Headlines
French PM faces backlash over holiday excuse
Published by Global Banking & Finance Review®
Posted on August 28, 2025
2 min readLast updated: January 22, 2026
Global Banking & Finance Review®
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Published by Global Banking & Finance Review®
Posted on August 28, 2025
2 min readLast updated: January 22, 2026
French PM Francois Bayrou faces backlash for claiming opposition leaders were on holiday, affecting talks on the 2026 budget crisis.
PARIS (Reuters) -French Prime Minister Francois Bayrou faced a backlash on Thursday after saying he didn't hold talks with the opposition in August to try and avoid a political crisis because everyone but him was on holiday.
Bayrou announced on Monday he would hold a confidence vote in parliament on September 8 to try and break a stalemate over the 2026 budget.
The centrist prime minister, who is very likely to lose that vote and be out of office as the main opposition parties say they will vote against him, said he would meet with opposition leaders next week to try and convince them to change their minds and back him.
Asked by TF1 TV on Wednesday why he had not invited them for talks earlier, Bayrou said: "Because they were on holiday."
"In August, they were all on holiday," he added.
That immediately triggered angry comments.
"I don't like lies," far-right leader Marine Le Pen said on X, adding her party had sent Bayrou economic policy proposals over the summer.
On TV news channel LCI, Greens leader Marine Tondelier said she was "extremely shocked" by Bayrou's comments. Her party held a days-long annual convention last week and was not on holiday.
Asked about the backlash, Bayrou stood by his remarks on Thursday.
"How is that a criticism? All French people know it's normal and that that's how things work," he told reporters, speaking of August holidays.
Referring to the confidence vote, Manuel Bompard, from the hard left France Unbowed party, quipped on X that Bayrou himself would soon be on holiday.
(Writing by Ingrid Melander, additional reporting by Gabriel Stargardter; Editing by Susan Fenton)
He stated he didn't hold talks with the opposition in August because they were on holiday.
The confidence vote, scheduled for September 8, aims to resolve a stalemate over the 2026 budget.
Opposition leaders, including Marine Le Pen and Marine Tondelier, expressed anger and shock, claiming they were not on holiday.
He defended his comments by stating that it's normal for French people to take holidays in August.
The backlash arose after Bayrou's comments were perceived as dismissive of the opposition's efforts to engage in political discussions.
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