France is to renationalise its indebted electricity giant EDF in response to the energy crisis aggravated by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the country’s prime minister, Élisabeth Borne, has announced, reports The Guardian.
Borne vowed to limit the impact of rising energy prices despite the political turmoil of Emmanuel Macron losing control of parliament in recent legislative elections.
“We must have full control over our electricity production and performance,” Borne told parliament in her first state-of-the-nation speech to parliament on Wednesday, as she tried to court opposition parties to avoid parliamentary deadlock.
“We must ensure our sovereignty in the face of the consequences of the war and the colossal challenges to come … That’s why I confirm to you the state’s intention to own 100% of EDF’s capital.”
The French state holds an 84% stake in EDF, one of the world’s biggest electricity producers, but the company is facing delays and budget overruns on new nuclear plants in France and Britain, and corrosion problems at some of its ageing reactors, which have heavily hit its shares price in recent months.
Macron, who was re-elected for a second term as president in April, wants massive investment in new nuclear reactors as a pillar of France’s push for carbon neutrality. Nationalising EDF is an idea that had also been recently promoted by the left, and Borne’s speech was seen as an attempt to appeal to different corners of a deeply divided parliament.
France is facing an unprecedented political crisis after Macron’s centrist grouping suffered big losses in legislative elections last month. The president’s centrist alliance, Ensemble (Together), won the most seats in the national assembly but fell about 40 seats short of the absolute majority needed to pass laws.
Meanwhile, Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Rally saw a historic surge and greatly increased its seats to become the biggest single opposition party. The hard-left Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s France Unbowed party also largely increased its seats and is now the biggest leftwing party in a broad coalition known as the Nupes, which includes the Socialists and Greens.
Borne’s government faces a constant struggle to pass legislation and will hope to negotiate compromises on a case-by-case basis with certain opposition lawmakers. This is a sharp contrast to Macron’s top-down approach to power in his first five-year term, when he held an absolute majority in a parliament that largely rubber-stamped his plans.