French election candidates clash over homegrown ills in fiery debate

Good morning. As EU leaders gear up for a second attempt at agreeing the bloc’s next leadership triad tomorrow, there’s one big unanswered question at the heart of the high-stakes political horse-trading: How can France and Italy both get the same prize?

Today, our Paris correspondent reports that last night’s French election debate featured so many domestic gripes that there was no time left to discuss international issues. And the leader of the EU’s liberal group tells us they may be diminished, but they’re still mighty.

Home truths

France’s three main parties clashed in a fractious debate yesterday over domestic issues from economy to education — but the candidates ran out of time to discuss the country’s role in the world, writes Ian Johnston.

Context: As the first round vote in French parliamentary elections nears this weekend, the far-right Rassemblement National (RN) is leading the polls ahead of the left-wing alliance Nouveau Front Populaire (NFP), with Emmanuel Macron’s centrist bloc Ensemble in third place.

Last night, Gabriel Attal, Macron’s centrist prime minister, Jordan Bardella, leader of RN, and Manuel Bompard, representing the NFP, traded blows on subjects including the cost of living, taxes, climate change and education.

International issues have been largely absent from the campaign so far. Viewers were promised a section on France’s “role in the world” but time ran out as the candidates kept interrupting each other. Discussions on the EU as well as the wars in Ukraine and Gaza were left for another day.

The ill-tempered debate instead focused on domestic issues. Indicative of the RN’s lead in the polls, both Attal and Bompard focused many of their attacks on their far-right rival.

Attal singled out RN’s plan to lower VAT on fuel and electricity from 20 to 5.5 per cent as a gift to energy giants “Total and Shell”. He and Bompard also attacked an RN plan to prevent dual nationals from occupying certain strategic roles in security and defence, with Bompard calling it “quite simply intolerable”.

Bardella, in turn, repeatedly chastised sitting premier Attal for giving “economy lessons”, just a week after the European Commission reprimanded the country for breaching EU budget rules.

He also attacked the government’s record on crime and promised to “drastically reduce” immigration.

In the closing sections, both Bardella and Bompard promised to “turn the page on Macronism”. Voters will decide whether to follow their instructions on Sunday, and again in the second round a week later.

Chart du jour: You’re in the army now

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Europe faces a manpower problem in its armies, as recruiters struggle to compete against more lucrative jobs with better work-life balances. So governments are seeking other incentives to sign up. Click here for the full interactive chart.

Every little counts

Finally some good news for the European parliament’s beleaguered liberal Renew group: It is growing by two members, write Andy Bounds and Marton Dunai.

Context: The Liberals were thumped in the elections earlier this month, losing third place to the hard-right European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR). Last week, Czech party Ano left Renew, reducing them to 70 seats. They used to have 102.

Today, the group is set to announce Bulgaria’s We Continue the Change is joining with its two members, after Les Engagés of Belgium with one MEP joined yesterday, taking it to 73, 10 seats behind ECR.

Renew’s leader, Valérie Hayer, told the FT that more members would join next week, but could not guarantee it would climb back to third place. However, her group remained the “kingmakers”, she said, and part of the governing “majority”.

This week, negotiators of the centre-right European People’s party (EPP), the centre-left Socialists and Democrats and Renew reiterated their picks for the EU’s top jobs: Estonian premier Kaja Kallas as chief diplomat; António Costa, ex-premier of Portugal, as president of the European Council; and a second term for Ursula von der Leyen as commission president.

At a leaders’ summit tomorrow, those positions should be confirmed. But von der Leyen then still needs a majority in the European parliament to vote for her.

Hayer said that Renew votes would come with conditions: no deal between von der Leyen and the “extreme right” ECR, higher defence spending, a strong commitment to competitiveness and the rule of law.

And von der Leyen must stop delaying a rule of law report expected to criticise Hungary and Italy, whose Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has been courted by the commission president as an ally.

Hayer said that publishing it in July “will be one of the requests from Renew”.

What to watch today

1. French President Emmanuel Macron hosts Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán in Paris.

2. EU chief diplomat Josep Borrell hosts talks between the leaders of Kosovo and Serbia in Brussels.

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