France’s finance minister has warned that it would be “difficult” to scrap a controversial levy on the country’s biggest companies in next year’s budget, risking a potential clash with business leaders.
The “exceptional” surcharge on the profits of large companies was introduced in 2025 but was extended last year to help plug the substantial hole in the country’s budget.
“If we can reduce [the corporate levy] we will, but today it’s not easy,” finance minister Roland Lescure told news channel BFM TV on Monday. “We are in a situation unfortunately that is likely to last.”
A third consecutive year of the additional levy would set up another fight with big businesses, which last year accused the government of a breach of trust when it was extended for a second time and have long complained that high taxes and other costs make doing business in the country onerous.
However, France is already struggling to reduce its budget deficit. The surcharge is expected to raise more than €6bn for the French state in 2026. Even with this, the country’s deficit is likely to reach 5.1 per cent of GDP this year, well above EU rules that place a cap at 3 per cent of GDP.
Lescure said on Monday that the country would “do everything it could” to reach its goal of a deficit of 5 per cent of GDP in the coming year and would not impose any new taxes. But he also warned that successive shocks including the disruption to the Strait of Hormuz, this summer’s heatwaves and rising borrowing costs posed challenges.
Taxation has been “the magic solution in France for 40 years: when we have a problem, we raise taxes. That’s the formula that no longer works. I think we need to think about something else,” Lescure said.
“That doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be adapted. That’s part of public policy. But saying we’ll raise taxes and everything will be fine, that doesn’t work any more,” he added.
France’s central bank in June revised down its GDP growth projection for 2026 from 0.9 to 0.5 per cent after the economy unexpectedly contracted in the first quarter and oil prices rose due to the Middle East conflict.
France has long struggled to reconcile voters’ expectations of a generous welfare state with the country’s high costs and slow economic growth. With a sharply divided parliament, where no group holds a clear majority ahead of presidential elections early next year, the government is expected to face another battle passing the 2027 budget.
Last year prime minister Sébastien Lecornu succeeded in passing the 2026 budget but at a heavy cost. He made a deal to suspend President Emmanuel Macron’s flagship reform to increase the pension age until after the 2027 elections in order to secure the support his minority government needed to pass the budget legislation.
The move was a blow to the credibility of France’s ability to implement structural reforms — a cornerstone of Macron’s agenda when he came to power in 2017 that has been thoroughly eroded in the years since
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