{"id":135787,"date":"2025-09-11T18:04:10","date_gmt":"2025-09-11T18:04:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/135787\/"},"modified":"2025-09-11T18:04:10","modified_gmt":"2025-09-11T18:04:10","slug":"new-french-prime-minister-open-to-watering-down-pension-reforms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/135787\/","title":{"rendered":"New French prime minister open to watering down pension reforms"},"content":{"rendered":"

France\u2019s new prime minister is offering to water down President Macron\u2019s hotly contested pension reforms in an effort to win left-wing support for a belt-tightening budget.<\/p>\n

S\u00e9bastien Lecornu, a staunch ally of the centrist president, has been set the daunting task of rallying the Socialist Party and the conservative Republicans behind austerity measures aimed at reducing France\u2019s colossal debt and deficit. <\/p>\n

However, Macron\u2019s seventh prime minister will be hampered by his closeness to the increasingly unpopular president and his own dismal approval ratings.<\/p>\n

Sometimes called Macron\u2019s \u201cspiritual son\u201d, Lecornu<\/a>\u2019s approval rating of 29 per cent is significantly below those of his two short-lived predecessors when they took office.<\/p>\n

He has begun meeting party leaders to try to hammer out compromises palatable to the Socialists, who voted on Monday to topple Fran\u00e7ois Bayrou, the previous prime minister, after he tried to push through a cost-cutting budget.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are going to have to change, be more creative and serious in our way of working with the opposition,\u201d said Lecornu, 39, formerly the defence minister<\/a>. He has already ditched Bayrou\u2019s most unpopular proposal to scrap two of France\u2019s 11 annual public holidays, which prompted public outrage.<\/p>\n

The support of moderate left-wingers and conservatives would be sufficient to pass a 2026 budget without the backing of Marine Le Pen<\/a>\u2019s populists or the hard left.<\/p>\n

The centre-left Socialists, who want to roll back Macron\u2019s increase in the pension age to 64, have ruled out joining a coalition government to be formed by Lecornu. However, they have signalled a willingness to negotiate after he proposed to reopen cross-party talks on the pension reforms.<\/p>\n

Another stumbling block on the path to consensus will be the Socialists\u2019 demand for higher taxes on the rich, a move that is fiercely opposed by conservatives and business leaders.<\/p>\n

However, the prime minister\u2019s hopes of holding on to power were bolstered by the successful handling of nationwide protests on Tuesday, which failed to achieve their aim of bringing France to a standstill.<\/p>\n

Bruno Retailleau, the outgoing interior minister who takes a tough line on law and order, was credited with overseeing effective police action and commentators predict he will keep his job in the next government.<\/p>\n

\"Protesters<\/p>\n

Protesters from the \u201cBloquons tout\u201d (Let\u2019s block everything) movement faced police in Toulouse, southwest France<\/p>\n

ED JONES\/AFP<\/p>\n

\"Protesters<\/p>\n

Participants took cover from a spraying water canon in Lille, northern France<\/p>\n

JEAN-FRANCOIS BADIAS\/AP<\/p>\n

The protests are believed to have been whipped up by pro-Russian propagandists as part of Moscow\u2019s ongoing campaign to destabilise France.<\/p>\n

The previous day, pigs\u2019 heads were left outside Paris mosques<\/a> in what is thought to have been a Russian-instigated attempt to stoke racial and religious tensions. Two Serbs who have since left France are suspected of depositing the heads.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"France\u2019s new prime minister is offering to water down President Macron\u2019s hotly contested pension reforms in an effort…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":135788,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[64,63,99,186,184,185],"class_list":{"0":"post-135787","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-personal-finance","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-business","11":"tag-finance","12":"tag-personal-finance","13":"tag-personalfinance"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/135787","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=135787"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/135787\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/135788"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=135787"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=135787"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=135787"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}