{"id":218068,"date":"2025-10-16T19:50:16","date_gmt":"2025-10-16T19:50:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/218068\/"},"modified":"2025-10-16T19:50:16","modified_gmt":"2025-10-16T19:50:16","slug":"french-pm-sebastien-lecornu-survives-two-no-confidence-votes-fending-off-a-government-collapse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/218068\/","title":{"rendered":"French PM S\u00e9bastien Lecornu survives two no-confidence votes, fending off a government collapse"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

French Prime Minister S\u00e9bastien Lecornu survived two no-confidence motions Thursday at the National Assembly in Paris.Benoit Tessier\/Reuters<\/p>\n

French Prime Minister S\u00e9bastien Lecornu has narrowly survived two non-confidence motions in the National Assembly, offering the country some political stability after weeks of uncertainty. But his government is still far from stable, and is expected to face further challenges in the coming days when parliamentarians begin a debate on the budget.<\/p>\n

The motions, known as censure, won 271 and 144 votes among MPs on Thursday, shy of the 289 needed to bring down the government. <\/p>\n

However, several MPs cautioned that their support for Mr. Lecornu\u2019s government might not last long and will depend on negotiations surrounding the budget. <\/p>\n

\u201cOur non-censorship today is obviously in no way a non-censorship pact,\u201d Socialist MP Laurent Baumel told the National Assembly. \u201cWe are not committing ourselves to anything and especially not to voting for or allowing the recessionary and unfair budget that your ministers have presented to us to pass.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mr. Lecornu was reappointed Prime Minister by French President Emmanuel Macron last Friday, after abruptly resigning a few days earlier. He had served in the role for less than a month and resigned a day after naming his cabinet ministers, because of infighting among some of his appointees. <\/p>\n

Mr. Lecornu is a close ally of Mr. Macron and said it was his duty to try once again to form a government and pass a budget. Days after returning to his post, he urged MPs to not bring down the government. <\/p>\n

\u201cThis is obviously the moment of truth. Do we want republican order with debates taking place in the National Assembly or do we want disorder?\u201d he asked the Assembly on Thursday. <\/p>\n

In an effort to win over the Socialists, whose 69 MPs were the difference on Thursday, Mr. Lecornu made a number of concessions this week, namely announcing plans to suspend controversial pension reforms that were introduced in 2023 and backed by Mr. Macron. The reforms include gradually raising the retirement age from 62 to 64 by 2030, which has been widely unpopular. <\/p>\n

The changes will be put on hold until after the presidential election in 2027, Mr. Lecornu said. He also promised to introduce some tax cuts and \u201cexceptional tax increases\u201d for certain large companies and the wealthy.<\/p>\n

Macron reappoints S\u00e9bastien Lecornu as French prime minister days after he quit<\/a><\/p>\n

But he added that delaying the pension reforms would cost \u20ac400-million ($655-million) in 2026, and \u20ac1.8-billion ($2.9-billion) in 2027, which would have to be offset by spending cuts to address France\u2019s<\/a> soaring debt level. <\/p>\n

The country\u2019s budgetary deficit is above 5 per cent of gross domestic product, nearly double the 3-per-cent-of-GDP target set by the European Union. <\/p>\n

Mr. Lecornu has promised to bring the deficit down to 4.7 per cent of GDP in the 2026 budget, but has also said that he was open to compromise on that goal. <\/p>\n

Nonetheless, it\u2019s far from certain that he will win enough support in parliament for his fiscal plans. Two previous governments have collapsed this year over proposed budgets that included steep spending cuts. <\/p>\n

Opinion: France barrels toward chaos as its public debt spirals out of control<\/a><\/p>\n

The challenge confronting the French Prime Minister is the deep division in parliament that is split between three groups: a left-wing coalition led by France Unbowed, a centrist group that includes Mr. Macron\u2019s party, and a far-right block led by Marine Le Pen\u2019s National Rally. <\/p>\n

Both France Unbowed and the National Rally have been pressing for an election and each vowed on Thursday to continue efforts to bring down Mr. Lecornu\u2019s government.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe will vote without hesitation to censure your government, because your budget is not a budget,\u201d Ms. Le Pen told the Assembly. \u201cThis budget is a museum of horrors.\u201d<\/p>\n

Aur\u00e9lie Trouv\u00e9, an MP for France Unbowed, said the reform proposal was only a distraction. \u201cAll of you who were elected to repeal the pension reform, are you really going to let yourselves be fooled by this deceptive handout?\u201d she said during the debate. \u201cA budgetary wrecking will take place if we do not censure.\u201d<\/p>\n

Many MPs have also turned on President Macron and demanded that he resign. Mr. Macron\u2019s second term ends in 2027 and he cannot run for another. He has shown no interest in resigning early and has resisted dissolving the National Assembly for an election. <\/p>\n

Mr. Lecornu expressed relief as he left the Assembly after Thursday\u2019s vote. \u201cThe debates on the budget and other challenges needed to be able to start, and they will start now,\u201d he told reporters. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: French Prime Minister S\u00e9bastien Lecornu survived two no-confidence motions Thursday at the National…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":218069,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[901,888,902,879,877,903,45,49,48,876,895,896,891,878,875,46,549,295,894,887,914,880,881,893,889,890,884,904,885,909,910,912,907,911,905,908,882,898,899,714,897,906,865,61,900,892,886,883,913],"class_list":["post-218068","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-alberta","tag-arts-news","tag-bc","tag-breaking-news","tag-breaking-news-video","tag-british-columbia","tag-business","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-canada-news","tag-canada-sports","tag-canada-sports-news","tag-canada-trafficcanada-weather","tag-canadian-breaking-news","tag-canadian-news","tag-economy","tag-education","tag-environment","tag-federal-government","tag-foreign-news","tag-globe-and-mail","tag-globe-and-mail-breaking-news","tag-globe-and-mail-canada-news","tag-government","tag-life-news","tag-lifestyle","tag-local-news","tag-manitoba","tag-national-news","tag-new-brunswick","tag-newfoundland-and-labrador","tag-northwest-territories","tag-nova-scotia","tag-nunavut","tag-ontario","tag-pei","tag-photos","tag-political-news","tag-political-opinion","tag-politics","tag-politics-news","tag-quebec","tag-sports-news","tag-technology","tag-travel","tag-trudeau","tag-us-news","tag-world-news","tag-yukon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218068","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=218068"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218068\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/218069"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=218068"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=218068"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=218068"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}