France’s Prime Minister Francois Bayrou speaks during a press conference in Paris on August 25, 2025.
Dimitar Dilkoff | Afp | Getty Images
Dear France,
I just wanted to let you know at this difficult time that I’m here for you.
I’m no gloating Englishman sneering from the other side of the Channel. I genuinely love you and your magnificent country. I even worked for one of your esteemed banks for five years back in the nineties and have just come back from another great holiday in your amazing country — a place I have visited for over 40 years, a place where my great grandfather lies to rest after fighting for liberty. I consider myself a Francophile, a friend.
But all friends need to be honest with each other, to tell each other home truths when it’s needed, to confront those awkward moments without fear of the reaction.
You let me know the folly of my ways nine years ago during Brexit. You let me know that we were going down a path of self-harm and now it’s time for me to return the favor.
Okay, the truth is this can’t go on. You are amazing but not exceptional. You need to realize that you are tempting fate by ignoring the fact that you are living way beyond your means, and it’s not going to end well.
Fifteen years you got away with it. The bond markets gave you a pass when they were tearing into Greece, Italy, Ireland, and all. At the time I remember thinking, “Why not France? Why aren’t the OAT getting hammered?” I presumed the answer was that you were just too big to fail, that Germany would never allow you to suffer the same ignominy that others were suffering mostly in Southern Europe.
But would it have done some good to have gotten the pain over and done with, back in 2010? Maybe you would have taken a hard look in the mirror like the Irish and the Spanish and reappraised your spending, your generous retirement age, your enormous public spending at the time?
As you say adieu to yet another prime minister, Francois Bayrou, who fell on his sabre after failing to get 44 billion euros of cuts ($51.8 billion) through the National Assembly, you know the next and the next and the next candidates up the ramp for that role will suffer a similar fate unless you confront the hard truths.
As Bayrou himself put it, “You have the power to topple the government, but you don’t have the power to erase reality.”
So, bon chance my friends, and when you are ready to be bold and confront the real world, I will be there for you.
