(Reuters) -French Finance Minister Eric Lombard said the government would have to compromise on plans to cut the budget deficit if Prime Minister Francois Bayrou is toppled in a confidence vote on September 8, the Financial Times reported on Wednesday.
Lombard said in an interview with the newspaper “It is inevitable” and fresh negotiations would require the government to make concessions to the left to reduce the size of the fiscal package if the government fell.
Bayrou’s government had sought to cut the budget deficit to 4.6% of gross domestic product next year from 5.4% this year, with a savings drive worth nearly 44 billion euros ($52 billion) that opposition parties have rejected.
In the interview, Lombard said he hoped Bayrou would win the vote, but said he was “confident” that either he or a successor could still pass a budget before the year-end deadline.
He also dismissed concerns of an impending debt crisis in France, asserting, “We will take care of the deficits.”
At a meeting of France’s MEDEF business lobby last week, Lombard reaffirmed that the public deficit would be reduced to 5.4% of GDP by year-end. Seeking to reassure investors, he said he saw no threat of a financial crisis.
If Bayrou does lose next week’s vote, President Emmanuel Macron can appoint a new prime minister immediately, ask Bayrou to stay on in a caretaker capacity for some time, or decide to call snap parliamentary elections. Last month, before Bayrou announced his confidence vote, Macron ruled out early elections.
Opposition parties in France have said they will bring down the minority government in a confidence vote scheduled next week. Bayrou began a series of talks on Monday with opposition parties to try to prevent this.
Lombard told FT he would be willing to remain as finance minister if Macron asked him to stay.
“I won’t hide the fact that I think it is a magnificent ministry where we can do many useful things,” he said.
($1 = 0.8542 euros)
(Reporting by Mrinmay Dey and Nilutpal Timsina in Bengaluru; Editing by Tom Hogue, Lincoln Feast and Kim Coghill)
