French prime minister survives eighth no-confidence vote

French centrist prime minister Francois Bayrou survived another no-confidence vote on Tuesday after just over half a year in office. (Pic: Wikipedia Commons)

French centrist prime minister Francois Bayrou survived a no-confidence vote on Tuesday after just over half a year in office.

It was the eighth no-confidence motion against Bayrou’s government and reflects France’s deep political crisis that mires France’s political system.

The Labour-type PS brought forward the motion after talks between bosses and unions over watering down president Emmanuel Macron’s hated pension reform collapsed.

The rest of the left, including Jean-Luc Melenchon’s LFI and the Greens, backed the motion.

But Marine Le Pen’s fascist RN did not, meaning Bayrou’s government stumbles on.

Denis Godard, a revolutionary socialist in France, dismissed the motion as “parliamentary manoeuvres”, by the PS without chance of success. 

The motion won 189 votes, falling well short of the 289 votes needed.

“The PS didn’t vote for any of the previous censorships against Bayrou”.  He told Socialist Worker. “But it means there is no solution in parliament since any majority against the government would depend on an alliance with the RN.

“Parliamentary manoeuvres are doomed to fail. If trade union leaders and the left want to beat the government, they need to call us to fight.”

But the PS was part of the NPF, left wing coalition. Since the start of 2025, PS has played a key role in propping up Bayrou. In return, Bayrou promised to bring together bosses and unions to produce a new bill that would weaken Macron’s pension reforms.

But PS is under pressure. It is losing members and tails the rise of the left wing LFI. 

One senior PS official said, “We were accused for six months of having moved away from the shores of the left. We can no longer appear to be accompanying the last steps of Macronism.”

But with PS now withdrawing its support, Bayrou depends more heavily on RN.

The RN is trying to present itself as a respectable to bosses, who are fearful of the instability caused by the fall of Bayrou.

One senior RN MP, Jean-Philippe Tanguy says pension reform must not be a “red line”.

But Le Pen did not rule out RN voting against Bayrou in the autumn over the 2026 budget, as the party did with Bayrou’s predecessor Michel Barnier.

And RN is looking to delay as the court ban on Le Pen from public office—after being found guilty of embezzlement—is still upheld. An appeal is set for the first half of 2026.

The deadline for calling fresh elections is nearly over. The French constitution states that after the president dissolves parliament for elections, they cannot do so again for at least a year.

Macron will be able to call fresh elections from from 8 July to solve the deadlock in parliament.

But elections this summer would mean Le Pen losing her seat as MP. 

Hope does not lie with this parliamentary manoeuvres but with the struggle on the streets and picket lines.