French government survives no-confidence motion but faces more challenges

President Emmanuel Macron's government narrowly survived a no confidence motion in the National Assembly on Monday, after bypassing the lower house to push through a deeply unpopular change to the pension system.

President Emmanuel Macron's government narrowly survived a no confidence motion in the National Assembly on Monday, after bypassing the lower house to push through a deeply unpopular change to the pension system. Some 278 MPs voted in favour of a tripartisan, no confidence motion tabled by a centrist party and others, just short of the 287 needed for it to succeed.

A second motion of no confidence, tabled by the far-right National Rally (RN), had no chance of going through later on Monday as other opposition parties said they would not vote for it. A successful no-confidence vote would have sunk the government and killed the legislation, which is set to raise the retirement age by two years to 64.

But even after having defeated the motion of no confidence, Macron's failure to find enough support in parliament to put his pension system overhaul to a vote has undermined his reformist agenda and weakened his leadership, observers say. Opposition parties will also challenge the bill in the Constitutional Council, which could decide to strike down some of it - if it considers it breaches the constitution.

Violent unrest has erupted across the country over the past days over the pension reform, while trade unions have promised to intensify their strike action, leaving Macron to face the most dangerous challenge to his authority since the "Yellow Vest" uprising over four years ago.