Government formation: start of the last-chance meeting at Matignon

The meeting between the Prime Minister and the heads of parties or groups consulted so far, which began around 15:00 p.m., aims, according to Matignon, at the "rapid formation" of a government.

Hervé Morin, president of the Centrists party, hoped upon arrival that "all this would succeed". After him, Marc Fesneau and Maud Gatel (MoDem), Hervé Marseille (UDI) Franck Riester (Renaissance party), Laurent Wauquiez and Bruno Retailleau (Les Républicains), Gabriel Attal (Ensemble pour la République group) and Edouard Philippe (Horizons) entered the courtyard of Matignon.

Michel Barnier also met separately on Thursday morning with the President of the National Assembly, Yaël Braun-Pivet, then with the President of the Senate, Gérard Larcher.

In a message to the deputies of his group, Gabriel Attal indicated that he would ask the Prime Minister "what are the broad outlines of the action that he intends to carry out with his future government, and how its architecture will make it possible to embody the republican union that our country needs so much".

A telephone conversation is planned with the elected representatives of the centrist Liot group, currently gathered in Corsica.

Tensions with the Macronists up to the president, ambitions of the LR, rejection from the left: two weeks after his appointment to Matignon, the pitfalls continue to pile up for Michel Barnier.

Tensions have particularly emerged at the top of the executive branch.

Emmanuel Macron, who assures that he does not want to intervene in the composition of the government, received Michel Barnier on Tuesday and again on Wednesday.

According to reports that are leaking, their lunch on Tuesday went badly.

A close friend of the Head of State recalled that the task assigned to the Prime Minister was "to move towards national unity and respect balances".

But "the account is not there" for the president, according to a leader of his camp. He would have indicated to Michel Barnier that the right could not have two big positions like Finance and Interior, only one or the other, annoying his interlocutor, reports a leader of LR.

"Nothing to lose"

This was "only a first list, the basis for a negotiation", said the spokesperson for the LR deputies, Vincent Jeanbrun, on Thursday on BFMTV/RMC.

"On the names mentioned" as well as "on the balance of sensibilities, this in no way represents the government project desired" by Michel Barnier, Matignon clarified on Wednesday evening.

The risk is that no one will be satisfied with the final result. "When Michel Barnier seeks to broaden the left, he talks about taxes but veers to the right and the centre," sums up the executive of the presidential camp.

Michel Barnier "wants to form an RPR government" and "there is resistance" in the majority, but "not so much from Macron" who "does not want a crisis" and could validate the team, believes a leading member of the majority.

The Macronist camp "invents the idea that LR wants everything, but that is not Barnier's style at all. I am convinced that he will make a reasonable and responsible proposal", deciphers an LR senatorial source. Before warning: "I believe that this time, it will be +this proposal or I leave+. He has nothing to lose, he is 73 years old, he expects nothing behind. No one is required to do the impossible".

Frictions escalated on Wednesday with a series of missed meetings. A first meeting between Michel Barnier and the group of Macronist deputies Ensemble pour la République, which is demanding "clarification" particularly in tax matters, was postponed, before a second with the right was in turn cancelled.

The Prime Minister explained that he had discovered a "very serious budgetary situation" which deserves "better than little phrases".

The appetite of the LR, who obtained Matignon with only 47 deputies, but have become pivotal, is annoying in the Macronist camp and on the left.

"Regime crisis"

Time is running out on the budget, the timetable for which was greatly delayed this year by the dissolution and very late appointment of a Prime Minister.

Matignon finally transmitted on Thursday to the Finance Committees of the National Assembly and the Senate "the budgetary documents prepared by the resigning government" with a view to the Finance Bill for 2025. These documents are, normally, available during the summer.

The Matignon tenant is also struggling to find left-wing personalities, from whom he has encountered several refusals.

And Marine Le Pen, leader of the National Rally deputies, stated in Le Parisien that she did not want Xavier Bertrand, her opponent in Hauts-de-France, or Eric Dupond-Moretti, the outgoing Minister of Justice, to be in her team.

This inextricable situation has led some elected officials to say that his mission has become impossible.

"There may be a crisis in the regime if we do not all make the effort to find solutions," said LR MP Olivier Marleix.