France and six other countries face EU budget discipline measures

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00:00Well, obviously the timing is not ideal, but the problem is, this was when this announcement

00:06was due.

00:07This announcement was made well before President Macron called that snap French election.

00:12And the thing is, if the Commission had delayed it until after the French election, well then

00:16you would have the accusations of France getting special treatment yet again, and everybody

00:21having to work around France on these types of things.

00:24So the Commission was kind of stuck here.

00:27They had to come out with this announcement, or they were going to get continued to be

00:30hit with charges of double standards, which have particularly come from Italy and Italy's

00:35Prime Minister Giorgio Meloni, who has said this really isn't fair that France doesn't

00:40get applied the rules, and in Italy very excessively has been applied the rules too.

00:45So I don't think anyone here in this building behind me at the Commission is under any illusion

00:49that this is going to help the centrist forces in that election.

00:53I think they're all well aware that this probably helps the far left and the far right who have

00:57railed against EU interference in France.

01:00But both of those far left and far right groups have spending plans in their campaign promises

01:04that would raise France's deficit very clearly.

01:07So they're planning to do the exact opposite of what the Commission is going to tell them

01:11to do.

01:12So I think this is also an opening salvo to signal to the far left and the far right,

01:16even before they possibly take control of the French Parliament, that they have to rein

01:20in their spending plans, because the Commission is going to go after them on this.

01:25This is a long process.

01:26Fines, if it comes to that, are a long way away.

01:29So the Commission's getting in there early.

01:31It's a message to the new Parliament.

01:33What you're saying in those campaigns are incompatible with being a member of the euro,

01:37and you have to rein it in to be responsible for the rest of the EU member states.

01:42We'll see if the far left or far right would actually take that message.

01:45I think everyone's expectation is that if the Commission, when the Commission comes

01:49out with its instructions to them in the autumn, they're going to reject those instructions.

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