France, socialists open up to Macron: ready to negotiate for a new government

The Left Front breaks up. The Parti socialiste is willing to enter into a government with the Macronian centre, and possibly also with the right-wing républicaine. Secretary Olivier Faure, who met with President Emmanuel Macron, spoke to FranceInfo of 'mutual concessions' in view of a government formed on the basis of a 'fixed-term contract'. He also divided the neo-Gollists who, in any case, pledged not to vote for the censure in the future.

The Nouveau Front Populaire, (Nfp). therefore, falls apart. La France Insoumise (Lfi) will not participate in the consultations with the President of the Republic: "The Insoumis have excluded themselves," said Faure. No veto on the républicains, the Gaullist right, but - he added - "what I want are mutual concessions". The Socialists are ready to make 'compromises in all fields': 'We are obliged to make compromises,' he said, 'because we do not have an absolute majority': 'I would like, for example,' he added, 'to introduce an Ifs (the tax on fortunes, ed.) that would bring in 15 billion instead of three, but we will see,' he said.

Faure also called for Macron to nominate a 'prefigurator' and 'left-wing' (and in any case not right-wing) prime minister: a hypothesis also agreed by several - but not all - of the Macronian deputies, as long as it was a person who had broken ties with Lfi. The president of the socialist senators, Patrick Kanner, therefore ruled out that the party could support a government led by François Bayrou, the leader of the Mouvement Démocrate. No 'preconditions', the secretary said after the interview, would be set by Macron, who would not ask the Socialists to disengage from Lfi.

There is no shortage of conditions. After voting to censure the Michel Barnier government, after sharing five months of political activity with the Nouveau Front Populaire, the Socialists need strong arguments to defend their choice. They are therefore calling for a 'freeze' on the pension reform (but no longer an immediate repeal) that raised the legal age from 62 to 64 and unleashed the wrath of the French, and for the organisation of a 'funding conference' that has as one of its objectives the cancellation of the law.

On the other hand, Faure did not like the fact that Macron did not invite ecologists and communists to the consultations. A choice probably intended to favour broader understandings: the invitation to the socialists was preceded by talks between representatives of the PS and Bayrou. It is clear, however, that the socialists would have preferred not to be alone in the rift with the radicals of the France Insoumise. Yannick Jadot and Cécile Duflot, leading exponents of the ecologists, had already hoped for a government involving the left and the centre (but not the républicains, probably) and in the morning Green secretary Marine Tondelier had asked to be received.
The secretary of the Parti communiste (Pcf), Fabien Roussel, also spoke of 'compromises' in the morning. 'We are not asking for the application of our entire programme,' he wrote in a letter sent to Macron. He did, however, demand the respect of certain programmatic points: repeal of the pension reform, indexation of wages and pensions, reduction of energy costs, support for public services, communities and industry, and a diplomacy in favour of peace'. During his conversation with Faure, Macron then pledged to get in touch with the two parties and Lfi.