December 4, 2024 • 15 mins
The government of French President Emmanuel Macron collapsed Wednesday after losing a no-confidence vote. The outcome brings the country one step closer to a far-right government — the one thing President Macron has sought to avoid at all costs.
Bloomberg’s Stephen Carroll and Big Take co-host David Gura break down the current pressures on France’s government, what led to the vote and what we know about what comes next.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news. In France on Wednesday,
President Emmanuel Macrone's government lost a no confidence vote. Politicians
on the right and the left called for that vote
and supported it after Prime Minister Michel Barnier pushed through
a budget without parliamentary support. Crisis on the brink as
(00:25):
France's government faces a vote of no confidence. Barnier has
recently falls through a budget bill without a vote.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
Is collapse now imminent for this French government? Well?
Speaker 1 (00:36):
That no confidence vote effectively ended Barnier's short tenure as
Prime minister. Barnier addressed the nation just before the vote,
calling it an honor to have served with dignity France
and its people. He'd been on the job for just
under three months.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
Chu dircus restauranuri a.
Speaker 1 (00:56):
La Today day, there are a lot of questions about
the future, big ones about President Macron's prospects, what happens
to his political party, and what's next for France.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
No government has fallen to one of these motions of
no confidence since nineteen sixty two.
Speaker 1 (01:15):
Bloomberg Stephen Carroll has been in Paris to cover the
vote and its fallout.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
That time around, it was solved by calling early parliamentary elections.
But this time around President Macron doesn't have that option
because he already did it this year, vuding France into
the political and potentially economic unknown.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
I'm David Gura, and this is the big take from
Bloomberg News today on the show Turbulence and Uncertainty in France.
After the government was toppled. What led to the vote
and what do we know about what comes next? Moments
after the vote, I caught up with Bloomberg Stephen Carroll
asked him to walk us through what happened. Get us
(01:56):
up to speed here. What was the outcome of the vote?
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Well, look, Michel Barnier has added an unhappy records to
his long career. That is, he is the shortest serving
prime minister in modern French political history, just two months
and twenty nine days in office, as he was felled
by a vote of no confidence in Parliament. Three hundred
and thirty one deputies voted against him and needed two
(02:19):
hundred and eighty eight for the motion to pass.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
Stephen mark this moment for us, you're kind of nodding
to the historic nature of this. What does it mean
for the country moving forward?
Speaker 2 (02:27):
It plunges France into a relative political unknown. I say
relative because this has happened once before in nineteen sixty two,
but the way out of that particular crisis was calling
early legislative elections. Emmanuel Macron doesn't have that choice this
time around because he did that last June, which means
he can't call new ones until next July. So for
(02:49):
the moment, it means that France has no government. There
will be caretaker ministers in place. Emmanuel Macron needs to
find somebody new to take on the impossible check challenge
as it now looks, of being Prime minister and trying
to cobble together some sort of working majority or minority
in Parliament, which on the mats looks very difficult. There
(03:13):
isn't an easy constituencies to win over, so that means
no policy making for the moment, no budget for twenty
twenty five. Once we go past the thirty first of December,
we get into a special arrangement where essentially the French
government keeps the lights on and works month to month,
but that could potentially cause further concerns on markets, but
(03:34):
also it could see them falling foul of the European
Union it's already under watch for what the EU calls
an excessive deficit procedure because its deficit is too high.
Well that depthit's going to get even bigger.
Speaker 1 (03:44):
Now, this of course was something of great popular interest,
of interest to investors as well. I know you've been
paying attention to that. What was the market reaction the
run up to the vote and what have we seen since?
Speaker 2 (03:54):
Well, look, in the days running up to it, there
were a number of again unhappy records that we saw
on French market. So the spread of borrowing costs between
France and Germany widened to the most since twenty twelve,
that was the height of the Eurozone crisis. And it's
always the way that we think about debt in the
euro Area. Germany is considered the safest bet. So the
further away you are from Germany when it comes to
(04:16):
borrowing costs, essentially the worst perception that investors have in you. Now,
our colleagues who are experts in the markets will also
point out that France's ten year borrowing cost is still
below three percent. It's two point nine percent or in
and around there, and that still means that you know,
if you're going to get a mortgage in France. You're
still going to get a pretty good rate on a
(04:37):
fixed rate mortgage because French mortgages are fixed for the
whole lifetime of around three percent, which looks pretty good
if you're sitting in the UK or in the US.
The other reaction that we've seen on markets has been
in the Euro weakening further, but difficult to unpick exactly
how much of that is around France because dollar strength
has been such a theme of recent weeks as well.
(04:58):
We've got the euro hovering around one and you do
have to look for some further sort of more outlandish
calls for anyone who sees that going back to party,
at least in the short term. The actual reaction once
the vote happened a bit of a shrug from markets
they'd seen it coming. We're not expecting any major moves
on the back of that. We'll be watching French equities
to see if French banks are put under further pressure.
Speaker 1 (05:20):
Stephen, this vote came after a string of speeches. What
did we hear in the run up to the vote?
Who were the key players who's spoken? What did you
take away from what they had? The same?
Speaker 2 (05:28):
So we heard from the leader of the far left
party in Parliament, Eric Correll, and also from Mamine le
Pen from the far right. They were very keen to
point to this being an unfair budget, a budget that
was not what they wanted to see from a government
and as they saw it hurting the French people. Lots
of rhetoric and high rhetoric as you'd expect from French
(05:50):
politicians when given this sort of pulpit, knowing well that
they had the numbers to topple Michel Bargnia. Michel Barnier
himself had the chance to defend himself in Parliament before
the vote was called, calling this a moment of truth
and a moment of responsibility for the country.
Speaker 1 (06:07):
Introduce us to Barnier. What's this background? Why did Macron
choose him as Prime minister?
Speaker 2 (06:11):
Michelle Barnier has been a fixture of French politics for
some fifty years. It was the late seventies when he
was first elected as an MP for the Utsavoir region
where he's from and the veteran around the French Alps,
and he's someone who's served as a minister in previous governments.
He was a member of the center right Republicans party
here in France. He went on to a career in
the European Union as a European Commissioner and also the
(06:34):
EU's chief negotiator on Brexit. He was a bit of
a surprise choice for Emmanuel Macron to bring in as
Prime Minister. They're not from the same political family, but
in Michel Barnier, he was looking for somebody who was
perhaps not in the fray of day to day politics,
someone who might be able to bring together forces that
weren't traditionally inclined to support Emmanuel Macron's group in Parliament,
(06:58):
and also leaning in to his legendary negotiation skills. We
learned this during Brexit that he was an extremely astute negotiator.
He used the phrase so often during the Brexit negotiations
that time is ticking, and really time was ticking from
Michelle Barnier from the moment that he took up this
(07:19):
job in September. He felt he'd achieved the best compromise possible,
but didn't have the numbers to vote it through, and
that's what's led us to this no confidence vote.
Speaker 1 (07:30):
In his speech, Michelle Barnier said he was sure that
the no confidence vote would quote make everything more severe
and harder coming up, the fiscal and political problems France
is facing and what's likely to happen next. France's government
(07:52):
has lost a no confidence vote, the first one in decades.
I called up Bloomberg Stephen Carroll and asked him to
explain how we got here and what this outcome means.
What kicked all this off was that decision by Prime
Minister Michelle Barnier to push through a budget for twenty
twenty five without parliamentary support. That is what led to
Wednesday's vote. What made this budget, the budget Michelle Barnier
(08:15):
pushed through parliament so unpopular, so.
Speaker 2 (08:17):
It wasn't an easy task to begin with. There were
lots of individually unpopular measures in this to do with
the reimbursement of medical costs provided by the state. Currently,
and most controversially, was this idea of pensions. In France,
state pensions go up every year in line with inflation,
and one of the things Michelle Barnier tried to do
to save money was delay that increase for pensioners that
(08:39):
would have been due to come into force from the
first of January until later in the year. Essentially just
trying to save a bit of money by implementing that
increase a bit later on, and that was one of
the red lines that Marie Lapenn had in her negotiations
with Michelle Barnier running up to this particular crisis point,
and that's proved to be one of the most controversial
(09:00):
measures that he was trying to pass.
Speaker 1 (09:02):
On the heels of this no confidence vote, President Macron
can't call for another special election until next summer. What
is likely to happen next here there.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
Are a couple of deadlines that we have to worry about.
One of them is that the budget needs to be
passed by the end of the year. Now, there isn't
a US style government shutdown on the cards for France,
but it does enter relatively untested territory where there is
an emergency provision which allows taxes to be collected, minimum
services to be provided, welfare benefits to be paid, for example,
(09:33):
but will make things very difficult in the running of
the country because it's essentially just maintaining the nature and
the business of the state without being able to make
any strategic decisions.
Speaker 1 (09:43):
Stephen says the outcome of the no confidence vote has
also raised questions about what's next for the far right
leader Marine la Penn and the National Rally party.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
She's been building her political capital in France, you know,
for more than ten years, essentially trying to make a
bid for the presidency. She came pretty close last time around. Now,
Emmanuel Macroon's term runs until twenty twenty seven. He's shown
no signs that he will resign early. Marie Leapen herself
is facing a court decision that's due to come in
(10:13):
March of next year, which could see her barred from
running in future elections.
Speaker 1 (10:18):
Lapen and National Rally have been accused of embezzlement, of
misappropriating funds from the European Union. She denies all wrongdoing,
but prosecutors have asked a judge to ban Leapen from
holding public office for five years.
Speaker 2 (10:31):
That's something that could be preying on her mind, is
if she's trying to force Emmanuel Macron to call an
early presidential election, something that he can still do. Looks
very unlikely at this point, but that's one theory that's
being bandied around by French political commentators that perhaps Marie
Lapenne has decided to cash in the chips of her
political capital and try and force Emmanuel Macron into an
(10:55):
impossible situation, Steven, As you.
Speaker 1 (10:57):
Say, Macron is resisting any calls to resign early. What
does this mean for him and for his party?
Speaker 2 (11:02):
It puts them in a very difficult position. There are
a number of figures who are lining up to try
and replace Emmanuel Macron as the presidential candidate for his
party in twenty twenty seven, because he'll have served his
maximum number of terms as president, but it's very difficult
to see who their constituency will be by that time.
(11:24):
This budget crisis has reminded voters and politicians that there
are other parties out there. There are other political forces
at play, and for now they look more powerful. So
how a government can proceed between now and twenty twenty
seven is very unclear. What can they do? What compromises
(11:45):
would that government have to make with Mary Lapenn's party
or with the left wing parties to try and pass
a budget and continuing even minimum functioning.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
One possibility, Stephen says is that the next prime minister
could choose to build an alliance with the Socialist Party.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
They picked up a lot of seats in the last
election and they represent one of the biggest parts of
this left wing alliance. The difficulty will be trying to
convince them to separate themselves from the hard left parties
and potentially sign their own political death sentence by going
into power with the Centrists and the center right. There'll
be many people in that party who would be wary
(12:23):
of this as an option, but looking at the numbers,
really it does seem like the most likely option if
you were to try and build a coalition. Of course,
plenty of convincing to be done there. But even in
the rhetoric that we heard from lawmakers from Macron's party
in the days running up to this no confidence vote,
they mention over and over again the stalwart reputation of
(12:46):
the Socialist Party in French politics and their long history
of government. They're trying to appeal to them to peel
away from that left wing alliance and join into something
that could form a functional government. For the moment, that's
the only option that looks possible without some major political
shifts from the parties involved.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
We've talked about what this means for politicians and political parties,
how about for the country itself.
Speaker 2 (13:10):
People in France are worried about, like everywhere else, the
cost of living and public services. There's very little hope
out there that this impasse, however it is resolved, will
actually lead to people's needs being addressed, their wants being
addressed by the next government. It's very difficult to try
and see how someone, any political figure could inspire the
(13:34):
sort of hope that Emmanuel Macron did when he arrived,
you know, into the presidential race late in twenty seventeen.
That sort of uniting figure hasn't been found really by
any party in recent elections. Marie Lapenn has a large
constituency on the right, Jean Luke Manlauchamp has a large
constituency on the far left, but neither have been quite
(13:56):
big enough to either break through and make it to
the presidentency or to be able to form a sufficient
number of alliances in Parliament to become a prime minister.
This leads to an interesting question about who will own
the center by the end of this political cycle. There
are plenty of players out there, but there's still a
(14:16):
lot of questions about how anyone can win over and
address the concerns that French people have about their future
in a more uncertain world.
Speaker 1 (14:28):
This is the big take from Bloomberg News. I'm David Gura.
This episode was produced by David Fox. It was edited
by Tracy Sanielson and Ergol O'Brien. It was fact checked
by Adriana Tapia and mixed and sound designed by Alex Sagura.
Our senior producer is Naomi Shaven. Our senior editor is
Elizabeth Ponso. Our executive producer is Nicole Beemster. Bor Sage
(14:48):
Bauman is Bloomberg's head of podcasts. If you like this episode,
make sure to subscribe and review The Big Take wherever
you listen to podcasts. It helps people find the show.
Thanks for listening. We'll be back tomorrow.
Speaker 2 (15:00):
Can you see
Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news. In France on Wednesday,
President Emmanuel Macrone's government lost a no confidence vote. Politicians
on the right and the left called for that vote
and supported it after Prime Minister Michel Barnier pushed through
a budget without parliamentary support. Crisis on the brink as
(00:25):
France's government faces a vote of no confidence. Barnier has
recently falls through a budget bill without a vote.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
Is collapse now imminent for this French government? Well?
Speaker 1 (00:36):
That no confidence vote effectively ended Barnier's short tenure as
Prime minister. Barnier addressed the nation just before the vote,
calling it an honor to have served with dignity France
and its people. He'd been on the job for just
under three months.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
Chu dircus restauranuri a.
Speaker 1 (00:56):
La Today day, there are a lot of questions about
the future, big ones about President Macron's prospects, what happens
to his political party, and what's next for France.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
No government has fallen to one of these motions of
no confidence since nineteen sixty two.
Speaker 1 (01:15):
Bloomberg Stephen Carroll has been in Paris to cover the
vote and its fallout.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
That time around, it was solved by calling early parliamentary elections.
But this time around President Macron doesn't have that option
because he already did it this year, vuding France into
the political and potentially economic unknown.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
I'm David Gura, and this is the big take from
Bloomberg News today on the show Turbulence and Uncertainty in France.
After the government was toppled. What led to the vote
and what do we know about what comes next? Moments
after the vote, I caught up with Bloomberg Stephen Carroll
asked him to walk us through what happened. Get us
(01:56):
up to speed here. What was the outcome of the vote?
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Well, look, Michel Barnier has added an unhappy records to
his long career. That is, he is the shortest serving
prime minister in modern French political history, just two months
and twenty nine days in office, as he was felled
by a vote of no confidence in Parliament. Three hundred
and thirty one deputies voted against him and needed two
(02:19):
hundred and eighty eight for the motion to pass.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
Stephen mark this moment for us, you're kind of nodding
to the historic nature of this. What does it mean
for the country moving forward?
Speaker 2 (02:27):
It plunges France into a relative political unknown. I say
relative because this has happened once before in nineteen sixty two,
but the way out of that particular crisis was calling
early legislative elections. Emmanuel Macron doesn't have that choice this
time around because he did that last June, which means
he can't call new ones until next July. So for
(02:49):
the moment, it means that France has no government. There
will be caretaker ministers in place. Emmanuel Macron needs to
find somebody new to take on the impossible check challenge
as it now looks, of being Prime minister and trying
to cobble together some sort of working majority or minority
in Parliament, which on the mats looks very difficult. There
(03:13):
isn't an easy constituencies to win over, so that means
no policy making for the moment, no budget for twenty
twenty five. Once we go past the thirty first of December,
we get into a special arrangement where essentially the French
government keeps the lights on and works month to month,
but that could potentially cause further concerns on markets, but
(03:34):
also it could see them falling foul of the European
Union it's already under watch for what the EU calls
an excessive deficit procedure because its deficit is too high.
Well that depthit's going to get even bigger.
Speaker 1 (03:44):
Now, this of course was something of great popular interest,
of interest to investors as well. I know you've been
paying attention to that. What was the market reaction the
run up to the vote and what have we seen since?
Speaker 2 (03:54):
Well, look, in the days running up to it, there
were a number of again unhappy records that we saw
on French market. So the spread of borrowing costs between
France and Germany widened to the most since twenty twelve,
that was the height of the Eurozone crisis. And it's
always the way that we think about debt in the
euro Area. Germany is considered the safest bet. So the
further away you are from Germany when it comes to
(04:16):
borrowing costs, essentially the worst perception that investors have in you. Now,
our colleagues who are experts in the markets will also
point out that France's ten year borrowing cost is still
below three percent. It's two point nine percent or in
and around there, and that still means that you know,
if you're going to get a mortgage in France. You're
still going to get a pretty good rate on a
(04:37):
fixed rate mortgage because French mortgages are fixed for the
whole lifetime of around three percent, which looks pretty good
if you're sitting in the UK or in the US.
The other reaction that we've seen on markets has been
in the Euro weakening further, but difficult to unpick exactly
how much of that is around France because dollar strength
has been such a theme of recent weeks as well.
(04:58):
We've got the euro hovering around one and you do
have to look for some further sort of more outlandish
calls for anyone who sees that going back to party,
at least in the short term. The actual reaction once
the vote happened a bit of a shrug from markets
they'd seen it coming. We're not expecting any major moves
on the back of that. We'll be watching French equities
to see if French banks are put under further pressure.
Speaker 1 (05:20):
Stephen, this vote came after a string of speeches. What
did we hear in the run up to the vote?
Who were the key players who's spoken? What did you
take away from what they had? The same?
Speaker 2 (05:28):
So we heard from the leader of the far left
party in Parliament, Eric Correll, and also from Mamine le
Pen from the far right. They were very keen to
point to this being an unfair budget, a budget that
was not what they wanted to see from a government
and as they saw it hurting the French people. Lots
of rhetoric and high rhetoric as you'd expect from French
(05:50):
politicians when given this sort of pulpit, knowing well that
they had the numbers to topple Michel Bargnia. Michel Barnier
himself had the chance to defend himself in Parliament before
the vote was called, calling this a moment of truth
and a moment of responsibility for the country.
Speaker 1 (06:07):
Introduce us to Barnier. What's this background? Why did Macron
choose him as Prime minister?
Speaker 2 (06:11):
Michelle Barnier has been a fixture of French politics for
some fifty years. It was the late seventies when he
was first elected as an MP for the Utsavoir region
where he's from and the veteran around the French Alps,
and he's someone who's served as a minister in previous governments.
He was a member of the center right Republicans party
here in France. He went on to a career in
the European Union as a European Commissioner and also the
(06:34):
EU's chief negotiator on Brexit. He was a bit of
a surprise choice for Emmanuel Macron to bring in as
Prime Minister. They're not from the same political family, but
in Michel Barnier, he was looking for somebody who was
perhaps not in the fray of day to day politics,
someone who might be able to bring together forces that
weren't traditionally inclined to support Emmanuel Macron's group in Parliament,
(06:58):
and also leaning in to his legendary negotiation skills. We
learned this during Brexit that he was an extremely astute negotiator.
He used the phrase so often during the Brexit negotiations
that time is ticking, and really time was ticking from
Michelle Barnier from the moment that he took up this
(07:19):
job in September. He felt he'd achieved the best compromise possible,
but didn't have the numbers to vote it through, and
that's what's led us to this no confidence vote.
Speaker 1 (07:30):
In his speech, Michelle Barnier said he was sure that
the no confidence vote would quote make everything more severe
and harder coming up, the fiscal and political problems France
is facing and what's likely to happen next. France's government
(07:52):
has lost a no confidence vote, the first one in decades.
I called up Bloomberg Stephen Carroll and asked him to
explain how we got here and what this outcome means.
What kicked all this off was that decision by Prime
Minister Michelle Barnier to push through a budget for twenty
twenty five without parliamentary support. That is what led to
Wednesday's vote. What made this budget, the budget Michelle Barnier
(08:15):
pushed through parliament so unpopular, so.
Speaker 2 (08:17):
It wasn't an easy task to begin with. There were
lots of individually unpopular measures in this to do with
the reimbursement of medical costs provided by the state. Currently,
and most controversially, was this idea of pensions. In France,
state pensions go up every year in line with inflation,
and one of the things Michelle Barnier tried to do
to save money was delay that increase for pensioners that
(08:39):
would have been due to come into force from the
first of January until later in the year. Essentially just
trying to save a bit of money by implementing that
increase a bit later on, and that was one of
the red lines that Marie Lapenn had in her negotiations
with Michelle Barnier running up to this particular crisis point,
and that's proved to be one of the most controversial
(09:00):
measures that he was trying to pass.
Speaker 1 (09:02):
On the heels of this no confidence vote, President Macron
can't call for another special election until next summer. What
is likely to happen next here there.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
Are a couple of deadlines that we have to worry about.
One of them is that the budget needs to be
passed by the end of the year. Now, there isn't
a US style government shutdown on the cards for France,
but it does enter relatively untested territory where there is
an emergency provision which allows taxes to be collected, minimum
services to be provided, welfare benefits to be paid, for example,
(09:33):
but will make things very difficult in the running of
the country because it's essentially just maintaining the nature and
the business of the state without being able to make
any strategic decisions.
Speaker 1 (09:43):
Stephen says the outcome of the no confidence vote has
also raised questions about what's next for the far right
leader Marine la Penn and the National Rally party.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
She's been building her political capital in France, you know,
for more than ten years, essentially trying to make a
bid for the presidency. She came pretty close last time around. Now,
Emmanuel Macroon's term runs until twenty twenty seven. He's shown
no signs that he will resign early. Marie Leapen herself
is facing a court decision that's due to come in
(10:13):
March of next year, which could see her barred from
running in future elections.
Speaker 1 (10:18):
Lapen and National Rally have been accused of embezzlement, of
misappropriating funds from the European Union. She denies all wrongdoing,
but prosecutors have asked a judge to ban Leapen from
holding public office for five years.
Speaker 2 (10:31):
That's something that could be preying on her mind, is
if she's trying to force Emmanuel Macron to call an
early presidential election, something that he can still do. Looks
very unlikely at this point, but that's one theory that's
being bandied around by French political commentators that perhaps Marie
Lapenne has decided to cash in the chips of her
political capital and try and force Emmanuel Macron into an
(10:55):
impossible situation, Steven, As you.
Speaker 1 (10:57):
Say, Macron is resisting any calls to resign early. What
does this mean for him and for his party?
Speaker 2 (11:02):
It puts them in a very difficult position. There are
a number of figures who are lining up to try
and replace Emmanuel Macron as the presidential candidate for his
party in twenty twenty seven, because he'll have served his
maximum number of terms as president, but it's very difficult
to see who their constituency will be by that time.
(11:24):
This budget crisis has reminded voters and politicians that there
are other parties out there. There are other political forces
at play, and for now they look more powerful. So
how a government can proceed between now and twenty twenty
seven is very unclear. What can they do? What compromises
(11:45):
would that government have to make with Mary Lapenn's party
or with the left wing parties to try and pass
a budget and continuing even minimum functioning.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
One possibility, Stephen says is that the next prime minister
could choose to build an alliance with the Socialist Party.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
They picked up a lot of seats in the last
election and they represent one of the biggest parts of
this left wing alliance. The difficulty will be trying to
convince them to separate themselves from the hard left parties
and potentially sign their own political death sentence by going
into power with the Centrists and the center right. There'll
be many people in that party who would be wary
(12:23):
of this as an option, but looking at the numbers,
really it does seem like the most likely option if
you were to try and build a coalition. Of course,
plenty of convincing to be done there. But even in
the rhetoric that we heard from lawmakers from Macron's party
in the days running up to this no confidence vote,
they mention over and over again the stalwart reputation of
(12:46):
the Socialist Party in French politics and their long history
of government. They're trying to appeal to them to peel
away from that left wing alliance and join into something
that could form a functional government. For the moment, that's
the only option that looks possible without some major political
shifts from the parties involved.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
We've talked about what this means for politicians and political parties,
how about for the country itself.
Speaker 2 (13:10):
People in France are worried about, like everywhere else, the
cost of living and public services. There's very little hope
out there that this impasse, however it is resolved, will
actually lead to people's needs being addressed, their wants being
addressed by the next government. It's very difficult to try
and see how someone, any political figure could inspire the
(13:34):
sort of hope that Emmanuel Macron did when he arrived,
you know, into the presidential race late in twenty seventeen.
That sort of uniting figure hasn't been found really by
any party in recent elections. Marie Lapenn has a large
constituency on the right, Jean Luke Manlauchamp has a large
constituency on the far left, but neither have been quite
(13:56):
big enough to either break through and make it to
the presidentency or to be able to form a sufficient
number of alliances in Parliament to become a prime minister.
This leads to an interesting question about who will own
the center by the end of this political cycle. There
are plenty of players out there, but there's still a
(14:16):
lot of questions about how anyone can win over and
address the concerns that French people have about their future
in a more uncertain world.
Speaker 1 (14:28):
This is the big take from Bloomberg News. I'm David Gura.
This episode was produced by David Fox. It was edited
by Tracy Sanielson and Ergol O'Brien. It was fact checked
by Adriana Tapia and mixed and sound designed by Alex Sagura.
Our senior producer is Naomi Shaven. Our senior editor is
Elizabeth Ponso. Our executive producer is Nicole Beemster. Bor Sage
(14:48):
Bauman is Bloomberg's head of podcasts. If you like this episode,
make sure to subscribe and review The Big Take wherever
you listen to podcasts. It helps people find the show.
Thanks for listening. We'll be back tomorrow.
Speaker 2 (15:00):
Can you see
Hosts And Creators
Sarah Holder
Saleha Mohsin
Popular Podcasts
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.