LIVE - 2026 Budget: MPs vote to double the Gafam tax targeting tech giants

On Tuesday, MPs voted in committee at the National Assembly on an amendment from the Republicans (LR) to set a 40% ceiling on commercial discounts that laboratories can grant on generic drugs, and to return this responsibility to Parliament, after a government decree triggered a pharmacists' strike. This came after the committee supported by a large majority amendments from several groups along similar lines.

The debate began with a decree dated August 4th, which capped commercial discounts on generic drugs at 30% of the pre-tax price of these products, instead of the previous 40%, as of September 1st. The measure sparked a backlash among community pharmacists, as the discounts granted by laboratories (intended to encourage the dispensing of generic drugs) are a significant source of revenue.

MPs voted Tuesday to double the rate of the Gafam tax targeting large tech companies, from 3 to 6 percent, despite opposition from the government, which is concerned about possible retaliation from the Trump administration.

In committee, Macron's MPs had proposed raising the rate from 3% to 15%, before changing their minds during the session and supporting a compromise of 6%. This reversal sparked outrage among left-wing MPs, who denounced a retreat in the face of American pressure. Before the vote, Economy Minister Roland Lescure urged MPs to be cautious: "If we introduce a disproportionate tax, we will have disproportionate reprisals."

In an extremely tense atmosphere, the left and the National Rally adopted, early in the evening, an amendment aimed at imposing very heavy taxes on multinationals. The Minister of the Economy denounced "a slap in the face to 125 countries."

Also read : "We have just suffocated the economy": in the Assembly, the left and the RN adopt a tax of 26 billion against multinationals

On Tuesday, MPs overwhelmingly approved an amendment from La France Insoumise, against the government's advice, to tax the profits of multinationals proportionally to their activity carried out in France and combat tax evasion and optimisation. The measure received votes from various left-wing groups and the National Rally, against those of the government camp (207 to 89). This "universal tax" on multinationals, inspired by the Attac association and economist Gabriel Zucman , could bring in €26 billion to the state budget, according to its supporters.

But for Economy Minister Roland Lescure, this would be "20 billion euros of additional trouble" for France, who pointed out that it is a signatory to more than 125 tax treaties with 125 countries. And that a company could then turn to the French courts arguing "double taxation." He also recalled the work underway between OECD countries to introduce a minimum tax of 15% on multinationals, "which will start paying off next year" and bring in "500 million euros." The general budget rapporteur, LR MP Philippe Juvin, also expressed serious doubts about the legal viability of the scheme.

Members of the National Assembly's Social Affairs Committee on Tuesday rejected cuts to social security exemptions specific to overseas territories, proposed by the government in the draft Social Security budget. The text "proposes, as it stands, to eliminate €350 million in tax relief," which would have "serious consequences" for overseas territories, declared RN MP Christophe Bentz.

"This is the guillotine for our small and medium-sized businesses," also argued Frédéric Maillot, MP for Réunion (Communist group). "This is not a gift we are giving to the so-called overseas countries, it is a need." Identical amendments from MPs from the Liot, National Rally , and Communist groups were adopted. But the committee stage is only a warm-up, and MPs will have to confirm their vote in the chamber, where the examination will start again from the government's initial copy.

Arising from the 2009 Overseas Economic Development Act (Lodéom), these exemptions from employer social security contributions are intended to support the economic development of overseas territories. Nearly 50,000 companies benefit from them, mainly SMEs and VSEs, but in 2024, the general inspectorates of social affairs and finance conducted a major review of the Lodeom, noting the "very limited effects of the system on employment or on company margins."

The Minister of Labour, Jean-Pierre Farandou, justified on Tuesday the reduction in the net salary of apprentices included in the 2026 budget project by the fact that these young people "have the same rights" as other employees but do not currently contribute "in proportion to their remuneration" .

Supported for several years by various governments, apprenticeships, which have made it possible to achieve the goal of training more than one million young people, are now being put to good use. In its 2026 budget, the government has proposed ending the contribution exemptions enjoyed by apprentices, which would automatically reduce their net salary.

Before 2025, apprentices benefited from significant exemptions from social security contributions or the general social contribution (CSG), which meant that their net salary was very close to their gross salary.

In 2025, this benefit has already been reduced and the portion of their salary that exceeds 50% of the gross minimum wage (around 900 euros) is now subject to employee contributions and the CSG.

Anything rather than see the Lecornu government fall , we are told. The consequences of such a fall, whether it takes the form of censure or a new resignation of Sébastien Lecornu, would be apocalyptic: dissolution would be necessary; early legislative elections would paralyze economic actors; it would lead either to a new fragmented Assembly or to a victory for the "extreme right"; we would not have time to vote on a budget, even in the purely conservative form of a special law; the deficit would spiral and lenders would tire; the spectre of default would loom; France's image would deteriorate even faster than the value given to the solidity of its public finances by the rating agencies . The keystone of the institutions, already shaky, would collapse under the weight of discredit, everyone turning an accusing eye towards the person responsible for the fact that generated our ills: the dissolution announced on June 9, 2024 by Emmanuel Macron. Economic crisis and regime crisis would horribly combine their effects.

Also read Jean-Éric Schoettl: “Giving everything to the Socialist Party is not the only way to give France a budget”

Presidential elections follow one another, but are they all the same? In 2022, only presidential candidate Emmanuel Macron 's proposal to raise the legal retirement age to 65 made it into the media spotlight, which was then monopolized by the outbreak of war in Ukraine. A year and a half before the next election at the Élysée Palace, everything suggests that the issue could return to the forefront. And for good reason: the suspension of the Borne law until January 2028, included in the Social Security budget proposal—which begins examination this week in the Assembly—is heating up tempers even before its possible adoption. This is a revealing stirring, given that the sustainability of the pay-as-you-go system remains a major sticking point in political life.

While Sébastien Lecornu was careful to point out that the financing options for this pause - involving contributions from supplementary health insurance and pensioners - mentioned in the "amendment letter" - were not set in stone, Emmanuel Macron put a coin back in the machine. At the risk of weakening the Prime Minister, to whom he had nevertheless given "carte blanche" upon his reappointment to Matignon to build compromises. From Ljubljana (Slovenia) last Tuesday, the Head of State ruled out any "abrogation" or "suspension" of the only structural reform of his second five-year term, preferring to talk about simply "postponing a deadline" - and perhaps, ultimately, a referendum. This is enough to rekindle an explosive debate with a view to 2027, from which the contenders for his succession can no longer avoid.

Also read: The battle for pension reform relaunched in view of the 2027 presidential election

Being a Macronist is no easy feat when it comes to discussing the suspension of pension reform. Sébastien Lecornu's decision to offer the Socialists the scalp of Élisabeth Borne's bill often provokes grim expressions among its former supporters. Memories of the jeers, the demonstrations, and sometimes the electoral defeats remain vivid. The political cost was too high to rejoice in a capitulation. Yet the head of government was not the first to note that the Borne reform was becoming an obstacle for his camp.

Before him, Gabriel Attal did not hesitate to lift this taboo. "The current system produces deficits and mistrust," he noted last spring, during an interview with Les Échos . There was no question, at that time, of suspending the Borne reform, but he was already touching on the idea of ​​"proposing a different system." With his eye on his candidacy in the presidential election, the secretary general of Renaissance effectively buried the achievements of raising the legal retirement age to 64.

Also read : Pensions: before the presidential election, how Gabriel Attal is cautiously burying the Borne reform

"I need you," "I'm going to multiply myself too" : Emmanuel Macron invited some 200 experts and field workers gathered at the Élysée Palace on Tuesday to propose ways by the end of the year to combat the threats posed by the internet and social networks to democracy and elections.

We must "launch the work of resistance" , "create a small platform for action" , "build a common action project" , beyond legislative and regulatory measures, he told the researchers, association leaders, neuropsychologists, entrepreneurs and elected officials present.

The debate, which took place in the presence of several media outlets, including AFP, also focused on the impact of screens on children's mental health, a subject already widely addressed by the Head of State in recent months.

For more than two hours, the speakers took turns speaking in a sequence reminiscent of the National Refoundation Council (CNR), the tool initiated by Emmanuel Macron at the start of his second five-year term in 2022 to try to renew the democratic debate, with relative success.

"It's the Lépine competition of taxation." Jean-Virgile Crance is furious. The deputy mayor of the tourist-heavy Saint-Malo and president of the Confédération des acteurs du tourisme (CAT) , a mega-union representing 70,000 businesses in the hotel, restaurant and air transport sectors, is protesting against a "bidding war" of amendments targeting his sector out of the 3,700 currently being discussed as part of the 2026 Finance Bill (PLF) . The latest? A proposal tabled by LFI on October 17th and providing for an increase to 33% of VAT on "services in luxury hotels " - an amendment adopted on October 22nd, according to the National Assembly website.

"We still need to know what we call luxury! If we consider it to be five-star and palace hotels , we risk seeing establishments renounce their fifth star, or even leave this rating system to avoid the tax," warns Jean-Virgile Crance. " However, we know that this classification is a guarantee of quality for the French hotel industry. High-end hotels operate well, in addition to being the sector that employs the most, per establishment. Let's not kill the goose that lays the golden eggs!" protests the mayor.

Also read: Budget 2026: “By wanting to tax tourists, we will mainly tax the French”

The session is suspended for a short break of about ten minutes.

If money has no smell, taxes can have a face: since January, the proposal for a minimum tax of 2% per year on the wealth of centimillionaires has had the babyish, modestly smiling face of economist Gabriel Zucman. It also has a name—his own. It's this face that appears in close-up on the videos posted by the professor on Instagram, from his office at the Paris School of Economics, and viewed hundreds of thousands of times: he himself promotes his idea, while, in the Chamber, Green MP Éva Sas pushed for the Zucman tax to be adopted in a bill voted on by the National Assembly. A crafty montage and a few slides stuffed with statistical data have strangely succeeded in making him a star, on this network where he is nevertheless taking his first steps: in six months, fewer than thirty publications were enough for 130,000 Internet users to subscribe to his account. And that's without counting those who follow him on X, on LinkedIn... Soon on TikTok?

"We created the conditions for a mobilization," enthuses Pierre-Natnaël Bussière, a former advisor to Raphaël Glucksmann who set his sights on the economist and devised a strategy to propel him to the forefront, with the support of another friend, the environmental influencer Camille Étienne (600,000 followers on Instagram). "I created Gabriel's social accounts, I wrote his posts, made his videos, and we activated all the left-wing networks to mobilize," says the communicator, who was copying his already extensive recipes with Glucksmann "on other mobilization topics: rape, Shein, the Uighurs..." Since then, the publications have been a hit and millions of views have been pouring in.

OUR PORTRAIT OF GABRIEL ZUCMAN

"What is the use of a CAC 40 shareholder?" It was late in the evening of Monday, October 27, when Aurélien Le Coq, LFI MP for the North, asked this question in the middle of a chamber exhausted by a long day of debates on the 2026 budget . A shareholder of the CAC 40 - an index that groups the 40 most important shares on the Paris Stock Exchange - is a "parasite that prevents money from returning to the real economy, to salaries or to investment," argues the left-wing MP.

Aurélien Le Coq criticizes the largest French companies for not using their profits to invest, recruit, or offer better salaries to "those who are the only ones who have produced the wealth." He concludes, to applause from his own camp: "While we distribute tens of billions in dividends, unemployment is rising in this country, jobs are being destroyed, and no one is living better apart from a few shareholders who continue to pocket the profits."

Also read: 2026 Budget: CAC 40 shareholders are “parasites,” says LFI MP

"After having swallowed the Assembly, how will the socialist ogre devour the taxpayer in this Soviet agreement that goes from the PCF to LR via Macronie. Publicly assume these agreements which are the final nail in the coffin of France and tell us what will happen to this Zucman tax version 'at the same time'" , scolded Alexandre Allegret-Pilot, UDR deputy (the party of Eric Ciotti, allied with Marine Le Pen).

"In a few days, in a few hours, we will have a debate on wealth taxation. This debate will take place between parliamentarians, it will not take place between economists or through media platforms. It will take place here [in the Chamber] because since 1789 it is you, ladies and gentlemen, the deputies, who ensure consent to taxation, who decide what taxes are and how they work, and in this debate the government will bring several convictions," replied Amélie de Montchalin, the minister responsible for action and public accounts.

Erected as an "emergency" by Sébastien Lecornu , the economic situation in the Overseas Territories is the subject of a bill against the "high cost of living" examined Tuesday in the Senate, which will adopt it without enthusiasm with the fear that it will cause "disappointment" in the overseas territories. The debates were opened in the afternoon in the upper house by the new Minister of Overseas Territories, Naïma Moutchou , who promised to become "minister of the fight against abuses and agreements that weigh on the wallets of our overseas compatriots" .

This is the entire purpose of this bill, which aims to defend purchasing power, transparency, and the economic transformation of the overseas territories, particularly in response to the protests that shook Martinique in the fall of 2024. The figures are alarming. According to INSEE, the price gap for food products can reach up to 42% between the overseas territories (Guadeloupe and Martinique in the lead) and mainland France. In Guadeloupe, for example, food prices have jumped 35% in ten years.

"The result is a lasting economic imbalance, a fracture in equality between citizens of the same country," "an injustice experienced daily," stressed Naïma Moutchou.

The government questions session begins in the chamber. The first question is asked by Guillaume Legavre, LFI-NFP MP for Seine-Saint-Denis, about the deaths of Zyed Benna and Bouna Traoré twenty years ago . To escape a police check in 2005, the two teenagers found a fatal refuge inside an electrical substation.

After corporate tax, income tax, the luxury sector in the Finance Committee, and even digital giants , MPs are now turning their attention to home employment. Since the start of the debates on the 2026 Finance Bill in the National Assembly, MPs have been calling for a review of the tax credit for employing home workers, which households benefit from. Deemed too costly for the benefit of the "ultra-rich," it could be limited or even eliminated, they argue.

As a reminder, this tax credit benefits all households that want to incur expenses for personal services. It is equal to "50% of the expenses actually incurred" , up to a limit of 12,000 euros per year, which can be increased in certain cases. This includes, in particular, academic support, the collection and delivery of ironed laundry, childcare at home, and even home maintenance.

THE EMPLOYMENT TAX CREDIT

Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu assured LR deputies on Tuesday that "for nothing in the world" would he agree to "touch professional assets" , in an allusion to the expected debate on the Zucman tax on high assets, we learned from participants in the meeting.

"Compromises must not be compromises," he added, according to the same sources during this group meeting, regarding the Socialist Party, which has proposed a lighter version of the Zucman tax, aiming to create a 3% tax on high assets from 10 million euros, excluding innovative and family businesses.

Also read: 2026 Budget: Does the Zucman amendment proposed by the Socialists have a chance of being voted on?

The President of the National Assembly, Yaël Braun-Pivet , wants to give MPs more visibility on upcoming texts - draft laws, proposals and debates, by publishing the provisional timetable of the Assembly's work.

On X, she emphasizes that "predictability, anticipation and the involvement of parliamentarians are the keys to a rich and constructive debate."

In November, the deputies will first examine the draft finance bill for 2026 , the social security budget , then, subject to its submission, the draft end-of-management finance bill for 2025.

The first secretary of the Socialist Party (PS), Olivier Faure , deplores on X that the National Rally opposes the Zucman tax: "For the extreme right, the working classes must pay the taxes of the billionaires."

Also read : Budget 2026: the Zucman tax is "no, neither light nor hard nor anything at all," declares Marine Le Pen

National Rally MPs leader Marine Le Pen announced on Tuesday that her group would oppose the Zucman tax, a minimum tax on high net worth individuals, including the lighter version proposed by the Socialist Party.

The Zucman tax is "no, neither light nor hard nor anything at all," she told the press at the Assembly, estimating that the socialist version which aims to introduce a 3% tax on high net worth individuals, from 10 million euros, excluding innovative and family businesses, was in fact "worse" because it affected "many more people" than the original version.

Also read: The National Rally faces the return of the war of the "union of the right"

Yesterday, MPs increased the yield of the corporate profit surcharge from 4 to 6 billion euros, placing the burden of the increase on the largest companies. A deleterious decision, according to the mayor of Cannes and LR vice-president David Lisnard . "The Government had promised to abandon the surcharge, now it is strengthening it on the fly by amendment," he wrote on X. "Once again, the State's word has been betrayed and with it the confidence essential to economic activity."

According to him, this development raises the level of taxation to a "crazy level, even though we already have one of the heaviest capital taxes in the OECD." The leader of the small New Energy party regrets that "instead of seeking performance, reforming the State and reducing spending, we prefer to tax even more those who create wealth."

Also read David Lisnard, vice-president of the LR: "The worst thing would be to be the guarantors of a socialist and spendthrift budget"

The Minister for SMEs and Purchasing Power , Serge Papin, is proposing to extend the Dutreil pact , which allows for tax relief during family business transfers, to transfers to employees under certain conditions, he announced on BFM Business on Tuesday. "In very small businesses, it's often the boss and an employee, and people of my generation, in very small businesses, they transfer, and often, the one who is interested is the employee," he explained. "We could, for very small businesses in particular, imagine having a Dutreil adapted to employees," he continued, "because you know that there are many very small businesses where, when the founder stops, the business stops."

The Dutreil pact allows for a 75% reduction in the value of a family business transferred by donation or inheritance under certain conditions, and requires that the beneficiaries of the donation keep the securities received for several years with the aim of promoting "long-term capital holding" . It would have generated a loss of tax revenue of 5.5 billion euros in 2024, according to Le Monde , which consulted a summary of a report from the Court of Auditors to be published in the coming weeks.

DUTREIL PACT FOR SME EMPLOYEES?

Speaking on BFMTV-RMC, government spokesperson Maud Brégeon announced that the government would oppose a lighter version of the Zucman tax, which is to be debated this week in the House. "When it affects the productive system, factories, large startups, work or employment, we will be against it," the parliamentarian insisted.

"We cannot negotiate by drawing red lines and threatening censorship. We will fight to defend our positions, in a spirit of dialogue and construction," the government spokesperson added, affirming that the government remains "open to discussing a better effort in terms of taxes."

"We are not used to this exercise of dialogue," Marc Fesneau lamented this Tuesday morning on the TF1 morning show regarding the abandonment of Article 49.3. In his general policy speech, delivered on October 14, Sébastien Lecornu announced that he would not resort to this article of the Constitution , which allows for avoiding a vote, to adopt the 2026 budget. The leader of the Les Démocrates deputies in the Assembly regrets this decision, because "Article 49.3 allows for the recording of agreements and disagreements." The elected official affirms that this renunciation is a "risk."

On the Zucman tax , which plans to tax assets worth more than 100 million euros at a rate of 2%, Marc Fesneau declared: "I recognize a form of weariness," before continuing: "We have the impression that the Zucman tax will solve everything." " It is not necessarily the Zucman tax," hammered the Loir-et-Cher MP on the subject of the taxation of high net worth individuals.

LR does not support the Lecornu II government , but did not vote for its censure. What about the budget, which Bruno Retailleau recently described as "unvotable" in its current state? "It doesn't make sense to say it like that," retorted Laurent Wauquiez , the leader of the LR deputies in the Assembly, on RTL. "We are fighting to correct it." The elected representative from Haute-Loire summed up his position in a few words: "Our line is very simple, we are against all tax increases, for the sake of spending savings." But Laurent Wauquiez maintains his line of non-censorship: "We do not bring down a government lightly. We do not censor just anyhow, we do not blackmail with censorship."

Laurent Wauquiez affirms that he is "against the surtax on large companies" voted this weekend by the government with the support of the socialists. "I am against increased taxes on SMEs, I am against penalizing the purchasing power of retirees. I am against hitting the purchasing power of those who work." As for the Zucman tax, the LR elected official called it a "sham" and a "fool's trap." "That is to say, we put the Zucman tax on the table, we make the French believe that there is a magic solution consisting of taxing the richest. And meanwhile, we don't talk about everything else in this budget" and the tax increases "on the middle classes."

Laurent Wauquiez also reiterated his desire to unite the right "from Gérald Darmanin to Sarah Knafo" and to exclude the RN from such an alliance. "The RN is not right-wing, Marine Le Pen says so herself," he argued. The leader of the LR in the Assembly also raised the case of Nicolas Sarkozy, whose conditions of incarceration are the subject of debate. "I do not understand this relentlessness," replied the LR elected official. "I am deeply saddened to see a former head of state being held in prison when he has not even been able to exercise his right of appeal and is still presumed innocent."

"There is no natural candidate on the right," Laurent Wauquiez finally stated on the thorny question of the LR candidate for the 2027 presidential election . "That's why we will have to organize a competition that will allow us to have a single person, a single candidate and then a team behind him."

Also read : “I am wary of meteorites in politics”: Laurent Wauquiez’s intact ambition

It's a dress rehearsal. This Monday, while MPs resumed their public session to examine the 2026 Finance Bill (PLF) , members of the National Assembly's Social Affairs Committee began voting on the Social Security Financing Bill (PLFSS) and its nearly 1,700 amendments.

The content of these exchanges already resembles the commedia dell'arte , foreshadowing those that will take place in the aisles of the Palais Bourbon from November 4. The first votes foreshadow the impossible debate to come in plenary session: a majority exists to reject the trajectory proposed by the government.

SOCIAL SECURITY BUDGET: THE IMPOSSIBLE DEBATE?

In total, some 3,700 amendments were tabled by MPs on the 2026 budget proposal, which began to be discussed in public session on Friday, October 24. Le Figaro takes stock of the main amendments adopted (and rejected) in the Chamber.

Income tax scale freeze cancelled; Differential contribution on high incomes extended; Overtime completely tax-free; Taxation of alimony reversed; etc. Find the main amendments adopted in the full article.

BUDGET: AMENDMENTS ADOPTED

The National Institute of Statistics will release its figures for the French economy for the third quarter on Thursday. The institute anticipates slight growth of 0.3% between July and September in the eurozone's second-largest economy, which would progress at the same pace as in the second quarter (+0.3%), despite a business climate that remains gloomy.

Appointed on September 9, the new Prime Minister, Sébastien Lecornu , confirmed the desire to reduce the deficit to 5.4% of GDP in 2025 and mentioned a deficit target of "below 5%" of GDP in 2026, compared to 4.7% of GDP previously. This would provide some political room for maneuver, but with the risk of increasing the deficit and public debt, which swelled further in the second quarter, reaching 115.6% of GDP, and a record in absolute value at more than 3,400 billion euros. Each tenth of a percentage point of additional deficit corresponds to almost 3 billion euros of additional spending.

Also read: Sharp rise in prices, growth prospects: the success of investments in defense

Despite a politically undermined context, the presidential camp and the Socialist Party have so far managed to find common ground to move the debates forward. To the great displeasure of the opposition, from the left (excluding the Socialist Party) to the National Rally , which is just waiting for one thing: a misstep that would allow censorship.

Yesterday, the Socialist Party and the government reached an agreement on Monday on the corporate profit surcharge , based on a government amendment increasing the tax's yield from 4 to 6 billion euros, placing the burden of the increase on the largest companies.

Also read : “It’s the end of real estate!”: How the Socialists want to destroy rental investment in the 2026 budget

The long budget battle continues this Tuesday. Discussions on the revenue portion of the 2026 Finance Bill continue in the House today and will continue until November 3.

Just like the review of the Social Security Financing Bill for 2026, which is being held in committee until tomorrow. Follow the developments hour by hour.

Also read: Increase in the CSG (General Social Security Contribution), abolition of the tax on mutual insurance companies: the Social Security budget has already been dismantled in committee in the Assembly