Speaker 1: Already and this is the daily This is the daily.
Speaker 2: Ohs oh, now it makes sense.
Speaker 1: Good morning and welcome to the Daily OS. It's Tuesday,
Speaker 1: the ninth of July. I'm zara, i'm emma, France's far
Speaker 1: right party was expected to dominate in France's election over
Speaker 1: the weekend, but a surprise swing to the left has
Speaker 1: resulted in a hung parliament. The results are nothing less
Speaker 1: than shocking. This was the biggest surprise in French politics
Speaker 1: for generations.
Speaker 2: A left wing coalition that didn't exist a few weeks
Speaker 2: ago won the most seats in the final round of
Speaker 2: voting for the French election, but a divided result means
Speaker 2: there's no clear majority winner. We'll take you through the
Speaker 2: results and what they mean for the future of France's
Speaker 2: government in today's deep dive.
Speaker 1: But first, Zara.
Speaker 2: What's making headlines.
Speaker 1: Northern Territory police have announced curfew in Alice Springs. It's
Speaker 1: the second in three months. Territory police say the decision
Speaker 1: comes after a recent spike in crime, including assaults against
Speaker 1: local police. The three day curfew prohibits anyone from entering
Speaker 1: the Alice Springs CBD from ten pm to six a m.
Speaker 1: The Anti Police Commissioner can extend the length of the
Speaker 1: curfew with approval from the Police Minister.
Speaker 2: Global plane manufacturer Boeing will plete guilty to fraud charges
Speaker 2: after the U S Government launched legal action over two
Speaker 2: separate Boeing seven three seven Max crashes. Two Boeing planes
Speaker 2: crashed in Indonesia and Ethiopia in twenty eighteen and twenty nineteen, respectively,
Speaker 2: killing nearly three hundred fifty people in total. Boeing will
Speaker 2: now have to pay a penalty of US two hundred
Speaker 2: forty three point six million dollars that's over three hundred
Speaker 2: sixty one million Australian dollars for failing to address safety concerns.
Speaker 2: The company will also need to invest a further four
Speaker 2: hundred and fifty five million US dollars in compliance and
Speaker 2: safety programs.
Speaker 1: Last month was the hottest June on record. That's according
Speaker 1: to the European Union's Climate change service Copernicus. New figure
Speaker 1: show a global average surface air temperature of sixteen point
Speaker 1: seven degrees celsius. That's nearly zero point seven degrees higher
Speaker 1: from the nineteen ninety one to twenty twenty June average,
Speaker 1: while below average temperatures were recorded in the northern and
Speaker 1: eastern areas of Australia. Countries like the US, Greece and
Speaker 1: India are facing some of their hottest summers on record.
Speaker 2: And today's good news the UK has elected its highest
Speaker 2: ever number of women to Parliament. Two hundred and sixty
Speaker 2: three women won seats in the general election on the
Speaker 2: fourth of July, according to interim summary results. That's up
Speaker 2: from the previous record of two hundred and twenty women
Speaker 2: set at the last election in twenty nineteen. Estimates indicate
Speaker 2: women now make up around forty percent of the UK Parliament.
Speaker 1: M another day, another global election. Yesterday we were of
Speaker 1: course talking about the UK election and their new PM,
Speaker 1: kir Starmer. Last week we were talking about the US
Speaker 1: election and Joe Biden and Donald Trump. But today we
Speaker 1: have a new entrant into the global election scene, and
Speaker 1: that is France. It was a bit of an unexpected
Speaker 1: weekend with the election results taking many by surprise. Can
Speaker 1: you just start with explaining what the hell is going
Speaker 1: on in France?
Speaker 2: It's a good question.
Speaker 1: On the starting point.
Speaker 2: Over the past few weeks, as you've mentioned, we've basically
Speaker 2: been told to brace for a big swing to the
Speaker 2: far right, in France's elections, but a coalition of left
Speaker 2: wing parties ended up securing the most votes in the
Speaker 2: second round of voting over the weekend. And the reason
Speaker 2: this has come as a big shop to a lot
Speaker 2: of people is because it follows this recent trend towards
Speaker 2: the far right in France. So both at a domestic
Speaker 2: level during the first round of national elections and at
Speaker 2: the recent European elections.
Speaker 1: I do want to pick up on those European elections
Speaker 1: and run with that because that really kickstarted this whole process,
Speaker 1: the whole election process in France. Talk me through those.
Speaker 2: Yep, you're exactly right. So President Emmanuel Macron called a
Speaker 2: snap election last month. That came after his main rival
Speaker 2: Marine Lapenn led the far right National Rally Party to
Speaker 2: its best ever result in the EU election. That election
Speaker 2: doesn't directly impact the composition of the French Parliament at
Speaker 2: a domestic level, but the result is considered an indicator
Speaker 2: of the president's popularity, in this case declining popularity. So
Speaker 2: he announced an election in light of that, and Macron
Speaker 2: told voters at the time that he had heard their
Speaker 2: message from the EU result and that he would address
Speaker 2: it with a vote so.
Speaker 1: It was almost this way for Macron to test the temperature,
Speaker 1: and obviously when he picked that thermometer up, he wasn't
Speaker 1: too happy with what it said. So then Macron calls
Speaker 1: this snap election. How did the rest of France feel
Speaker 1: about this?
Speaker 2: So something pretty remarkable ended up happening within French politics
Speaker 2: after we saw the far right round that was made
Speaker 2: up in the EU elections and that has gone on
Speaker 2: to have some pretty major implications.
Speaker 1: So we saw the emergence of.
Speaker 2: A new coalition of parties all from the left of politics,
Speaker 2: in response to concern around this growing influence of La
Speaker 2: penn and the National Rally Party. We've got this group
Speaker 2: of socialist communists, left wing alliance parties all working together
Speaker 2: in sort of really unlikely circumstances. But the socialist leader
Speaker 2: Olivier for a he said only a united left could
Speaker 2: stand in the way of the far right. So this movement,
Speaker 2: this coalition is called the New Popular Front and as
Speaker 2: I mentioned, it's an alliance of left wing parties. It's
Speaker 2: also got this party called France Unbowed included in it.
Speaker 2: Now that's a party scene as kind of the most
Speaker 2: extreme far left party in France. It's led by Jean
Speaker 2: Luke Melenchon, and he's seen as a pretty radical figure
Speaker 2: in France. He's been in politics since the seventies, but
Speaker 2: more recently he's been a really vocal critic of NATO.
Speaker 2: He's been calling for France to leave the Treaty Alliance
Speaker 2: for a few years. He's also been accused of anti
Speaker 2: Semitism over recent campaigns. So quite an extreme figure in
Speaker 2: the French political landscape.
Speaker 1: So this left wing alliance has emerged in response to
Speaker 1: this surge in the far right wing vote in these
Speaker 1: EU elections. It is still a bit complex to understand though.
Speaker 1: How does that impact what's actually happening in France.
Speaker 2: Yep, So it's complicated, but stay with me. The timeline
Speaker 2: essentially is.
Speaker 1: Only because you are so niceute.
Speaker 2: European Union has elections. That's about the decision makers in
Speaker 2: the EU, so that body of European nations. But then
Speaker 2: that's seen as a temperature test of French sentiment and
Speaker 2: politics and this kind of swing to the far right.
Speaker 2: So the president says to the country, you seem to
Speaker 2: be keen.
Speaker 1: On this far right party of which Macron is not
Speaker 1: a member.
Speaker 2: Of, not a member. No, so Macron is a centrist leader.
Speaker 2: He is part of the Ensemble party. So Macron says
Speaker 2: to the French people, it seems like France is skewing
Speaker 2: to the far right. Let's go to an election and
Speaker 2: see if that's how you want your government to look
Speaker 2: here at home domestically rather than in the EU. So
Speaker 2: that gives us the French elections.
Speaker 1: Okay, And those elections work differently to how they do here.
Speaker 1: They've split up into two different rounds, right.
Speaker 2: Yes, So the first thing to say here is that
Speaker 2: we're talking about elections of France's National Assembly, it's lower House.
Speaker 2: These elections, as you say, are held over two rounds
Speaker 2: to elect five hundred and seventy seven members that make
Speaker 2: up the lower House. Only candidates who receive more than
Speaker 2: twelve point five percent of the votes in their electorate
Speaker 2: progress to the second round of voting.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Round one essentially narrows down the field, and round two
Speaker 2: gives voters the choice between the most popular candidates in
Speaker 2: their electorate.
Speaker 1: I think this is the first and last time I'm
Speaker 1: ever going to use a sporting analogy, but it's almost
Speaker 1: like the heat and then the finals. Yes, thank you.
Speaker 1: I was really proud of that I've.
Speaker 2: Got like a knockout round and then a final okay.
Speaker 1: And thank you so much, and just before we go
Speaker 1: on any further. This election doesn't impact Emmanuel Macron's job
Speaker 1: in the very literal sense. His job wasn't up for.
Speaker 2: Grabs, yeap, His job was not up for grabs. This
Speaker 2: is a parliamentary election and that's different to the presidential race.
Speaker 2: So Mcron will be the president of France until twenty
Speaker 2: twenty seven. His job might change in terms of how
Speaker 2: he governing with less of a majority or in terms
Speaker 2: of how he governs with a minority, but we'll get
Speaker 2: to that. But unlike in Australia, as you mentioned earlierz Aara,
Speaker 2: the parliamentary system of France, it functions differently. We've got
Speaker 2: a president and a Prime minister. The president is elected
Speaker 2: by French voters every five years. That's the country's head
Speaker 2: of state. They have control over foreign policy and defense matters.
Speaker 2: But this election did mean something for the Prime minister
Speaker 2: in France. So that person is appointed by the President
Speaker 2: with the approval of the parliament and they serve as
Speaker 2: the head of government. So we're talking about every day
Speaker 2: governing and domestic policy matters.
Speaker 1: Okay, so I think I understand a bit of the
Speaker 1: lay of the land now, and just going back to
Speaker 1: our timeline, we've already had the first round and then
Speaker 1: most recently we have the second round. What happened in
Speaker 1: the first round of the election, so.
Speaker 2: That was the thirtieth of June round one where we
Speaker 2: had this historic turnout of voters. Turnout was estimated at
Speaker 2: sixty seven point five percent, the high turnout since nineteen
Speaker 2: ninety seven, an interestingly national rally. That's the far right
Speaker 2: party won the most votes of any party, so they
Speaker 2: were seen to dominate in that first round, and that
Speaker 2: is kind of what we were expecting. It's kind of
Speaker 2: in line with what we saw in the EU elections,
Speaker 2: so it was this general trend general trends, so what
Speaker 2: we were expecting. But it's also the first time that
Speaker 2: we saw a glimpse of nfp's success among voters. So
Speaker 2: that's the new left wing alliance. They were formed recently
Speaker 2: after the EU elections. This is the first time we've
Speaker 2: put their popularity to the test, and NFP beat mccron's party,
Speaker 2: the Centrist Ensemble Party. So NFP won about twenty eight
Speaker 2: point five percent of the vote, in round one ensemble
Speaker 2: twenty two percent. So to recap, we had far right
Speaker 2: National Rally with over thirty percent of the vote, around
Speaker 2: twenty eight percent with the left wing Party, and around
Speaker 2: twenty two percent with the Center.
Speaker 1: Okay, So that was what happened in round one of
Speaker 1: the election. Round two then happened over the weekend yeap.
Speaker 2: So despite the fact that National Rally won the most
Speaker 2: votes of any party in the first vote, it came
Speaker 2: in third overall with.
Speaker 1: This second right party YEP.
Speaker 2: Sunday's vote actually saw the left wing Alliance NFP take
Speaker 2: the highest number of seats, around one hundred and eighty.
Speaker 2: So remember there are five hundred and seventy seven up
Speaker 2: for grabs, the party with the most votes gets one
Speaker 2: hundred and eighty. Mccron's party picked up about one hundred
Speaker 2: and sixty. That's down from two hundred and forty five
Speaker 2: at the last election, So nearly one hundred seats lost
Speaker 2: and the far right won about one hundred and forty seats.
Speaker 1: Okay. So it wasn't what the first round had necessarily
Speaker 1: indicated what was going to happen. It kind of flipped
Speaker 1: on its head. It was exactly the far right it
Speaker 1: was the Left Wing Alliance. Did that alliance win enough
Speaker 1: seats to govern in its own right?
Speaker 2: So this is where it gets even trickier, because the
Speaker 2: short answer is no. Two hundred and eighty nine seats
Speaker 2: are needed to form a majority in the lower house
Speaker 2: of French Parliament. None of these parties are even close
Speaker 2: to that. So we've got the party with the most votes,
Speaker 2: that Left Wing Alliance, on one hundred and eighty. That's
Speaker 2: one hundred and nine short of where it needs.
Speaker 1: So many numbers, Okay, so they're far away from where
Speaker 1: they need to be in order to govern in an
Speaker 1: outright majority.
Speaker 2: So a bit of a hung parliament exactly, we've got
Speaker 2: a hung parliament. Now. In Australia, if we had a
Speaker 2: hung parliament, we'd expect to see the major parties doing
Speaker 2: deals and negotiating with the minor parties and independents to
Speaker 2: try and form government. But it's different in France because
Speaker 2: minor parties have essentially been amalgamated already into these three
Speaker 2: major parties. They're each coalitions made up of multiple other parties.
Speaker 1: So it's not like the Liberal Party and the Labor Party.
Speaker 1: We're talking about a bunch of different groups all coming
Speaker 1: together under the same pannel.
Speaker 2: And that's a strategic decision that these parties have made
Speaker 2: based on their political leanings, to kind of try and
Speaker 2: garner more seats to be a stronger presence. So even
Speaker 2: Macron's ensemble in the center, that's a coalition of three
Speaker 2: center parties. So there isn't the option for these players
Speaker 2: to kind of do those deals with those minor parties
Speaker 2: and independents. They just don't exist.
Speaker 1: Can they do deals with each other? Though, So if
Speaker 1: there's three kind of main alliances or broad umbrella groups,
Speaker 1: can say the left wing who emerge victorious do a
Speaker 1: deal with Macron's centrist party.
Speaker 2: That definitely makes more political sense than if that left
Speaker 2: wing group we're working with the far right. But commentators
Speaker 2: are indicating that it could be weeks before a deal
Speaker 2: is reached because no one has indicated that they're inclined
Speaker 2: to work together. You've got macrons ensemble in the center
Speaker 2: who have been vocally critical of members of that far
Speaker 2: left alliance that Macron has said some parts of that
Speaker 2: group are, to paraphrase how he's described the situation that
Speaker 2: there are radical leaders as bad on the far left
Speaker 2: as on the far right, and he doesn't want to
Speaker 2: work with them. You've got this kind of deadlock that
Speaker 2: we end up being left with. And each of these
Speaker 2: parties give or take, has basically a third of the vote.
Speaker 2: And I think that really speaks to the division in
Speaker 2: French politics. That's the landscape in a nutshell, right, It's
Speaker 2: this incredibly divided environment.
Speaker 1: I don't envy Emmanuel Macron, who among this kind of
Speaker 1: divided society has to somehow lead through that when it's
Speaker 1: so clear that he doesn't have the support that he
Speaker 1: once had or once enjoyed. Another person who has really
Speaker 1: been feeling the results of this has been Gabriel La Tal,
Speaker 1: who was the Prime minister. As we said before, the
Speaker 1: French system has both tell me a bit about him.
Speaker 2: Gabrielle Atal is a casualty of this snap election. He's resigned.
Speaker 2: He has not secured enough of a majority or a
Speaker 2: minority to lead as prime minister. He's part of Macron's
Speaker 2: Ensemble party, which has sort of ranked second in this
Speaker 2: race of three, but he has suggested that he could
Speaker 2: remain in office throughout the upcoming paras Olympic and Paralympic
Speaker 2: Games to maintain government, to sort of oversee day to
Speaker 2: day runnings in a caretaker kind of role. But he's gone.
Speaker 2: He's resigned, basically, whether or not he sticks around for
Speaker 2: the Olympics regardless, you know, he will not be prime
Speaker 2: minister in the future. The French constitution requires Macron to
Speaker 2: choose the next prime minister, though, and we have no
Speaker 2: idea who that's going to be. In a victory speech,
Speaker 2: Melonchon who is from that left wing alliance, He's called
Speaker 2: on the president to choose a prime minister from the NFP,
Speaker 2: from that alliance, but it's not clear who that could be.
Speaker 2: Melonchon said that the president has the power and the
Speaker 2: duty to call the new Popular Front to govern, but
Speaker 2: we just don't know what that will look like.
Speaker 1: And just to clarify, if that were to happen, it
Speaker 1: would mean that centrist Macron as president is working with
Speaker 1: a left wing leader in a prime minister and you
Speaker 1: know they might not see eyda eye, but together they're
Speaker 1: meant to really rule in harmony, and that's a really
Speaker 1: challenging situation to be in.
Speaker 2: Could be incredibly difficult, and I think when you look
Speaker 2: to some of nfp's policies and how they kind of
Speaker 2: butt heads with Macron's agenda, it could be a stalemate
Speaker 2: kind of a government.
Speaker 1: And what's the reaction been like among voters after this
Speaker 1: second round election?
Speaker 2: So if the lead up to the election was any
Speaker 2: indication of things to come, there's going to be a
Speaker 2: long road ahead in terms of uniting the French people.
Speaker 2: Government officials said that there were at least fifty candidates
Speaker 2: and activists who'd experienced physical violence in the lead up
Speaker 2: to the election. There was a spate of assaults, dozens
Speaker 2: of arrests and a significantly ramped up police presence.
Speaker 1: Obviously, the far right has not ended up on top
Speaker 1: as they would have liked. And also what the polls
Speaker 1: were telling us was going to happen. What have we
Speaker 1: heard from Marie Leapenn, who's the leader of that far
Speaker 1: right alliance?
Speaker 2: So Lea Penn posted on x saying the tide continues
Speaker 2: to rise and our victory is now only delayed. So
Speaker 2: I think it's important to point out while the far
Speaker 2: right didn't outperform an FP, there was still big momentum
Speaker 2: for the National Rally Party. They will be counting this
Speaker 2: as their best ever result in the lower House because
Speaker 2: it is. It's not a loss by any means for them.
Speaker 2: So we'll have to wait and see how this future government,
Speaker 2: whatever that ends up looking like, is received by voters
Speaker 2: to really know if the rise or the threat of
Speaker 2: the far right, which is what the opposition has called it,
Speaker 2: has subsided. You know, if French voters aren't happy with
Speaker 2: how the future coalition government manages things, they might want
Speaker 2: to see change next time they got to vote for
Speaker 2: their president, and you could see a far right leader
Speaker 2: still becoming president. So overall you could say, you know,
Speaker 2: mccron took a gamble on this snap election. He has
Speaker 2: kept the far right at bay for now. But I
Speaker 2: don't think that this conversation is over by any means.
Speaker 2: We've got a really divided country, a really divided government,
Speaker 2: and the chaos kind of looks like it's going to continue.
Speaker 1: And if that could be the theme of every general
Speaker 1: election this year, I think it would be at this rate.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for explaining that, m and thank
Speaker 1: you for joining us today on the Daily OS. If
Speaker 1: you learned something I know I did. Who knew that
Speaker 1: French elections were so fascinating? You can hit follow if
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Speaker 1: video podcasts. We'll be back again tomorrow, but until then
Speaker 1: or what. My name is Lily Madden and I'm a
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