Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne and Minister of Relations with Parliament Franck Riester, October 30, 2023 at the Assembly, in Paris (AFP/Archives/Geoffroy Van der Hasselt)
The government should trigger a new 49.3 Monday in the National Assembly for the final adoption of the 2023-2027 budgetary programming law, without Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne, on an official trip to Ireland.
This 17th use of 49.3 from the Borne government is expected from 4:00 p.m. The Minister of Relations with Parliament, Franck Riester, is expected to trigger it, in order to have the text adopted without a vote, in the absence of an absolute majority at the Palais Bourbon.
“As the Prime Minister is on an official trip to Ireland, she will be replaced in the National Assembly in the event that her government is held responsible,” Elisabeth Borne’s entourage told AFP.
The absence of the Prime Minister to hold the government accountable before the Assembly “would not be a first”, recalls a parliamentary source. “Under Michel Rocard (Prime Minister from 1988 to 1991), several 49.3s were triggered by the Minister of Relations with Parliament or the N.2 of the Lionel Jospin government”.
49.3 could be followed by the tabling of a new motion of censure from the opposition, the probable rejection of which a few days later will constitute definitive adoption of this public finance programming text.
The government promises in this law to reduce the public deficit from 4.9% of gross domestic product in 2023 to 2.7% in 2027, below the European objective of 3%.
The Senate with a right and center majority for its part demanded a return below 3% two years earlier, in 2025, and a public deficit reduced to 1.7% in 2027, but was unsuccessful.
Excluding State and Social Security budgets, for which the use of 49.3 is unlimited, the government only has the right to use this constitutional weapon on a single text per parliamentary session.
But the executive, supported by legal opinions, assures that it is not using this cartridge for this public finance programming law, since it had already been the subject of a first 49.3 at the end of September, when of an extraordinary session.
The opposition could try to challenge this legal argument if the government uses 49.3 again during this ordinary session, for example on the immigration bill.
© 2023 AFP
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