Unsurprisingly, the Senate voted largely in favor: the State budget, proposed by Michel Barnier, definitively adopted in Parliament

François Bayrou at the Élysée on February 5, 2025. MAXPPP – Alexis Sciard

The day after the non-censorship of the Bayrou government, the Senate voted for the State budget this Thursday, February 6, 2025. A final step without suspense before the promulgation of the text. Another step now awaits Parliament, with the Social Security budget.

The French State budget project for 2025 was definitively adopted on Thursday, February 6 in Parliament, after a final vote by the Senate that ended the tumultuous journey of this text suspended in December by the censure of Michel Barnier's government.

Took up by the new Prime Minister François Bayrou, who resisted two motions of censure from the radical left on Wednesday, the finance bill was definitively validated by the upper house, dominated by a right-centrist alliance, by 219 votes to 107.

The text was the subject of an agreement between the two chambers of Parliament on Friday, reached during a fourteen-hour joint committee, bringing together seven senators and seven deputies. It is this compromise version that was submitted to the Senate. A final step without suspense before the promulgation of the text.

If the left and the National Rally (extreme right) opposed it, the choice of the deputies of the Socialist Party and the RN not to vote for censure allowed the budget to be adopted.

30 billion savings

The Minister of the Economy Éric Lombard welcomed in the Senate the adoption of a “financial recovery text” which seeks to reduce the public deficit to 5.4% of GDP in 2025 with “an effort never before made” of 30 billion euros in savings and 20 billion euros “in tax increases proportional to each person's ability to contribute”.

He particularly praised the socialist elected representatives, who “had the courage to compromise and not to censure”. The Minister for Relations with Parliament, Patrick Mignola, stressed the “responsibility of parliamentarians who, without denying their differences, have prioritized the interests of their country and stability”. “We have collectively proven that it is possible to discuss, debate, oppose, but without blocking the country”, added the Minister of Public Accounts Amélie de Montchalin.

Among its flagship measures, the State budget for 2025 provides for several exceptional and temporary contributions on large companies and the wealthiest households, an effort of around 2.2 billion euros requested from local authorities, the restoration of 4,000 threatened teaching positions.

Slashed budgets

It targets almost all ministries which see their budgets slashed, sometimes by several hundred million euros, with rare exceptions. This finance bill “marks a halt to the past budgetary collapse to begin an essential recovery”, said the general budget rapporteur in the Senate, Jean-François Husson (right).

The communist, environmentalist and socialist groups logically voted against. But even if “the account is not there”, “the prolonged absence of a budget is a risk for our economy, which would be paid first by the most vulnerable”, explained the socialist Thierry Cozic, justifying the PS's choice not to censure François Bayrou.

Another budgetary step now awaits the French Parliament with the Social Security budget, which is currently the subject of a 49.3 (constitutional device allowing it to be forced through) and a new motion of censure in the National Assembly.