PARIS — French Finance Minister Eric Lombard has taken a significant step toward reaching a budget deal that would secure the short-term survival of his government but partially roll back President Emmanuel Macron’s hard-fought, legacy-defining pension reforms.
In talks that ran into late Wednesday evening, Lombard and Budget Minister Amélie de Montchalin signaled to the French left-wing parties present that the new government may be willing to discuss amendments to the law which raised the age of retirement from 62 to 64 years for most workers nearly two years ago.
Macron has maintained that the change, which remains extremely unpopular, was necessary to keep France’s pension system solvent. For international observers seeking to gauge eurozone stability, pension reform is seen as a key litmus test of whether France is serious about reining in its skyrocketing deficits.
The two strongest parties present at the meeting, the Greens and the Socialists, had previously said the government would need to make some sort of concession on pensions to allow a successful negotiation.
The leaders of both parties struck positive notes after the discussions. Socialist chief Olivier Faure said “the government was no longer vetoing the pension issue.” His Greens counterpart Marine Tondelier, meanwhile, had said before the meeting that “compared with ministers from previous governments, we can feel that [Lombard] is open to discussion … and relative to others seems closer to our positions.”
The question, Tondelier said, is the extent to which Lombard’s voice might be heard in a government that includes many right-wing heavyweights. However, support for amending the retirement reform could be found in other corners of the cabinet.
A Socialist official who took part in the meeting with Lombard, and who was granted anonymity to discuss the content of the talks, stressed that Prime Minister François Bayrou’s own green light would be needed on key issues.
Still, in Lombard, a career banker unknown to the general public until he was appointed minister in late December, Bayrou may have found an interlocutor within his minority government who is well positioned to strike a deal with center-left members of the opposition.
Bayrou’s predecessor, Michel Barnier, tried instead to court the far right to keep his government afloat and draft a budget for 2025. Barnier handed Marine Le Pen’s National Rally concessions on a number of issues to try to win at least its tacit support for his plans to get France’s finances in order and rein in the budget deficit, only to see the party back a no-confidence motion put forward by left-wing lawmakers and bring down his government.
Le Pen argued that Barnier’s budget would prove too costly for the middle class and accused his government of waiting too long to involve the National Rally in negotiations.
Lombard appears to be trying to avoid the same mistake, targeting the center left as potential partners in the opposition and getting them involved early in the process. Industry Minister Marc Ferracci told POLITICO that Lombard’s style, which “favors opening doors,” and the format of talks have helped push the process forward.
Should Lombard succeed, it would cause a serious rift in the New Popular Front, the pan-left alliance that owns a plurality of seats in the National Assembly, France’s lower house of parliament.
The hard-left France Unbowed, which has more seats in the National Assembly than any other New Popular Front party, opposes all talks with the current government and has been pushing for Macron to resign.
France Unbowed’s unfiltered and divisive leader, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, has already lashed out at the center left, describing the Greens and Socialists as “ridiculous in their servility.” His deputy Manuel Bompard warned that talks with the government would revive what he called the “disgust and hatred” that marked the Socialist Party during François Hollande’s unpopular presidency.
Mélenchon, a former Socialist minister who broke with the party over his belief that it had veered too much toward the center, was by far the leading left-wing candidate in the last two presidential elections. His electoral success prompted the Greens and Socialists to join forces with him in the 2022 and 2024 legislative elections, but the center left has been attempting to distance themselves from Mélenchon’s more radical brand of politics to rebuild their own reputation.
Giorgio Leali and Elisa Bertholomey contributed to this report.
New French finance chief offers to dilute Macron’s pensions reform to woo the left
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