Closing summary
This blog will be closing shortly. Here is an overview of today’s events.
France’s caretaker prime minister, Sébastien Lecornu, has said his talks with various party leaders had revealed a “willingness” to pass a budget by the end of the year and that snap parliamentary elections were now looking less likely.
“This willingness creates a momentum and a convergence, obviously, which make the possibilities of a dissolution more remote,” he said in a brief address on Wednesday from the courtyard of Matignon Palace, the prime minister’s residence, in Paris.
Lecornu, who resigned on Monday after 27 days in office but was given 48 hours by Emmanuel Macron to try to rally support for the new government, said he would deliver his conclusions to the French president as planned later on Wednesday.
You can read more on the topic in Jon Henley’s piece here: Outgoing French PM hopeful for concessions to avoid snap elections
In other developments:
Lecornu clarified on Wednesday that outgoing ministers from his government would not be entitled to compensation. The resigning prime minister noted in his speech that the topic of compensation for such ministers had upset “a certain number of French people”.
The outgoing prime minister also noted ongoing efforts to establish New Caledonia as a new state, but said political tensions in the country had halted the process. New Caledonia is an overseas territory that was rocked by deadly separatist violence last year. The territory, home to about 270,000 people, has faced a deadlock between forces loyal to France and those wanting independence.
Spanish emergency workers on Wednesday recovered the bodies of two missing construction workers in the rubble of a building that collapsed in central Madrid a day earlier. The recovery brought the death toll to four.
German federal police will soon be allowed to shoot down unmanned aerial vehicles, interior minister Alexander Dobrindt said on Wednesday, after a spate of drone sightings believed to be Russian efforts to spy and intimidate. Unveiling a draft law, Dobrindt said police would be authorised “to take state-of-the-art technical action against drone threats, for example with electromagnetic pulses, jamming, GPS interference, but also with physical means”.
Gisèle Pelicot, who became a feminist hero in a mass rape trial last year, testified in court on Wednesday, telling the one man who still denies raping her that she “never” gave him her consent. Husamettin Dogan, 44, has maintained his innocence, drawing the woman who publicly defied her abusers back into court.
Russia seriously damaged one of Ukraine’s thermal power plants in an overnight attack, authorities said on Wednesday. Meanwhile, Ukrainian rockets killed three people and wounded one more in Russia’s Belgorod border region, where previous attacks have brought power outages, Gov. Vyacheslav Gladkov said on Wednesday.
Russia will shoot down Tomahawk cruise missiles and bomb their launch sites if the United States decides to supply them to Ukraine and find a way to retaliate against Washington that hurts, a senior Russian lawmaker said on Wednesday. The comments came as Russian deputy foreign minister Sergei Ryabkov said on Wednesday that momentum towards reaching a peace deal in Ukraine after the presidential meeting between Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump in Anchorage, Alaska, had largely “gone”.
Russia’s lower house of parliament on Wednesday approved a move to withdraw from a landmark agreement with the United States aimed at reducing vast stockpiles of weapons-grade plutonium left over from thousands of cold war nuclear warheads. The Plutonium Management and Disposition Agreement (PMDA), signed in 2000, committed the United States and Russia to dispose of at least 34 tonnes of weapons-grade plutonium each, which US officials said would have been enough for as many as 17,000 nuclear warheads. It came into force in 2011.
Russia seriously damaged one of Ukraine’s thermal power plants in an overnight attack, authorities said on Wednesday, the Associated Press (AP) reports.
The move came as Moscow pursued its campaign to deny Ukrainians heat, light and running water as winter approaches
Two workers were injured in the attack, according to DTEK, Ukraine’s biggest electricity operator. It provided no further information, including the plant’s location.
The Russian Defense Ministry said on Wednesday that its air defenses overnight intercepted 53 Ukrainian drones over nine Russian regions.
The Ukrainian town of Shostka, in the north-eastern Sumy region, has been hard hit by the Russian onslaught against the power supply, officials say.
Ukraine’s air force said it intercepted or jammed 154 out of 183 Russian strike and decoy drones fired at the country overnight.
Meanwhile, Ukrainian rockets killed three people and wounded one more in Russia’s Belgorod border region, where previous attacks have brought power outages, Gov. Vyacheslav Gladkov said on Wednesday.
Women’s rights activists taped their mouths shut at a demonstration on Wednesday outside the Latvian parliament to protest against the country’s possible withdrawal from an international treaty aimed at supporting women who are victims of violence, the Associated Press (AP) reports.
Dozens of protesters watched as several women, with their hands tied behind their backs, sat down in front of a table with a white cloth covered in red paint handprints.
The demonstration, the second of its kind in two weeks, follows a decision by Latvian lawmakers last month to start a process that could lead to withdrawal from the Istanbul Convention.
The Council of Europe treaty, which Latvia ratified in 2023, is meant to standardise support for women who are victims of violence, including domestic abuse.
Italy’s ruling Brothers of Italy party put forward legislation on Wednesday to ban the burqa and niqab in public spaces, part of a broader bill aimed at combating what it called “cultural separatism” linked to Islam, Reuters reports.
The bill, presented to parliament by lawmakers from prime minister Giorgia Meloni’s party, would prohibit garments covering the face in all public places, schools, universities, shops, and offices nationwide.
The burqa is a full-body garment that covers a woman from head to foot, including a mesh screen over the eyes. The niqab is a veil for the face that leaves the area around the eyes clear.
Violators would face fines of €300 to €3,000 ($350-$3,500).
The legislation was aimed at combating “religious radicalisation and religiously motivated hatred”, the introductory text said.
Gisèle Pelicot, who became a feminist hero in a mass rape trial last year, testified in court on Wednesday, telling the one man who still denies raping her that she “never” gave him her consent, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reports.
The 72-year-old’s former husband has admitted to drugging her with sedatives and inviting dozens of strangers to rape and abuse her over nearly a decade in a case that shocked the world.
A French court handed her ex-husband Dominique Pelicot, 72, the maximum term of 20 years in jail last year. He and 49 other men convicted in the case are not appealing against their sentences.
But one man, 44-year-old Husamettin Dogan, has maintained his innocence, drawing the woman who publicly defied her abusers back into court.
At the beginning of the original trial, she argued that it should be the perpetrators of sexual violence, not the victims, who should be ashamed.
On Wednesday, she confronted Dogan in court.
“At what moment did I give you my consent?” Pelicot asked. “Never.”
“Take responsibility for your actions and stop hiding behind your cowardice,” she added.
Updated
Russia’s lower house of parliament on Wednesday approved a move to withdraw from a landmark agreement with the United States aimed at reducing vast stockpiles of weapons-grade plutonium left over from thousands of cold war nuclear warheads, Reuters reports.
The Plutonium Management and Disposition Agreement (PMDA), signed in 2000, committed the United States and Russia to dispose of at least 34 tonnes of weapons-grade plutonium each, which US officials said would have been enough for as many as 17,000 nuclear warheads. It came into force in 2011.
A Russian note on the legislation withdrawing Moscow from the pact said:
The United States has taken a number of new anti-Russian steps that fundamentally change the strategic balance that prevailed at the time of the Agreement and create additional threats to strategic stability.
Russia in 2016 suspended implementation of the agreement, citing US sanctions and what it cast as unfriendly actions against Russia, Nato enlargement and changes to the way the United States was disposing of its plutonium.
The country said at the time that the United States had not abided by the agreement after Washington moved, without Russian approval, to simply diluting the plutonium and disposing of it.
Key event
The European parliament voted on Wednesday to ban the use of meat-related terms including “burger” and “steak” to market plant-based foods, in a win for disgruntled farmers, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reports.
EU lawmakers approved the legal proposal with 355 votes in favour and 247 against during a plenary session in Strasbourg.
The text still needs to be negotiated with the bloc’s 27 member states before it can become law.
Afternoon summary
Here is a summary of the events that have occurred so far today:
France’s caretaker prime minister, Sébastien Lecornu, has said his talks with various party leaders had revealed a “willingness” to pass a budget by the end of the year and that snap parliamentary elections were now looking less likely. “This willingness creates a momentum and a convergence, obviously, which make the possibilities of a dissolution more remote,” he said in a brief address on Wednesday from the courtyard of Matignon Palace, the prime minister’s residence, in Paris.
Lecornu clarified on Wednesday that outgoing ministers from his government would not be entitled to compensation. The resigning prime minister noted in his speech that the topic of compensation for such ministers had upset “a certain number of French people”.
The outgoing prime minister also noted ongoing efforts to establish New Caledonia as a new state, but said political tensions in the country had halted the process. New Caledonia is an overseas territory that was rocked by deadly separatist violence last year. The territory, home to about 270,000 people, has faced a deadlock between forces loyal to France and those wanting independence.
Spanish emergency workers on Wednesday recovered the bodies of two missing construction workers in the rubble of a building that collapsed in central Madrid a day earlier. The recovery brought the death toll to four.
German federal police will soon be allowed to shoot down unmanned aerial vehicles, interior minister Alexander Dobrindt said on Wednesday, after a spate of drone sightings believed to be Russian efforts to spy and intimidate. Unveiling a draft law, Dobrindt said police would be authorised “to take state-of-the-art technical action against drone threats, for example with electromagnetic pulses, jamming, GPS interference, but also with physical means”.
Russia will shoot down Tomahawk cruise missiles and bomb their launch sites if the United States decides to supply them to Ukraine and find a way to retaliate against Washington that hurts, a senior Russian lawmaker said on Wednesday. The comments came as Russian deputy foreign minister Sergei Ryabkov said on Wednesday that momentum towards reaching a peace deal in Ukraine after the presidential meeting between Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump in Anchorage, Alaska, had largely “gone”.
Regarding the draft law put forward by Germany, chancellor Friedrich Merz said on X that drone incidents threatened the country’s security.
He said in a post on X:
We will not permit that. We are strengthening the Federal Police’s powers so that drones can be detected and countered more quickly in future.
German federal police will soon be allowed to shoot down unmanned aerial vehicles, interior minister Alexander Dobrindt said on Wednesday, after a spate of drone sightings believed to be Russian efforts to spy and intimidate, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reports.
Unveiling a draft law, Dobrindt said police would be authorised “to take state-of-the-art technical action against drone threats, for example with electromagnetic pulses, jamming, GPS interference, but also with physical means”.
He said:
This means that the interception and shooting down of drones will be regulated and possible for the Federal Police in the future.
Germany was learning about modern UAV defences from its allies Israel and Ukraine, he said, adding that it would also set up a joint drone defence centre for state and federal police to develop situation reports “and take joint countermeasures”.
Germany – a major Nato backer of Ukraine in its fight against Russia – has reported multiple drone sightings this year over military bases, industrial sites and other critical infrastructure.
Last weekend, drones spotted over the southern city of Munich twice shut down the city’s airport, grounding thousands of passengers after their flights were cancelled or re-routed, echoing similar incidents in Denmark and Norway.
“Our suspicion is that Russia is behind most of these drone flights,” chancellor Friedrich Merz told public broadcaster ARD in an interview on Sunday.
Updated
Russia will shoot down Tomahawk cruise missiles and bomb their launch sites if the United States decides to supply them to Ukraine and find a way to retaliate against Washington that hurts, a senior Russian lawmaker said on Wednesday, Reuters reports.
US president Donald Trump said on Monday he would want to know what Ukraine planned to do with Tomahawks before agreeing to provide them because he did not want to escalate the war between Russia and Ukraine. He said, however, that he had “sort of made a decision” on the matter.
Andrei Kartapolov, head of the Russian parliament’s defence committee, told the state RIA news agency:
Our response will be tough, ambiguous, measured, and asymmetrical. We will find ways to hurt those who cause us trouble.
Kartapolov, a former deputy defence minister, said he did not think Tomahawks would change anything on the battlefield even if they were supplied to Ukraine as he said they could only be given in small numbers – in tens rather than hundreds.
Kartapolov was also cited as saying that Moscow had so far seen no signs that Ukraine was preparing launch sites for Tomahawks, something he said Kyiv would not be able to hide if it got such missiles.
If and when that happened, he said Russia would use drones and missiles to destroy any launchers.
French far-right leader Marine Le Pen said on Wednesday she would block all action by any new government, compounding the country’s political deadlock, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reports.
“I vote against everything,” said the three-time far-right presidential candidate.
She repeated a call for president Emmanuel Macron to “seriously consider” dissolving parliament and call early legislative elections, or “even his resignation”.
Le Pen, 57, said at a livestock fair in central France:
The problem with our political leaders today is that they get on the horse not to go somewhere, but for a rodeo.
Le Pen’s far-right National Rally party is leading voting opinion polls and senses its best ever chance of winning power in the next presidential elections due in 2027, with Macron barred from running.
Macron, who was first elected in 2017, has repeatedly said he would serve until the end of his second term.
Updated
Outgoing French PM hopeful for concessions to avoid snap elections
Jon Henley is the Guardian’s Europe correspondent, based in Paris.
France’s caretaker prime minister, Sébastien Lecornu, has said his talks with various party leaders had revealed a “willingness” to pass a budget by the end of the year and that snap parliamentary elections were now looking less likely.
“This willingness creates a momentum and a convergence, obviously, which make the possibilities of a dissolution more remote,” he said in a brief address on Wednesday from the courtyard of Matignon Palace, the prime minister’s residence, in Paris.
Lecornu, who resigned on Monday after 27 days in office but was given 48 hours by Emmanuel Macron to try to rally support for the new government, said he would deliver his conclusions to the French president as planned later on Wednesday.
Macron was re-elected in 2022 for a second five-year term, but since snap legislative elections last summer a hung parliament has ousted two successive prime ministers who failed to assemble a majority to back austerity budget plans.
Lecornu became the third to go when he tendered his government’s resignation just 14 hours after the new cabinet had been unveiled, saying opposition to the lineup from allies and opponents alike would make it impossible for him to do the job.
You can read more of Jon Henley’s article here: Outgoing French PM hopeful for concessions to avoid snap elections
No guarantee has been made, after talks with caretaker prime minister Sébastien Lecornu, that the suspension to France’s pension reform will go ahead, said Socialist party leader Olivier Faure on Wednesday, Reuters reports.
Faure added that the Socialist party could not back the government’s budget plan as it currently stands.
He spoke after meeting with Lecornu as part of a two-day round of talks with political parties he launched after resigning from his post on Monday morning.
Changes to France’s pension system have been a hot potato for French presidents for decades, bringing disgruntled people on to the streets, leading to civil unrest and nationwide strikes that have brought the country to a standstill.
Lecornu wrote to trade unions last week, promising to improve pension provisions for women. Trade unions said they instead wanted a suspension of president Emmanuel Macron’s changes to the pension system, pushed through without a parliament vote in 2023, and a complete rethink.
Updated
Russia said on Wednesday that momentum towards reaching a peace deal in Ukraine after the presidential meeting between Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump in Anchorage, Alaska, had largely “gone”, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reports.
Russian deputy foreign minister Sergei Ryabkov said, according to Russian news agencies:
Unfortunately, we must admit that the powerful momentum generated by Anchorage in favour of agreements … has largely gone.
Ryabkov was quoted by such agencies as saying the loss of momentum was as a result of “destructive activities, primarily by the Europeans”, according to Reuters.
Trump and Putin met at a cold war-era air force base in Anchorage on 15 August in an attempt to end the deadliest land war in Europe since the second world war.
Updated
The father of a victim of Greece’s worst rail disaster has ended a 23-day hunger strike after persuading judicial authorities to examine the precise cause of his son’s death, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reports.
“The hunger strike ends today,” Panos Ruci, 48, told TV crews on Tuesday in front of parliament, where he had pitched a tent since 15 September.
Ruci’s son Denis was among 57 people, mostly students, who died on the night of 28 February 2023, when a passenger train and a freight train collided near the central city of Larissa.
Some families, backed by experts, suspect that their loved ones were killed by an explosion attributed to undeclared chemicals on board the freight train.
But though several families appealed to hold further tests on the victims’ remains, judicial authorities refused because the official investigation found no signs of illegal cargo on board.
Elsewhere in Europe, Spanish emergency workers on Wednesday recovered the bodies of two missing construction workers in the rubble of a building that collapsed in central Madrid a day earlier, the Associated Press (AP) reports.
The recovery brought the death toll to four.
The top floor of a six-story building under renovation collapsed and pancaked the floors below on Tuesday afternoon.
Emergency workers searched the site overnight with the help of police search dogs and drones, finding the bodies early on Wednesday.
One of the four dead workers was a woman.
Another three workers were injured, with one suffering a fractured leg.
The facade remained standing and apparently stopped most of the debris from reaching the street.
Police are investigating the incident as a workplace accident.
Updated
French PM hopeful for end of year budget and talks down prospect of snap election
Caretaker French prime minister Sébastien Lecornu struck a cautiously optimistic tone on Wednesday, saying a deal could be reached on the country’s budget by year-end, making the possibility of a snap election less likely.
Lecornu’s remarks came as he was set to wrap up talks on Wednesday with various parties and report back to president Emmanuel Macron on whether he has found a way to end France’s worst political crisis in decades.
He added that outgoing ministers from his government would not be entitled to compensation after “a certain number of French people” became upset by the prospect.
The prime minister also said the country’s political situation had halted the process of establishing New Caledonia as a new state.
The overseas territory, home to about 270,000 people was rocked by deadly separatist violence last year and has faced a deadlock between forces loyal to France and those wanting independence.
In July, after 10 days of talks in Paris, various parties agreed to increased sovereignty, under which a “State of New Caledonia” should be created, but would also remain French.
Lecornu said that he would meet Macron later on Wednesday as planned to discuss the results of his meetings with various political parties and see if a deal was possible.
Based on his talks so far, he said he hoped a deal could be reached on bringing France’s budget deficit down to between 4.7% and 5%, from a target of 5.4% in 2025, Reuters reports.
Emmanuel Macron’s second term is set to end in May 2027 and he has repeatedly said he will not resign, the Associated Press (AP) reports.
If the French president were to quit, the Constitutional Council would declare a vacancy, the Senate president would assume interim powers and a new presidential election would be held within 35 days.
On the far left, Melenchon’s France Unbowed has asked for Macron’s departure.
More surprisingly, and a sign of Macron’s growing isolation inside his own camp, Édouard Philippe, Macron’s first prime minister after he swept to power in 2017 and once a close ally, has suggested the president should step down and call an early presidential election once the 2026 budget is adopted.
Since 1958 and the inception of the Fifth Republic, only one French president has resigned: Charles de Gaulle after losing a 1969 referendum.
French prime minister Sébastien Lecornu noted ongoing efforts to establish New Caledonia as a new state, but said political tensions in the country had halted the process.
New Caledonia is an overseas territory that was rocked by deadly separatist violence last year. The territory, home to about 270,000 people, has faced a deadlock between forces loyal to France and those wanting independence.
In July, after 10 days of talks in Paris, various parties agreed to increased sovereignty, under which a “State of New Caledonia” should be created, but would also remain French.
The 13-page agreement announced on Saturday calls for a New Caledonian nationality, and the possibility for residents there to combine that status with French nationality.
Lecornu was reported by Le Monde as saying:
New Caledonia, which may seem far from mainland France but on which, as you know, important texts (…) [are to be adopted] in the coming days, and unfortunately the political situation prevents us from starting the debates and the possible adoption of these texts by the National Assembly and the Senate. This is a major concern.
Lecornu clarified on Wednesday that outgoing ministers from his government would not be entitled to compensation, according to Le Monde.
The resigning prime minister noted in his speech that the topic of compensation for such ministers had upset “a certain number of French people”.
He said:
It turns out that members of the government, when they leave office, are entitled to three months of compensation when they have no other income.
It is obvious that ministers who were ministers for only a few hours will not be entitled to these compensations. I have decided to suspend them.
We cannot want to make savings if we do not also maintain a rule of exemplarity and rigor.
Updated
Outgoing French prime minister Sébastien Lecornu said during his speech on Wednesday that the possibility of a dissolution of parliament looked remote, after he held rounds of talks with different political parties, Reuters reports.
He noted that the talks showed a general willingness to get a budget passed by the end of the year.
Lecornu said:
This willingness creates a momentum and a convergence, obviously, which make the possibilities of a dissolution more remote.
French publication Le Monde reported that Lecornu will continue meeting with the Socialist party, the Ecologists and the Communist party this morning to “see what concessions they are asking from other political parties to guarantee this stability, what concessions they are also prepared to make, if necessary, to allow it.”
Updated
Rising political tensions have seen president Emmanuel Macron’s popularity plummeting since the summer of 2024, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reports.
An opinion poll by Odoxa of more than 1,000 French people published on Monday found that 57% believe the president was “entirely responsible” for Lecornu stepping down, and 70% were in favour of the president’s resignation.
Lecornu says 'there is a desire' for a French budget
French prime minister Sébastien Lecornu has said that “there is a desire” for France to have a budget by the end of the year, according to French publication Le Monde.
Speaking at the Matignon Palace, Lecornu said:
I have good reason to tell you that among the good news, all the consultations I have had with the President of the National Assembly, Ms Braun-Pivet, and with the President of the Senate, Gérard Larcher, with all the political parties of the UDI, LIOT, the Republicans, Place publique, MoDem, Horizon, Renaissance and others, that there is a desire to have a budget for France before 31 December of this year.
This desire creates a movement and a convergence, obviously, which removes the prospects of dissolution.
He added that he will present his findings to the country’s president, Emmanuel Macron, later this evening.
Updated
Sébastien Lecornu is the third French prime minister after a set of snap elections last year ended in a hung parliament and increased seats for the far right, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reports.
The premier resigned on Monday just hours after broad rejection of his new cabinet.
France’s president Emmanuel Macron convinced Lecornu to stay on until Wednesday evening to try to form a coalition government able to pass a much-needed austerity budget through parliament, with public debt at an all-time high.
Lercornu is expected to make a public statement on the state of discussions on Wednesday morning, before receiving representatives of the Socialist party.
Macron has said he would “assume his responsibilities” if this failed, appearing to mean early parliamentary elections.
Updated
Lecornu to make speech following resignation
French prime minister Sébastien Lecornu is due to appear shortly in the courtyard at the Matignon Palace.
You can follow the speech in the video feed below:
The Guardian has published an editorial on how the political deadlock in France may benefit the country’s far-right factions.
In Jean-Paul Sartre’s 1944 play No Exit, hell is portrayed as a locked room in which characters are condemned to fall out and squabble for all eternity. Ever since foolishly calling a snap election which delivered a deadlocked and divided national assembly, the French president, Emmanuel Macron, has found himself trapped in a modern political version of the same plot.
On Monday morning, the third prime minister Mr Macron has appointed in just over a year became the latest to throw in the towel, after only 27 days in the job. Hours after unveiling his ministerial team, Sébastien Lecornu stood down following a backlash from centre-right allies, who objected to the number of carryovers from François Bayrou’s previous administration. By Monday evening, Mr Macron had persuaded Mr Lecornu to conduct a round of last-ditch negotiations to try to resolve the crisis. Should he fail, the president has hinted that the next step will be a second dissolution of parliament and fresh legislative elections.
Such dizzying chaos and dysfunction is bringing mainstream French politics into disrepute, at a time when Marine Le Pen’s far right National Rally enjoys a substantial lead in the polls. For this ominous state of affairs, Mr Macron bears a heavy responsibility. His centrist alliance lost its outright majority in the parliamentary elections of 2022, and was then defeated by a leftwing coalition in the snap poll he called last year. But he has ploughed on as if nothing had changed, pressuring successive prime ministers to propose unpopular austerity budgets without a mandate.
You can read the full editorial from the Guardian here: The Guardian view on political chaos in France: the gift that keeps on giving to Marine Le Pen and the far right
Opening summary
Good morning and welcome to our coverage of European news.
French prime minister Sébastien Lecornu will make a speech at 9.30am (8.30am British time) on Wednesday in the courtyard at the Matignon Palace, his office said in a statement.
Lecornu had said on Monday after announcing his resignation that he would hold a series of talks with political parties’ leaders by Wednesday.
The speech comes as the country’s president, Emmanuel Macron, faces intense pressure to call snap parliamentary elections or resign as former allies join his opponents in demanding he act to end a spiralling political crisis in the EU’s second biggest economy.
Macron’s first prime minister on Tuesday urged the president to step down amid mounting frustration even within the president’s own camp over one of the worst spells of political chaos in France since the foundation of its Fifth Republic in 1958.
Édouard Philippe, prime minister from 2017 to 2020 and now leader of a Macron-allied party, said he should announce an early presidential election once a budget for next year was adopted.
Macron was re-elected in April 2022 for a five-year term, but since snap legislative elections in 2024 his appointees as prime minister have been unable to summon a parliamentary majority to pass a budget.
Stay with us for all the developments over the day.
Updated
