France’s Lescure Says Senate Budget Won’t Narrow Deficit Enough

French Finance Minister Roland Lescure said the senate’s version of the 2026 budget would lead to an unacceptably wide deficit and called for major changes as lawmakers struggle to stabilize financial plans before year-end.

Lescure said the gap in 2026 would narrow only marginally to 5.3% of economic output from 5.4% this year if France implemented a combination of the main budget adopted by the senate on Monday and the social security bill approved by the National Assembly last week.

At the start of what’s been an unusually complicated process, the government initially proposed a target of 4.7%. It’s ...