French President Emmanuel Macron has appointed former EU Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier as France’s next prime minister.
The Élysée Palace said in a statement on Thursday that Barnier ‘will be charged with forming a unifying government that will serve the country and the French’.
Barnier, 73, is a former member of France’s conservative Les Républicains (LR) party.
The approaching deadline for the start of budget talks for 2025 in parliament next month has increased the urgency to break the deadlock in France, where no new government has been formed for a long time, especially given the poor state of France’s public finances.
Barnier, a former LR statesman, refused to comment on the growing speculation about his candidacy or on his direct talks with the Élysée Palace.
Macron has chosen the prime minister Le Pen wants
But Barnier has emerged as a more suitable candidate than LR regional president Xavier Bertrand, who was close to taking up the post on Wednesday, people familiar with the talks told the Financial Times.
Bernier, who ran for the LR presidency in the 2022 election but lost to rival Valérie Pécresse, had taken a hard line on immigration in that campaign, proposing a three-to-five-year moratorium on non-EU arrivals in France and claiming immigration was ‘out of control’.
According to the FT, Bernier’s stance surprised those who knew him in Brussels, but it could make him more palatable to Marine Le Pen’s National Rally (RN).
National Rally recognises Bernier’s legitimacy
Le Pen issued a statement from X following Bernier’s appointment, saying they recognised the prime minister.
As we announced to the President of the Republic, we will demand that the new head of government respect the 11 million French people who voted for the National Assembly and respect them and their opinions. We will pay close attention to the project he will put forward and we will make sure that the wishes of our voters, who represent a third of the French population, are heard and respected,’ she said.
Jordan Bardella, president of the RN, also said his party was considering the nomination of Michel Barnier as prime minister, adding: “We will evaluate his general policy speech, his budgetary decisions and his actions on the basis of the evidence”.
Mélenchon: ‘This government is the government of Macron and Le Pen’
The parties that make up the New Popular Front (NFP), which came first in the elections, reacted harshly to Macron’s decision.
Jean-Luc Mélenchon, leader of Unbowed France (LFI), reacted to Emmanuel Macron’s decision to appoint Michel Barnier as prime minister by claiming that the election had been ‘stolen’ from the French people.
The LFI leader said: “The prime minister was appointed with the approval and perhaps at the suggestion of the National Rally. This is practically the government of Mr Macron and Mrs Le Pen,” he said.
Olivier Faure of the Socialist Party (PS) also expressed concern about today’s decision.
“In all democracies in the world, the coalition that has to form a government is the first party. It is never the party that lost the election. Setting this precedent would be dramatic and dangerous for the institutions themselves,” Faure wrote.
Greens: Macron finds RN more acceptable than LFI
PS MP Arthur Delaporte said that Emmanuel Macron had ‘made a big mistake’ and that the French leader, elected ‘by the Republican Front’, had ‘succumbed to the blackmail of the RN and the extreme right’.
Marine Tondelier of the French Greens also criticised Macron’s decision.
Barnier’s appointment is possible because Macron finds the RN more acceptable than the LFI,’ said Sandrine Rousseau, another Green MEP.
LFI MEP Rodrigo Arenas went even further, saying that Michel Barnier’s arrival at the Matignon castle was a sign that ‘Marine Le Pen has seized power’.
