Communist MP\u00a0<\/span>St\u00e9phane Peu<\/strong>\u00a0pointed out that when talking with Bayrou about the\u00a0<\/span>budget to be approved for 2025<\/strong>, “we asked him\u00a0<\/span>not to resort to 49.3, and he refused<\/strong>.”<\/span>\u00a0The reference is to the provision in the national Constitution that allows the head of government to\u00a0force the passage of a budget law by circumventing parliamentary debate<\/strong>.<\/span>\u00a0That is, precisely the same move that led to the collapse of the Barnier government<\/a>. Bayrou would not categorically rule it out, keeping open the option of resorting to it<\/strong> if groups in the Assembly were to filibuster.<\/p>\n

Bayrou is making a\u00a0small opening on\u00a0the hotly\u00a0contested pension reform<\/strong>.\u00a0\u00a0The premier suggests the “resuming without suspending” formula, which would include resuming debate on the rule\u2014which has never been well received by either the left or the right\u2014without temporarily halting its implementation.\u00a0According to government sources, the parties and social partners have reportedly been offered to propose a “new reform” within the next nine months in exchange for supporting Bayrou’s executive.<\/p>\n

\n

Retirement reform: resume without suspending. pic.twitter.com\/u2J6GT6F6q<\/a><\/p>\n

– Fran\u00e7ois Bayrou (@bayrou) December 19, 2024<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In this way, the premier minister<\/i>\u00a0aims to secure parliamentary confidence<\/strong> in his government, dodging the censure motions already threatened by some political forces. He would like his team to be ready by the weekend to take office before Christmas\u00a0<\/strong>and\u00a0indicated a name<\/a>\u00a0he would like to have with him: the current Interior Minister, the conservative Bruno Retailleau<\/strong>.\u00a0Retailleau is known for his hard line on issues related\u00a0<\/span>to immigration and security\u00a0<\/strong>and, for that very reason, is especially disliked by progressives, for whom\u00a0his reappointment is particularly irritating.<\/span><\/p>\n

The situation beyond the Alps remains tense. Meanwhile, on Wednesday (Dec. 18), the Senate approved<\/a> a special bill to avoid the shutdown<\/i><\/strong>, i.e., the interruption of state functions, after the Assembl\u00e9e<\/i> had already given the measure the green light. It is a patch put on the Republic’s coffers while waiting for Parliament to approve the budget for 2025<\/strong>, which Bayrou would like to present by the first half of February<\/strong>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The worst political crisis of the Fifth Republic, which has consumed four prime ministers in the space of a year, is not yet over in France. Centrist Fran\u00e7ois Bayrou, named premier last week, is seeking the support of parliamentarians, so far without success<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7876,"featured_media":415234,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"episode_type":"","audio_file":"","podmotor_file_id":"","podmotor_episode_id":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"format":"standard","override":[{"template":"1","parallax":"1","fullscreen":"1","layout":"right-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"top","share_float_style":"share-monocrhome","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author":"1","show_post_author_image":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"default","post_date_format_custom":"Y\/m\/d","show_post_category":"1","show_post_reading_time":"0","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","post_calculate_word_method":"str_word_count","show_zoom_button":"0","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","show_post_tag":"1","show_prev_next_post":"1","show_popup_post":"1","number_popup_post":"1","show_author_box":"0","show_post_related":"1","show_inline_post_related":"0"}],"image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"crop-500","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","disable_ad":"0","subtitle":""},"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_override_counter":{"view_counter_number":"0","share_counter_number":"0","like_counter_number":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[25681],"tags":[26261,26260,30015],"class_list":["post-415237","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics","tag-emmanuel-macron-en","tag-francois-bayrou-en"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/415237","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7876"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=415237"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/415237\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":415243,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/415237\/revisions\/415243"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/415234"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=415237"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=415237"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=415237"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}