Not interested in a second fiddle – why the French parliament’s Prime Minister’s Questions experiment failed

Yesterday, Calixte Bloquet and Ruxandra Serban revealed a submit explaining why the French Nationwide Meeting determined to trial a weekly session of Prime Minister’s Questions. Right here they clarify how the experiment fared and why it failed.

What did French PMQs seem like?

To analyze how the brand new PMQs process operated in France, we checked out each query requested to the Prime Minister on Wednesday periods throughout the six weeks previous to the experiment, in addition to the six weeks of the experiment. For every query, we coded the writer, in addition to their occasion and place (majority or opposition). We additionally coded the theme of every query, and whether or not it had a conflictual tone. Lastly, we coded whether or not the questioner answered and/or posed a second query of their allotted time. This tends to be correlated with adversarialism: if the questioner leaves a while from their allotted 2 minutes, that is often an indication that they need an opportunity to criticise the reply. One of many six periods of the experiment didn’t happen (22 Could), and out of the Wednesday periods we chosen previous to the experiment, the Prime Minister was requested questions on 5 out of six periods, however on certainly one of these events, the query was answered by one other minister, leaving 4 Wednesdays when the Prime Minister answered a query within the Meeting.

What is straight away obvious when taking a look at how the process has modified the way in which questioning takes place within the Nationwide Meeting is, on the one hand, the rise within the variety of questions and, on the opposite, the higher variety of questioners (Desk 1). Certainly, earlier than the process was launched, the Prime Minister not often answered questions – seven within the six periods earlier than the brand new process, in opposition to 10 per session with the brand new process, amounting to 50 questions in whole throughout the experiment. By way of who will get to ask questions, 5 of the seven questions requested earlier than the brand new process had been requested by a celebration chief, in comparison with solely two of the 50 questions requested throughout the experimental periods: a way more numerous group of backbenchers are immediately concerned within the questioning, democratising the questioning of the Prime Minister. Apparently, the 2 questions requested by occasion leaders below the brand new process had been each requested by leaders of governing events, which could possibly be interpreted as an indication of respect for the Prime Minister. So far as the events are involved, the process dictates the outcomes, as every occasion is allowed to ask one query per session, no matter its measurement.

Desk 1: Distribution and conflictuality of inquiries to the PM, below situations of collective and particular person questioning

These questions are clearly used otherwise by events in authorities in comparison with these in opposition, however the change in process didn’t appear to have an effect on these patterns. Not a single query requested by a member of a authorities occasion, below both process, confirmed indicators of being conflictual, both in tone or as a result of the MP used their proper to answer. In the meantime, of the 35 questions requested over the interval by opposition events, solely seven had been neither confrontational in tone nor used the chance to answer; the distribution falls alongside anticipated government-opposition strains.

By way of the matters of questions, there appears to be no clear sample: the Prime Minister was requested about many alternative topics, from industrial coverage to the Olympics, and from schooling to worldwide relations. This can be a slight change from earlier patterns, when the Prime Minister was often questioned primarily by occasion leaders.

Why was the brand new PMQs process not adopted completely?

The dissolution introduced by President Emmanuel Macron on 9 June 2024 didn’t enable the analysis of this new process to happen in mid-June as deliberate, because the Meeting was dismissed and new elections needed to be organised. The newly elected Bureau of the Nationwide Meeting, the collegiate organ accountable for the interior organisation of the chamber, had to attract its conclusions after the appointment of the brand new authorities in September.

The Bureau determined to revert to the earlier process. The explanations given had been succinct: the targets of accelerating participation and curiosity had not been achieved and the occasion leaders had ‘no attachment’ to the method. Michel Barnier, the newly appointed Prime Minister, additionally had little interest in it. One other argument which will have performed a job is the shift in majorities: the occasion teams against the process have grow to be bigger due to the election, whereas the teams in favour of the process have tended to grow to be smaller, in order that assist has grow to be narrower.

The reform subsequently failed due to an absence of political assist and dangerous timing – each of that are essential for the result of any try at parliamentary reform. Because the experiment solely ran for a short while, it’s onerous to say what it might have grow to be in the long term.

Its failure is just not devoid of fascinating options: certainly, it’s value noting that this instrument, which was advocated as an try to present MPs extra management over the federal government, was rejected by giant sections of the opposition, regardless that it’s they who’ve probably the most to achieve from strict scrutiny of the federal government. Quite the opposite, they appear to have seen this variation as a discount of their oversight skills – as they’ve fewer alternatives to ask inquiries to the minister truly accountable for a given subject – and a method for almost all events (Renaissance, MoDem and Horizons) to make use of the query time as a political stage. This contrasts with how inquiries to the Prime Minister are usually perceived in Westminster-type parliaments, so what explains it?

One speculation to clarify this distinction could lie within the distinction in standing between the French Prime Minister and the classical place of a first-rate minister in a Westminster-style parliamentary system. Not like the British Prime Minister, the French Prime Minister is just not (often) the keystone of the chief. They don’t seem to be the chief of the occasion or the final word decision-maker: that’s often the President. In these configurations, the Prime Minister is usually the coordinator of presidency motion, whose high quality is measured by their skill to face again and permit the absence of crises to talk for his or her competence. In any case, that is the function that almost all prime ministers have performed in latest a long time, alongside presidents who’re decision-makers in addition to the recognized face of the chief. Questioning the Prime Minister is subsequently not questioning the decision-maker, however quite questioning a second fiddle.

Nevertheless, the political panorama in France has modified since 2022, and the nation has to get used to minority governments during which the Prime Minister is a extra vital but in addition extra fragile determine, and to a context during which President Macron suffers from report unpopularity. Shifting the main target to the Prime Minister was all the time going to really feel compelled within the French Republic, however on this context, it could possibly be seen as an try and deliver out one other, maybe extra common, chief right into a governing coalition that may not depend on the recognition of the President, and to present credibility to a place that’s institutionally extremely fragile. On this gentle, the opposition’s rejection – and the bulk occasion’s insistence that this experiment ought to happen throughout an election marketing campaign – is sensible. The aim was to not allow oversight, however to create political capital and credibility.

Conclusion

This short-lived experiment illustrates the complicated politics of parliamentary reform: though the said intention was to enhance parliamentary oversight of the top of presidency, opposition MPs rejected this premise and noticed it as a transfer to extend the Prime Minister’s standing, while coalition events thought that extra productive scrutiny is carried out by questioning ministers.  Though the experimental process led to questions on a wider vary of matters and by extra backbench MPs, it’s debatable whether or not within the French context this truly means significant and related scrutiny, given the Prime Minister is neither the important thing government determine, nor a minister with a transparent coverage portfolio. With out a clear function inside the French constitutional construction that might justify gathering political assist for PMQs, it appears to be like unlikely that this experiment will likely be repeated sooner or later.

Apparently, one other session of Prime Minister’s Questions was organised in December 2024. The context was very particular: the brand new Prime Minister, Francois Bayrou, had simply been appointed, however the ministers of his authorities weren’t but in place – and the structure mandates a weekly session of questions be held for a parliamentary week to be legitimate. Outdoors of different actual choices, the process that was used below Gabriel Attal was subsequently a really handy device for the federal government to have. To the detriment, but once more, of the standard of parliamentary oversight.

That is the second submit in a two-part collection on the latest trial of Prime Minister’s Questions within the Nationwide Meeting. The primary submit within the collection, which explains why this experiment was tried, was revealed yesterday.

In regards to the authors

Calixte Bloquet is a analysis affiliate on the Institute for Parliamentary Analysis (IParl – Berlin) and an affiliate member of the CESSP (Paris). 

Ruxandra Serban is a Lecturer (Instructing) in Comparative Politics within the Division of Political Science at UCL.

Featured picture: Richard Ferrand – Assemblée nationale (CC BY 2.0) by paquierjacques.