France's autumn of protest: the schools, the street and the 2027 budget
A secondary school movement that began in Créteil on 17 September merged in October with a march against the cost of living, which drew 550,000 people by the interior ministry's count. Underneath both sits a 2027 budget with about 43 billion euros of fresh savings. Sébastien Lecornu has promised not to force it through with article 49.3, in a chamber where he has no majority.
On 17 September, pupils at the Saint-Exupéry secondary school in Créteil, outside Paris, came out in support of striking teachers who said the school lacked staff and resources. Within two weeks the protest was national, and the pupils' demands had grown to overcrowded classes, unsafe buildings and uncovered teacher absences. On 4 October the education ministry expected 400 to 500 secondary schools to be fully or partly closed the next day. It had counted 78 of its own staff injured since the movement began.
Sébastien Lecornu set out his 2027 finance bill in Le Figaro on 17 September, the day the Créteil protest began. The finance ministry expected the deficit to slip to 5.4 percent of GDP in 2026, after 5.1 percent in 2025, and the bill aims to bring it back to 5 percent in 2027. It carries about 43 billion euros of fresh savings, 54 billion counting cuts already under way, and it freezes the index that sets civil servants' pay. The same bill raises spending on education, Euronews reported.
By 7 October more than 6,500 people had been arrested, most of them minors, as allegations of police violence mounted. A 15-year-old in Lens lost a hand to a police stun grenade on 5 October, and the interior minister then suspended its use at school protests. Lecornu went on television on 7 October and said the anger of young people does not come from nowhere. He promised a plan by the end of October, and diesel from state stocks to bring down pump prices above 2.36 euros a litre.
On 17 October the pupils' movement joined a national march against the cost of living, which drew 550,000 people by the interior ministry's count and 800,000 by the CGT union's. In Saint-Étienne a second protester lost a hand to a police grenade, a police source told AFP. Protesters burned a tourist office in Lyon and forced their way into the town halls of Marseille and Lille. Dozens of shops were looted in five cities, according to eyewitnesses. Macron promised prosecutions and backed the police. Lecornu blamed ultraleft groups.
On 13 October the National Assembly rejected a Socialist motion to throw the bill out before debate, 236 votes to 149. The left voted for it and the government's bloc against, leaving the outcome with Marine Le Pen's party. Its deputies called the bill bad for the nation's accounts, then voted to let the debate proceed and fight for their own budget in it. Lecornu has promised not to use article 49.3, which lets a government skip the vote, so the text has to find votes he does not control.
”The responsibility lies first of all with those who run the country and who have no majority”
The numbers
What the comparison shows
Where they agree
The prime minister said on television that the anger of young people does not come from nowhere. His education minister sent 3,000 substitute teachers to the schools with the biggest staffing gaps. All the teachers' unions said on 4 October that the pupils' demands were legitimate and at the heart of their own campaign over missing resources.
Where they split
Macron answered 17 October with prosecutions and public backing for the police, and Lecornu blamed ultraleft groups. Mélenchon, who had posted his pride in the pupils' rally nine days earlier, rejects the charge that he is stoking the unrest. Inside the National Assembly the argument is about who pays: Mélanie Thomin's Socialist group wants the richest taxed first, and the public accounts minister David Amiel told deputies the government would discuss how to save, not how much. The 13 October vote was settled by neither of those two sides, but by Marine Le Pen's party.
What nobody is saying
Through 17 October the government had put no price on either concession: no figure for the 3,000 substitute teachers, none for the diesel release. Neither of them moved the 5 percent deficit target or the civil service pay freeze, and Lecornu's letter to Socialist deputies on 13 October called that target a constraint that binds everybody. He promised the schools a plan by the end of October.
Who says what
He said the anger of young people does not come from nowhere and promised a response plan by the end of October, while blaming ultraleft groups for the violence of 17 October. In a letter to Socialist deputies on 13 October he called cutting the deficit to 5 percent of GDP a constraint that binds everybody.
”Peaceful demonstrations have their rightful place in our Republic. Arson, looting, and attacks have no place whatsoever.”Peaceful demonstrations have their rightful place in our Republic. Arson, looting, and attacks have no place whatsoever.
He answered the night of 17 October with a promise that those who attacked prefectures, businesses and town halls would be prosecuted, and with public backing for the police. The post Euronews quoted said nothing about the cost of living that brought the march out.
She said the prime minister had answered the Socialists' very precise demands with vague replies, and had left the door closed to any measure of tax justice. Her group kept its motion to throw the budget out before debate, which she called a formal warning.
”La responsabilité est d'abord dans les mains de ceux qui dirigent le pays et qui n'ont pas de majorité”The responsibility lies first of all with those who run the country and who have no majority
He declared on X that the Bastille had been retaken after the pupils' rally there on 8 October, and told his followers he would see them at the next day of action on 13 October, called by the student and worker unions. He rejects his opponents' charge that he is stoking the unrest, saying the pupils launched the movement themselves.
”powerful demonstration by the youth who carry their demands in the most beautiful way possible! Immense pride. See you on Tuesday, October 13, at the call of the youth unions and workers.”powerful demonstration by the youth who carry their demands in the most beautiful way possible! Immense pride. See you on Tuesday, October 13, at the call of the youth unions and workers.
Our coverage
- Nationwide protests over cost of living turn violent across France, Macron vows prosecutionsSunday, 18 October 2026
- French student protests swell to 71,500 as Mélenchon calls for a new mobilisationFriday, 9 October 2026
- France's PM offers diesel relief and a reform plan as school-protest arrests pass 6,500Thursday, 8 October 2026
- French school protests escalate: nearly 5,000 arrests, 78 staff hurt since late SeptemberMonday, 5 October 2026
- French public-sector strike and school blockades ahead of 2027 budget presentationWednesday, 30 September 2026
- France's Lecornu courts Socialists as 2027 budget standoff risks a no-confidence voteThursday, 24 September 2026