However, far-left France Unbowed leaders said they would be seeking to remove him, and Greens boss Marine Tondelier said she would support a no-confidence motion if Bayrou ignored their tax and pensions concerns.

France’s festering political malaise has raised doubts about whether Macron will complete his second presidential term, which ends in 2027. It has left a power vacuum in the heart of Europe, just as Donald Trump prepares to return to the White House.

Macron spent the days after Barnier’s departure speaking to leaders from the conservatives to the Communists to lock in support for Bayrou. The RN and France Unbowed were excluded.

There was no immediate comment from the conservative Les Republicains party, which supported the previous government, nor from Socialist Party leaders, whose involvement in Bayrou’s coalition may come with a hefty price tag in next year’s budget.

“Now we will see how many billions the support of the Socialist Party will cost,” a government adviser said.

No legislative election before mid-year

Macron will hope Bayrou can stave off no-confidence votes until at least July, when France will be able to hold a new parliamentary election, but his own future as president will inevitably be questioned if the government should fall again.

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Bayrou, the founder of the Democratic Movement (MoDem) party, which has been a part of Macron’s ruling alliance since 2017, has himself run for president three times, leaning on his rural roots as the longtime mayor of the south-western town of Pau.

Macron appointed Bayrou as justice minister in 2017, but he resigned only weeks later amid an investigation into his party’s alleged fraudulent employment of parliamentary assistants. He was cleared of fraud charges this year.

The fragmented nature of the National Assembly, rendered nigh-on ungovernable after Macron’s June snap election, means Bayrou will likely be at the mercy of the president’s opponents for the foreseeable future.

Barnier’s budget bill, which aimed for €60 billion ($100 billion) in savings to assuage investors increasingly concerned by the country’s 6 per cent deficit, was deemed too miserly by the far-right and left, and the government’s failure to find a way out of the gridlock has seen French borrowing costs push higher still.

Reuters, Bloomberg

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