France, live

I’ll wrap this up now and come back to it later in the week after we’ve all had time to digest the result, but first a couple of figures to show just how remarkable it was. The far right, as we’ve noted below, led in 298 seats in the first round (38 of which it won outright). But in more than half of those, 154, it was overtaken in the runoff by the second-placegetter, and in one (Ardèche 3rd) it was overtaken by the third-placegetter. No seats at all went the other way: the far right didn’t pick up a single seat that it hadn’t led in a week earlier.

The other parties, by contrast, all improved their tallies. The left, which led in 171 (I said 172 below but I’ve followed Le Monde and reclassified the Tavini MP as non-aligned), lost 17 of those (mostly to the centre), but it picked up 41 from the far right. The centre-right lost two seats where it had led to the centre, but it picked up 33 from second (or in one case third) place. The centre did best of all: it won every one of the 75 seats in which it had led, and picked up another 99.

For years the far right has been able to complain that it was disadvantaged by the electoral system. In 2017, for example, it won 13.2% of the vote but only eight of the 577 seats. The disadvantage is still there, but much reduced; this time, its 33.2% of the first-round vote won it 24.8% of the seats.

In effect, this election resolved itself into a two-party contest, the far right versus everyone else. “Everyone else” won a big majority of the vote – about 62% in the second round – so not surprisingly, given a system of single-member districts, it won an even bigger majority of seats. Yes, proportional representation would be fairer, but in this case, unlike some others (of which Britain is a prime example), it wouldn’t have made a huge difference.

In due course we’ll see whether that big majority can find some unity within itself. Thanks everyone for following along this morning!

3.02am (Paris time): All done. At a time when three days ago we had hardly any British results in, the French have finished theirs. You can see the complete list of those elected at Le Monde; here are the totals:

• New Popular Front (left to centre-left) 182, of which LFI 74, Socialists 59, Greens 28, Communists nine and others 12; plus 13 non-aligned left for a total of 195.
• Ensemble (centre) 168, plus six non-aligned centre for a total of 174.
• National Rally (far right) 126, plus 17 for its wing of the Republicans for a total of 143.
• Republicans (centre-right) 45, not counting those who sided with National Rally, plus 15 non-aligned centre-right for a total of 60.
• Five others, basically regionalists (two from Corsica and one each from Brittany, Martinique and French Polynesia).

Stay tuned for some interpretation.

1.46am: I’m now going to pause for breakfast, but with only three seats undecided (all of them expatriate seats being fought between centre and left) it’s been a massive setback for the far right. It finishes with 143 seats (including its allies who used to be in the centre-right), compared to National Rally’s 89 in 2022. The New Popular Front is well ahead with 181, plus another 13 or so non-aligned left, compared to a left total of 152 last time.

There are 172 centrists, well down from 2022’s 255 but in the circumstances something of a moral victory. The centre-right (the part, that is, that stayed clear of the far right’s embrace) will have 60, not far down on their previous total of 72.

Centre, centre-right, Socialists, Greens and some non-aligned mainstream candidates will have a majority between them, of the order of about forty seats – maybe double that if you include the Communists. I doubt they’ll actually form government together, but they could provide the basis for a governing majority. Whereas if the NFP and the Macronists persist in fighting each other, keeping the far right out again next time is going to be much more difficult.

1.22am: It’s not just the left’s voters that have been doing the right thing. Look at Sarthe 4th, in Le Mans (once François Fillon’s seat). Élise Leboucher from LFI was the sitting member, but on the first round she trailed the far right’s Marie-Caroline Le Pen (Marine’s sister) by about seven thousand votes, 25.9% to 39.3%. The Macronist, who was only 35 votes further back, argued that she would have a better chance of beating Le Pen, but in the end she withdrew.

And despite the bad blood between the centre and LFI, her voters followed her lead and backed Leboucher, who made up 24 points and won narrowly with 50.2%. It’s been a very bad night for the Le Pens.

1.06am (Paris time): And one from the far north, Nord 13th based on Dunkirk. National Rally had a comfortable first-round lead with 43.5%, well clear of a dissident Socialist (not part of the NFP) on 32.2% and LFI on 21.9%. LFI withdrew and endorsed the Socialist, who not only won but did it handsomely, with 53.8%. The far right only picked up three points while the Socialist picked up twenty.

12.55am: On Saturday I gave the results of a seat-by-seat analysis I’d made using assumptions that I said were “optimistic but not (I think) completely unrealistic,” which produced a far-right total of 184. In fact I wasn’t optimistic enough; they’ll be forty seats short of that.

Here’s an example of one where I was wrong: Loiret 3rd, near Orleans, where the sitting far-right member led on the first round with 45.5%, more than six thousand votes ahead of an independent centre-right candidate on 32.0%. The third-placed LFI candidate (19.4%) withdrew to support the centre-right, but I still thought that’d be too big a difference to make up. She did it though, winning with 51.1%.

12.44am: Another seat where the far right wasn’t in the mix (eliminated in the first round with 13.2%), but interesting because it’s the prime minister’s seat: Hauts-de-Seine 10th, in the south-western suburbs of Paris. Gabriel Attal has been comfortably re-elected with 58.2% against his Socialist opponent. (Ministers don’t actually sit in parliament, they have an alternative who replaces them while they’re in office.)

He’s already announced that he will submit his resignation as a result of his party’s defeat, even though it’s actually done much better than expected.

12.31am: Some of the expatriate seats are in. In the 8th district, which covers the eastern Mediterranean, incumbent Meyer Habib, centre-right but apparently close to Benjamin Netanyahu, has been beaten by the Macronist candidate, Caroline Yadan, who won with 52.7%. In the 11th, which includes Australia (as well as most of Asia), another Macronist, Anne Genetet, was elected, beating the Socialist with 57.0%. (In both cases the far right was eliminated in the first round.)

12.16am: Virtually all of the undecided seats are now either in metropolitan Paris or the seats for expatriate voters, and there are no far-right prospects there, so its total of 140 is pretty much final. That would mean it’s been beaten in more than half the seats where it led in the first round, a truly striking result.

France 24 quotes an estimated turnout figure of 67.1%, which is up slightly on the first round’s 66.7% – a reversal of the usual trend where the second round is lower. Another marker of republican solidarity.

11.43pm (Paris time): I’m just going to take a break, but a quick summary first. Only 38 seats are still undecided, and my prediction that the three blocs of far right, left and centre+centre-right would come out about even has been vindicated. In fact the far right will clearly be the smallest, currently with 140 seats. The New Popular Front has 169, plus another 11 independent left; the Macronist group has 149, the centre-right Republicans (those that didn’t align with National Rally) 44, and another 21 independent centre and right.

It’s a huge comedown from the (often foolish) predictions of far-right success. One implication is that centre, centre-right and the more mainstream parts of the NFP (that is, excluding Mélenchon’s LFI) will have a majority between them – a possible route to a governing majority, and an outcome that I described last week as “only barely within the realm of possibility.”

11.27pm: Nice reaction from Polish prime minister Donald Tusk, as reported by the BBC: “In Paris enthusiasm, in Moscow disappointment, in Kyiv relief.”

11.25pm: Even National Rally’s sitting members (of which there are 89) are not immune: Grégoire de Fournas, member for the 5th district of Gironde and famous (I’m taking this from Le Monde) for having been suspended a couple of years ago for telling an LFI MP to “go back to Africa”. He led by more than 11 points on the first round, but he’s lost by a thousand votes – the Socialist, who benefited from a centrist withdrawal, won with 50.6%.

11.18pm: A more high-profile case: Olivier Marleix, who leads the centre-right parliamentary group; his seat is Eure-et-Loir 2nd, just south-west of Paris. On the first round he trailed the far right, 25.9% to 38.3%. The Socialist, who was only fractionally behind him with 25.6%, withdrew and endorsed him. And he’s scored a comfortable victory with 57.3%.

11.08pm: Another sample district: Cher 2nd, pretty much right in the middle of France. National Rally led with 40.6%, which would usually be a winning score; the Communist (part of the New Popular Front) was second more than ten points behind, on 29.7%. The centrist, who also qualified with 20.8%, withdrew; an independent centre-right candidate also had 6.4%. On those numbers it was going to be tough for the left to reel it in, but they did it, by just over 500 votes: 50.6%.

11.00pm (Paris time): You can follow developments in English at the BBC – where the simple conclusion is “once again, the majority of the French have looked at the possibility of a National Rally government and said ‘non'” – or rather more exhaustively in French at Le Monde. I can’t find a ticker at Le Figaro, but there’s lots of other good stuff, including “the disillusion of the National Rally in a map.”

With the undecideds now down to 83, we have left 154, centre 146, far right 135 and centre-right 54.

10.51pm: To pick an example of what’s happening, more or less at random: the 4th district of Bas-Rhin (Lower Rhine). National Rally led in the first round with 33.1%, against 32.4% centre, 20.9% left, 5.8% centre-right and a few others. Centre-right was eliminated, but the left, who could have stayed in, also withdrew to support the centrist. Who therefore didn’t just win, but won with a crushing majority, 61.4% to 38.6%.

Republican solidarity is working. It’s still going to deliver a dog’s breakfast of a legislature, but not one where National Rally will be a contender for power.

10.42pm: A quick recap of where we started: a week ago in the first round the far right led in a bare majority of seats, 298 out of 577. The left led in 172, the centre 75 and centre-right 29. (There were three others, which I won’t mention again; just accept that the totals are always going to add to a bit less than 577.) But in most of those 298, the forces opposed to the far right consolidated for the second round.

And it seems to have worked better than anyone expected.

10.35pm (Paris time): On Saturday I said that “a far-right plurality is not a certainty,” and as far as I can see I seemed to be the only person who was saying that. But the reality is even worse for the far right than I had dared to predict. With 122 seats yet to be declared, it has 131 seats so far, as against 136 for the left, 132 centre and 51 centre-right. (That’s off Le Monde’s summary table; I’m consolidating categories a bit, which may overstate the centre-right slightly at the expense of the far right.)

Le Figaro’s projection says far right to finish with between 135 and 143 seats, well behind the left on 188-199 and centre on 164-169, with centre-right 63. If the far right really does end up in third place it will be a massive defeat for it and a remarkable comeback for the Macronists in particular.

——

It’s not just the electoral system in France that’s more sensible than its British counterpart: counting works more efficiently as well. The polls close three hours earlier, at 7pm (and France is an hour ahead to start with), and then votes are counted in each municipality rather than being taken to a single location in each seat, so it all gets under way much more quickly. Which means that whereas British results come in slowly and mostly around the middle of the day by eastern Australian time, French results are nearly all in by breakfast time here.

It’s currently 10.20pm in Paris and most seats have been declared. The results are surprising to a lot of people, so follow along in real time as I try to make sense of them. Most recent comments will appear at the top; all times given as in Paris, eight hours behind eastern Australia.