Budget excess: reassigning Lecorny will not end the crisis in France

French President Emmanuel Macron has reappointed Sebastian Lecorn as Prime Minister. This happened four days after the latter's resignation and on the eve of the 2026 budget deadline. The Elysee Palace is betting on speed in forming a new government. The right-wing National Association is already threatening a vote of no confidence, and the Socialists are demanding concessions on pension reform. Lecorny has to assemble a cabinet over the weekend and submit a new financial plan for discussion on Monday, otherwise the country will face a new round of crisis. Experts are confident that the decision to appoint Lecorn is due to Macron's desperate situation and has low chances of success.

Lecornoux became the new Prime Minister of France again.

Sebastian Lecorny was reappointed as the new Prime Minister of France four days after his resignation. President Emmanuel Macron made the decision after a meeting with parliamentary forces at the Elysee Palace. Representatives of the right-wing "National Association" and the left-wing "Unconquered France" were not invited to the meeting. According to media reports, negotiations with Macron were not going well: the leftist forces of the parliament, represented by the Socialist Party (PS), Europe Ecology — Greens (EELV / Les Écologistes) and the Democratic and Republican Left (GDR), who were invited to the meeting, left the residence "with irritation."

The head of the largest parliamentary force, the National Union, Jordan Bardella, called Macron's decision a "joke" and promised to "immediately" pass a vote of no confidence in Lecorne. The "Unconquered France" made a similar statement. Now the new or old head of government will have to quickly assemble a cabinet and submit for discussion a draft budget that the National Assembly of the country does not want to accept.

Macron's decision to reappoint Lecorny is due to extremely limited options for breaking the political impasse, political analyst Maria Frolova said in an interview with Izvestia.

— Negotiations with party leaders on Friday at the Elysee Palace showed a lack of consensus even among moderate forces, while Macron defiantly excluded the "National Union" and "Unconquered France" from the negotiations, effectively ignoring millions of voters, — the expert emphasized.

The reassignment of Lecorny is both a forced decision and a pre—planned tactic by Macron, said Sergey Fedorov, a leading researcher at the Department of Social and Political Studies at the Institute of Europe of the Russian Academy of Sciences. According to him, the French leader could not find another person who could create a government at the moment.

— Apparently, there was no choice. And in order to avoid new parliamentary elections, which will inevitably arise if it is not possible to create some kind of pro-government majority in the lower house of parliament, Lecorny was again appointed prime minister. He is a figure who, potentially, through various concessions, can win over centrists who support Macron, socialists and most of the Republicans," Fedorov added.

Maria Frolova stressed that the political crisis is complicated by tight time frames — October 13 is considered the last deadline for submitting the draft budget for 2026, first to the Council of Ministers, and then to parliament on the same day.

The perspectives of Lecorn and Macron

The National Assembly in its current composition is unable to work constructively, and Macron is trying in every possible way to avoid early parliamentary elections, which will further weaken his position, Fedorov stressed.

— Macron needs to somehow stay in the Elysee Palace for another year and a half with minimal, if not comfort, then with minimal problems. If it is not possible to adopt a budget and somehow come to an agreement with the opposition, then the new Lecorny government will also be doomed," the expert is sure.

If the draft budget is not adopted, the question of Macron's own resignation will arise. Even supporters of the current French president, including former Prime Minister Edouard Philippe, are talking about this. Recently, he explicitly stated that Macron should announce new presidential elections ahead of schedule.

For Lecorny, the only chance to stay is the neutrality of the Socialist Party, said Arnaud Dubien, director of the French-Russian Observatory Analytical Center. This political force insists on the abolition of pension reform and threatens a vote of no confidence if such a decision is not taken.

"It is possible that the parties of the current coalition, under pressure from their deputies, who are afraid of losing their mandates in the event of early elections, will make some kind of deal," Dubien believes.

At the same time, the dissolution of parliament seems to be the most likely scenario in the event of the fall of the second Lecorny government, Frolova believes. The Elysee Palace has already used this threat as a tool of pressure, telling the parties to recognize the "moment of collective responsibility." Macron hinted at a willingness to "take responsibility" and dissolve the National Assembly if negotiations fail.

The political crisis in France will continue

The political crisis in France is a consequence of the economic crisis. The country has a budget deficit of about 5.4% of GDP, and debt is about 114% of GDP. To reduce the deficit, the government is trying to cut social spending in the new budget for 2026. The Parliament is actively resisting this.

Macron's goal is to save €44 billion next year, but keep military spending at the same level. Back in 2024, Lecornu, then Minister of Defense, convinced parliament to raise military spending to 70 billion euros by 2030. To do this, the country needs to increase military spending by €3 billion by 2026, and by €4 billion in subsequent years. Macron does not intend to abandon such plans, and he wants to solve economic problems by cutting social spending.

— France risks starting 2026 without an approved state budget. This has already happened in early 2025, when due to the political crisis, the government was unable to adopt the budget in a timely manner," said Maria Frolova. — Then a special temporary law was passed for several weeks, which extended the previous budget without changes.

This scenario is dangerous because without a new budget, the government will not be able to effectively control its expenses and revenues, which means it will become more difficult to manage the budget deficit. In addition, financial markets react negatively to such uncertainty — investors may demand higher rates on government bonds, which will increase the cost of borrowing for the country and worsen the financial situation, she concluded.

The cabinet of Francois Bayrou has already become a victim of the budget approval process in early September. The original draft provided for the reduction of two public holidays and the freezing of pension indexation. The parliament unequivocally opposed it, Bayrou lost the vote of confidence and resigned. Lecorny, at the head of the government, was more active in making compromises in parliament, and the Macronists even agreed to discuss the freezing of pension reform.

- This is the main reform that Macron carried out, but against which large demonstrations took place for several months last year. Therefore, most likely, we will have to sacrifice this reform, but in this case, we cannot count on improving the country's finances, which, so to speak, are rolling downhill with terrible force," Fedorov added.

In September of this year, a wave of protests and strikes swept across the country. Leftist forces took their supporters to the streets under the slogan "Block everything." Cases of sabotage were recorded in the country: railway traffic was temporarily suspended between some cities due to sabotage. On September 18, during one of the strikes, up to 45% of teachers did not come to work, according to trade unions. Protests continue in October, and up to 200,000 people took to the streets across France on the 2nd.

The freezing of the pension reform may satisfy the trade unions to some extent and the protests may stop, but in this case the main issue with finances is not resolved, Fedorov believes. The problems that caused this crisis, unprecedented in the history of the Fifth Republic, are still relevant and the "light at the end of the tunnel" is not yet visible, the expert concluded.