Katherine Lawton – Daily Mail June 23, 2024

Emmanuel Macron has driven France to the brink of its own ‘Frexit’ moment by ignoring warnings about migration, EU’s chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier has claimed.

Mr Barnier warned in his memoir that other countries could leave the European Union if lessons were not learned from Brexit.

After leaving his role as the chief Brexit negotiator, he gave a copy of the memoir to the French president, but three years later Mr Barnier believes Macron has not listened to his warning.

Mr Barnier told The Sunday Telegraph: ‘I regret that in my country that this warning has not been listened to… about migration, security, authority of the state, and the respect and development of the poorest parts of the country.’

He added: ‘The first chapter was written precisely in the spirit of what could happen in [France].

‘It is my conviction that we have to pay huge conviction and great respect to what people on the ground think in some very poor regions.

‘That was the case in the UK, and I think it could be the same in France.’

Mr Macron decided to dissolve parliament after his centrist alliance was defeated by the hard-Right in a European parliamentary vote this month.

Mr Barnier, who is a prominent pro-European conservative in France, called the gamble as ‘very risky’.

Macron risks plunging France into chaos as his decision to call a snap election threatens to boost his hard-Right opponents, predecessor Nicolas Sarkozy warned earlier this month.

Opinion polls suggest Mr Macron’s centrist alliance faces an even greater rejection than Rishi Sunak is forecast to endure in next month’s general election, with barely 20 per cent of French voters voicing their support.

It comes as French financial markets have taken a hammering in the week since his unexpected decision to dissolve the National Assembly in the wake of elections to the European Parliament, which saw his group trounced by the hard-Right National Rally.

Mr Macron has denied accusations he had taken a reckless gamble with the country’s political future, saying it was ‘a gesture of great confidence in the French people’.