PARIS (Reuters) -French Prime Minister Francois Bayrou will hold a news conference on Monday, his office said, as he seeks to boost support for his government’s budget which aims to cut more than 40 billion euros ($47 billion) in public spending.
“I want to put things in place again without ambiguity and send a message of mobilization and responsibility,” Bayrou was quoted saying in La Tribune Dimanche on Sunday.
Bayrou’s remarks will come ahead of a possibly turbulent September.
Taxi drivers are expected to restart their demonstrations on September 5 against the government’s plans to overhaul compensation for medical trips.
And on September 10, leftist parties and some unions have joined calls for general protests that have drawn comparisons to the Yellow Vest protests that erupted in 2018 over fuel price hikes and the high cost of living.
The “gilets jaunes” protests spiralled into a broader movement against President Emmanuel Macron and his efforts at economic reform.
Bayrou has proposed scrapping two public holidays and freezing welfare spending and tax brackets in 2026 at 2025 levels, not adjusting them for inflation. He has, however, planned to increase defence spending.
The prime minister has warned that public debt is a “mortal danger” to the country, which saw its budget deficit hit 5.8% of gross domestic product last year, nearly double the official EU limit of 3%.
But Bayrou’s efforts at belt-tightening have come under fire from both the left and the right, meaning that he faces the risk of a no-confidence vote like the one that toppled his predecessor, Michel Barnier, in late 2024 after just three months in office.
($1 = 0.8536 euros)
(Reporting by Makini Brice and Elizabeth Pineau; Editing by David Holmes)
