Emmanuel Macron dissolves French parliament and calls snap elections

I dunno. The French love a protest, but they aren't suicidal vis-a-vis the Republic. It matters greatly to them. And RN represents clear echoes and indeed many direct ties to the despised collaborationist Vichy government of the last World War.

But the only solution to immigration, is a Europe wide plan, not just in the EU, but out to Ukraine and Turkey and Moldova and beyond.

And its clear for Macron, as much as it is for Scholz in Germany, that that plan must be immensely robust and extremely well resourced.

Great news on two election fronts. Hope the Dems in the US now get their act together too.

Delighted. Vive la France.

A fair few right wing/fascists folk left very disappointed on this thread tonight .

That’s Britain rejecting the far right and now France . Only the rapist and convicted felon trump to go now.

Vive la France !

Shall we have a minute's silence for them?

Melenchon could be troublesome, isn't he somewhat Marxist? Hopefully his "coalition" partners and his own party will keep him in check.

Sometimes you have to be careful what you wish for. Hard left better than hard right? I dunno…

From what I read lots in the left coalition don’t like him, no chance of him becoming pm according to that.

You are insufferable.

So this is like People Before Profit winning this election?

I'm reading online they want to reduce the retirement age and introduce price controls.

This would be very radical in an Irish context and Labour/Soc Dems wouldn't support those policies.

The homophobic supporters of the far right National Rally must be very disappointed at such a showing. Lets hope this puts them back in their box rather than galvanised into lashing out in violent hate.

https://www.france24.com/en/europe/20240619-rights-safety-lgbtq-people-danger-risk-far-right-win-french-parliamentary-elections-bardella-le-pen-macron

The Socialists are a major part of the grouping. They have been in power before in France. They are in same grouping in European Parliament as Labour.

That is why I drew the parallel with Labour here.

PBP have never been in government here or held high offices.

Not really, there are independent centre right who didn't participate in the electoral pact, centrists did better than expected, PS and greens did ok, Melonchon is very divisive, even among the left. There's also regional independents in the mix

Because there seems to be some joy here about the result. When put in an Irish context, that joy seems to recede. The left wing in France are extreme and divisive.

It's a disaster for France.

The 'joy' is that the disaster of a far right National Rally / National Front majority government has been stopped in its tracks.

Would you have preferred that?

The popular front participated in the election pact, withdrawing candidates from runoffs so as not to split the anti RN vote. Would an extreme and divisive group have done that? Would PBP here? Doubtful.

The popular front likewise is far short of a majority and will need to work with other parties, boosting moderare elements within in. It is messy but France will muddle through such a mess.

Not sure what point you are making there. Yes there are other smaller parties too, the centrists did better than expected but the main point is that the popular front are on track for most seats but well off a majority - true or false?

In Irish terms I used 60 seat comparison to show how far off a majority they are, it needs more than a few independents or micro parties to form a workable majority?

It would be a very different conversation if either of the big three factions were at 250 seats.

No.

The Centre lost. They've shifted to the extremes in France.

The market reaction tomorrow should be interesting.

The left wing in France are not extremists or 'extreme'.They have a very strong tradition of left wing parties since the Revolution and have had socialist governments and Presidents in the past (Mitterand and Hollande for example).

Rash?

What would have happened had he not grasped the nettle?

I really don't know the answer to that.

What ,I wonder led him to call the snap election?

The fear that things were going to get worse and that this was the least worst time?

Or was he more aggressive in his thinking and did he count on the country to not allow FN to take power in the same way that it prevented it last time?

Was it desperation or an astute play?

Did he get lucky or did he get what he played for?

Macron may (or may not - that remains to be seen) have prevented the RN from winning the three years' time (a calculation that is so long term in a domain where a week has frequently been described as "a long time") but he has certainly strengthened them immeasurably in their preparatives for whenever the next election does take place.

Such an early election (THREE years before it was required, or expected) he basically, and for no pressing reason, handed them so many seats in parliament for the first time ever that they now have access to all sorts of taxpayer-funded finances including paid parliamentary assistants that they would not otherwise have had. That will set them up wonderfully for the next elections.

So no, I think the only sensible conclusion is that Macron has promoted the interests of the far right. I don't suppose it was deliberate, but it was certainly reckless and has not paid off - if the far right is the group he was trying to damage.

Great news for the EU and also Ukraine