The austerity chickens come home to roost – in Britain and in Europe
Labour leader Keir Starmer speaking during a BBC Question Time Leaders' Special in York, June 20, 2024
PRESIDENT Emmanuel Macron is in a double bind. Whoever comes out on top in the forthcoming French legislative elections it isn’t going to be his faux-liberal coalition of neoliberal austerians.
His first response to coming second to Marine Le Pen’s Rassemblement Nationale (NR) in the Euro elections was to try the previously successful tactic of presenting his outfit as the best vehicle for assembling a coalition against the extremes.
This necessarily entailed dragging big elements of the Socialist Party establishment into his governmental majority and now these people are losing out along with him.
Similar stories
As heavy industry flees and public-sector strikes paralyse the nation, the French leader’s increasingly desperate attempts to rule without a majority reveal the deep crisis at the heart of European liberal democracy, writes KEVIN OVENDEN
