French legislative elections 2022: live coverage of the decisive second round
French voters have delivered a major setback to Emmanuel Macron and his centre-right Ensemble coalition, which has failed to achieve an overall majority in the National Assembly in today's decisive second round legislative elections. This is a huge blow for President Macron who cannot now be assured of Parliamentary backing for his planned reforms. His centre-right coalition has so far picked up 245 of the 577 seats, with 289 being the magic number to achieve an overall majority. This is well down on the number of seats it won in 2017 and means that for the government to have a working parliamentary majority it will have to seek the help of another party. That could be the rightwing Les Républicains who have 61 seats. Meanwhile the broad left and environmental alliance NUPES will be the main opposition party in the new Assembly, with it and its allies winning 147 seats. This is a major achievement for the driving force behind NUPES, veteran leftwinger Jean-Luc Mélenchon, whose La France Insoumise party only won 17 seats in the last parliament. But one of the biggest winners of the night is the far-right Rassemblement National who have won 89 seats. These dramatic results are now set to usher in a period of political uncertainty. Our live coverage of the second round results and reactions was by Graham Tearse and Michael Streeter.
SummarySummary (updated Monday morning with the final figures): France's political landscape has undergone dramatic change tonight following the second round of legislative elections. In a major setback inflicted by voters, Emmanuel Macron has became the first president in 30 years not to win a working majority in the National Assembly, with his Ensemble coalition picking up 245 seats. This is far short of the 289 seats required for an overall majority in the National Assembly.
