When François Bayrou took over as France’s prime minister two months ago, he likened the job in front of him to climbing the Himalayas.
His short-lived conservative predecessor, Michel Barnier, had just crashed out of office, losing a no-confidence vote after being forced to rely on a controversial constitutional measure to push a budget through parliament without a majority.
President Emmanuel Macron turned to Bayrou, a 73-year-old ally from his own centrist camp, to try to succeed where Barnier failed.
The numbers in parliament did not immediately look any different, Bayrou led a minority government made up of Macron’s weakened Ensemble coalition and a small number of deputies from the centre-right Republicans.
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Bayrou relied on the same emergency powers to force through a budget, which drew a series of no-confidence motions from the large radical leftwing party, France Unbowed.
This time, though, there was less appetite among the centre-left Socialist Party and the far-right National Rally to send another government over the cliff. The motions of censure failed, Bayrou survived and France finally got a budget through parliament.
Having made it up over that first considerable height, Bayrou will have looked up and seen a lot more mountain to climb.
France is still trapped in a state of political paralysis. Snap elections called by Macron last June saw voters return a National Assembly where no political group was close to a working majority.
Marine Le Pen’s National Rally made significant gains, as did a broad coalition of left-wing parties who came together in an electoral pact under the New Popular Front banner. Macron’s centrist camp lost a third of their seats, further damaging the standing of the already-unpopular president.
The National Assembly cannot be dissolved again until summer, 12 months after the last poll. Even if there were fresh elections, many observers predict the result would be a similarly fractured and largely ungovernable parliament.
In the meantime the prospect of Bayrou winning enough support to pass substantive legislation looks slim. He is stuck in the middle, needing to keep the far right and some of the left happy enough to abstain in any votes of no confidence. The budget took small steps to reel in France’s large spending deficit, but bigger ones will be needed.
Chloé Ridel, an MEP for the Socialist Party, says people were “very tired” of the turmoil and a budget needed to be clearer. However, Bayrou was a “man of the past” and represented a continuation of Macron’s unpopular policies. In particular Ridel criticised recent comments, in which the prime minister sympathised with French people feeling submerged by waves of immigration.
Some believe the political deadlock will be broken only by new presidential elections. Macron shows no intention of stepping down early, meaning that crucial vote would be held in early 2027.
France Unbowed’s firebrand leader, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, is likely to stand, and seek to elbow out figures from the more moderate Socialist Party, to claim the mantle of the Popular Front candidate. Either Le Pen, or her 29-year-old protege and deputy Jordan Bardella, will be on the ticket for National Rally.
After two consecutive terms Macron cannot run again, with several politicians vying to be his successor. Contenders to represent the centre camp include former prime ministers Gabriel Attal and Edouard Philippe. Bayrou could fancy his chances as well. Bruno Retailleau, the interior minister known for his hard line on immigration, is seen as having ambitions to be the candidate for the centre-right Republicans.
Macron hollowed out the centre right and centre left to build a centre party, but there is no way back
France’s two-round voting system shapes the election into a choice between two final candidates. This means voters could be faced with picking between a candidate from the far right or the radical left, says Pierre-Charles Pradier, an economics professor at the Panthéon-Sorbonne University.
“Macron [has] somewhat drained the centre, because it was the first time in France – the first time in the Fifth Republic – that someone tried to govern with the centre,” he says.
Previous French presidents all hailed from the centre left, such as François Hollande, or the centre right, like including Nicolas Sarkozy and Jacques Chirac.
“But Macron did something extraordinary, he sucked up the reasonable people from the Socialist Party and from the Republicans ... He hollowed out the centre right and centre left to build a centre party, but there is no way back,” Pradier says.
The Socialists now find themselves overshadowed by Mélenchon’s more radical left-wing force, while the Republicans support base has been consumed by Le Pen’s National Rally.
Two years out from what may be the most consequential presidential election in modern French history, both of the once-dominant political parties have their own mountains to climb even to be in the conversation.
