French lawmakers adopted a social security budget bill and suspended France's pension reform at the Assemblée Nationale, in Paris, on December 16, 2025. DIMITAR DILKOFF / AFP
A joint parliamentary committee of French lawmakers failed to reach a compromise on the state budget for next year, parliamentary sources said on Friday, December 19, making it unlikely that France will have a 2026 budget bill by year's end. The 2025 budget is now likely to be carried over into the new year, as debates continue in both chambers.
France, the eurozone's second-largest economy, is under pressure to rein in its deficit and soaring debt, but efforts have been hampered by political deadlock. Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu has pledged to produce an austerity budget by year's end, without using a constitutional power to ram the bill through without a vote, as had been done in previous years.
In a win for Lecornu, on Tuesday, lawmakers narrowly adopted the social security budget bill, another part of the government's broader spending plan, postponing an unpopular pension reform until 2028.
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