Marine Le Pen wants 140 billion euros in cost-savings, partly by slashing France’s contribution to the EU budget. On Wednesday, she told The Financial Times she expects “a tough debate, even a trial of strength” with Brussels. She was in Brussels that day for the Patriots for Europe’s pre-Council meeting, and had a press conference scheduled for 7:30 p.m.
The far right’s front-running presidential candidate set out her plan as France’s finance minister called higher borrowing costs an “alarm signal.” Roland Lescure told Franceinfo radio that Paris still has the markets’ confidence, “in the sense that we have no trouble issuing debt.” But, he said, “it costs us more, and that is an alarm signal we all need to take on board.” France’s 10-year government bond yield has already neared five percent in recent weeks.
Who Pays for the Squeeze
The figures set the terms of the political fight. Under the government’s budget proposal, French public debt is projected to reach a record 121.7 percent of GDP in 2027, up from 119 percent at the end of June. The budget aims to bring the deficit down to five percent of GDP next year, from an estimated 5.4 percent for 2026.
Le Pen acknowledged what she called the “gigantic, enormous debt ... that could become uncontrollable.” Part of her proposed savings would come from cutting France’s contribution to the EU budget. The base reporting doesn’t say which public services or budget lines would absorb the rest of the 140 billion euros.
EU officials, by contrast, pressed for clarity and discipline. EU economy commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis told AFP at the IMF-World Bank annual meetings in Bangkok that “it’s important to have clarity about the budget” in France. IMF chief Kristalina Georgieva warned it “would take time” before France’s debt could fall to levels “that are providing confidence -- full confidence -- to people and to the investor community.” Bank of France Governor Emmanuel Moulin urged political leaders to “shoulder their responsibilities” to secure a budget, apparently referring to a constitutional provision that lets governments force legislation through without a vote.
A Government Without a Majority
The government faces an uphill struggle to adopt the budget because it has no majority in the lower house of parliament. President Emmanuel Macron, a centrist former investment banker, can’t seek a new term, and the approaching presidential election complicates the picture. On Wednesday, the French National Assembly votes on how much France should contribute to the EU.
Austerity Politics and the Border Question
The budget fight is also about who bears the cost of reducing debt. Investors, the IMF, the European Commission and the central bank all want a deficit cut. The far-right frontrunner wants cuts too, and her campaign for them runs through a Patriots for Europe meeting she attended in Brussels.
The base reporting includes no figures on migration, asylum or border spending in the French budget, and it doesn’t say how either the government’s plan or Le Pen’s savings would affect those areas. What it does show is that political figures across the spectrum, from a centrist government to the far right, agree that the debt must come down. They disagree only over how, and at whose expense.
Students in the Streets
Away from bond markets and summit rooms, AFP’s headlines noted that 480,000 French students joined a new day of school protests. The report gives no detail on the demands behind the day of action.
The National Assembly vote on the EU contribution comes the same day.