What the data tells us about the Barnier government

Data “Le Nouvel Obs” has put the Barnier government under the scanner, to compare it to all the previous governments of Emmanuel Macron, from the first government of Edouard Philippe to the government of Gabriel Attal. Analysis.

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Breakfast at Matignon, first council of ministers at the Elysée, and several handovers: the Barnier government, a fragile alliance between the Macronists and the Republicans, is taking its first steps this Monday, September 23, while it is already criticized and threatened with censorship.

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The 39 members of Michel Barnier’s government, which is right-wing with Bruno Retailleau at the Interior Ministry in particular, are now known, as are their political careers and experiences.

What can we learn, then, from this government without an absolute majority and whose formation was painful, between the left wing of Macronie and the hard right of the Republicans? “Le Nouvel Obs” has scanned its members, to compare the Barnier government to the five previous governments of Emmanuel Macron: Philippe 1 and Philippe 2 governments, Castex and Borne governments and, finally, the short-lived Attal government.

· Record number of ministers

In terms of data, this is probably the easiest figure to find: including Prime Minister Michel Barnier, the new government has 40 members, or 20 ministers, 15 deputy ministers and 5 secretaries of state. These figures make it the second largest government of the two Macron five-year terms, just behind the Castex government (43 members, including 12 secretaries of state) but far ahead of the first Philippe government (which lasted only one month) and its 23 ministers.

Another peculiarity: the new government is the one with the most full-time ministers (20), with, mathematically, new ministries, such as that of Partnership with the Territories and Decentralization. It remains to be seen whether the government is so well-stocked because Michel Barnier wanted to divide the tasks… or because the Prime Minister had to satisfy each political family in this strange combination.

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· A government of septuagenarians

What is likely to be immediately obvious is the number of white hairs (or bald heads) at the cabinet table. The Barnier government is in fact the oldest in seven years and the Philippe I government.

With an average age of 52 years and 5 months, the new ministers are four years and six months older than the ministers in the Borne government (47 years and 11 months). Symbolically, the Barnier government has 10 people in their sixties and even 3 in their seventies, a record.

Is age, as the saying goes, synonymous with experience?

· New ministers with multiple mandates

In terms of political experience, the Barnier government is extremely unique compared to previous ones. Due to its composition (ministers from the right and Macron’s party, with a desire for renewal), the members of the Barnier government have, for the vast majority, no ministerial experience. It must be said that the right has not been at the helm of the State since Nicolas Sarkozy and his Prime Minister – collaborator François Fillon… in 2012. Most of the ministers of the time (Alain Juppé, Michèle Alliot-Marie, Brice Hortefeux, Nadine Morano…) have left politics or are now far from the forefront. The leaders of the current right have therefore never governed. As for the Macronists, only eight have been reappointed to the government, and not the best known, like Catherine Vautrin, Geneviève Darrieussecq or Guillaume Kasbarian.

In fact, we have to go back to the Philippe governments to find such inexperienced ministers at the helm (four experienced ministers out of 23 with Edouard Philippe, ten out of 40 with Michel Barnier, or only 25%).

◗ [Comment lire cette infographie ? A chaque gouvernement correspondent trois colonnes, reflétant l’expérience de ministre, l’expérience d’élu national (député, sénateur ou député européen) et l’expérience d’élu local (maire, conseiller département ou conseiller régional, etc.). La partie verte de chaque colonne correspond aux ministres ayant au moins une expérience en la matière avant d’entrer au gouvernement, la partie rouge à ceux n’en ayant aucune. NDLR]

A fundamental difference with the Philippe governments: the ministers of the time were also few of them (barely half) to display experience as a national elected official or experience as a local elected official. In fact, the early Macronists had no local roots… Conversely, the Barnier government is a government of local barons, in most cases combining experience as a local and national elected official. When only two secretaries of state have no mandate to their credit, 33 out of 40 have on the contrary been deputies or senators, and 32 out of 40 local elected officials. Some of them have even held up to six, seven or even nine different mandates in the past (including the presidencies or vice-presidencies of departmental or regional assemblies), like, for example, Didier Migaud (MP, Regional Councillor, General Councillor, President of the Metropolis, Mayor and Municipal Councillor) or, the one who probably holds the record, Valérie Létard (Senator, Vice-President of the Senate, MP, First Vice-President of the Regional Council, Regional Councillor, Departmental Councillor, President of the urban community, deputy mayor, Municipal Councillor and, what’s more… minister!).

A local implantation that is verified on the map. The ministers of the Barnier government are thus “rooted” locally in 27 metropolitan departments, to which is added the territory of Mayotte. A figure far surpassing the two Philippe governments (13 and 17 metropolitan departments, plus Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon) and the Borne government (15 metropolitan departments plus Guadeloupe). The Barnier government is even doing better in this area than the Castex government (25 metropolitan departments, plus Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon and the ninth constituency of French nationals abroad), which nevertheless had three more ministers. Power to the territories? The symbol is there, but for the moment it is only a symbol.

◗ [Comment lire cette carte ? Elle présente l’ancrage local des ministres de tous les gouvernements de l’ère Macron, lorsqu’ils sont « géolocalisables » (élection locale ou à la députation, implantation publique au sein d’une université ou d’institutions publiques, etc.). La taille du point dépend du nombre de ministres issus de la commune lors de chacun des gouvernements. En cliquant sur les noms de gouvernements en légende, vous pouvez faire disparaître les points relatifs au (x) gouvernement(s) correspondant(s). La couleur du département est, quant à elle, définie par le nombre de ministres issus du département pour l’ensemble des six gouvernements. Un ministre reconduit est compté plusieurs fois. L’Eure affiche par exemple 10 ministres, avec cinq fois Bruno Le Maire et cinq fois Sébastien Lecornu. Vous pouvez zoomer sur la carte. NDLR]

Where are the women?

No, we will not paraphrase Patrick Juvet’s sexist hit here. But the question arises. Because the Barnier government displays, “on the surface”, perfect parity with 20 women and 20 men. As was the case in all previous governments (parity has in fact always been respected since 2017, with a maximum of one more man, in the Philippe 1 and Attal governments).

But where are the women? That’s where the problem lies. There are, for example, four fewer women than men in full-time ministries. And, mathematically, four more in delegated ministries (i.e., under supervision) or secretariats of state. Only the Attal government displayed such a gap. Furthermore, Michel Barnier’s female ministers do not occupy any top-level ministries: neither Justice (as was the case for Nicole Belloubet with Edouard Philippe), nor the Armed Forces (Sylvie Goulard and Florence Parly, with Edouard Philippe and Jean Castex), nor Foreign Affairs (Catherine Colonna, under Elizabeth Borne), nor the Economy, nor the Interior…

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Women, on the other hand, hold the portfolios of Labor, National Education, Health and Housing.

Only the Attal government was, once again, comparable in this matter.

A right-wing government… and right-wing Macronists

Let us now look at the political line that should serve as a direction for the Barnier government. According to Matignon’s count, the new government includes twelve figures from Renaissance, ten LR, four DVD, then three MoDem, two Horizons (Edouard Philippe’s party) and only one DVG. On paper, the Macronists are therefore in the majority. But this is forgetting a little too quickly that the Macronists who remained are mainly from… the right wing of Macronie and therefore, before 2017, from the right! Conversely, there is only one left-wing minister in the government, Didier Migaud for Justice, to which are added only three Macronist figures who came, sometimes a long time ago, from the left.

Overall, the Barnier government is therefore the most unbalanced of the Macron era, particularly if we consider that the MoDem is centre-right, in which case 29 out of 40 current ministers are therefore right-wing, centre-right or from the right. That is more than 70% of current ministers. And then, as the controversies that have already started to flare up show, it is, moreover, a hard right that is entering the council of ministers, like Bruno Retailleau, Laurence Garnier or Patrick Hetzel (who voted against the constitutionalisation of abortion, against access to medically assisted procreation for all women and against marriage for all).

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What future?

This is the only data that we will not be able to compare for the moment: how long will the Barnier government last? Will it suffer an early motion of censure from the left, temporarily allied with an RN disappointed by policies that are too moderate (for the far right…). Or will it manage to last? First crash test in October, with the 2025 budget!