It is a largely revised text which will return to the Assembly after senators and deputies failed to find an agreement this Wednesday evening in the Joint Committee.
The Senate modified the draft Social Security budget for 2026, adopted at the Luxembourg Palace this Wednesday afternoon. Here are the main points of the new text.
The Social Security financing bill (PLFSS), as it comes out of the upper house, reduces the projected Social Security deficit to 17.6 billion euros in 2026, compared to 23 billion in 2025, according to government calculations.
A balance very close to the government’s initial objective, set at 17.5 billion. The copy resulting from the work of the National Assembly at first reading clearly deteriorated the deficit, to more than 24 billion euros in 2026.
Unacceptable for the government, which has set as an “absolute red line” a deficit below 20 billion euros next year.
A major concession from Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu to the Socialists to avoid censorship, the suspension of pension reform until 2028 no longer appears in the text, after its deletion in the Senate. There is no doubt, however, that the Assembly will restore it.
This suspension leads the generation born in 1964 to leave at 62 years and 9 months (like the previous one) instead of the 63 years provided for by the reform. These policyholders would leave with 170 quarters of contributions instead of 171.
This suspension was also extended to long careers and to people born in the first quarter of 1965, at the request of the left, excluding LFI which only sees a time gap.
The total cost is 300 million in 2026 and 1.9 billion in 2027.
- Social benefits, pensions
At the heart of the Social Security budget is the question of the annual revaluation of retirement pensions and social benefits (family allowances, RSA, etc.), usually indexed to inflation.
The government proposed freezing them, an unpopular but useful measure for restoring social accounts, because it would bring in 3.6 billion euros in 2026.
Unthinkable for the National Assembly, which abolished it. Considerable, however, for the Senate, which reestablished it, nevertheless preserving the allowance for disabled adults (AAH) and especially pensions below 1,400 euros. A compromise which would bring in 1.9 billion euros.
The expansion of the scope of medical franchises to dental consultations and medical devices (prostheses, glasses, dressings, etc.), proposed by the government, displeases both the Assembly and the Senate. This is also the case for an article aimed at limiting excess fees for doctors.
The government is also considering a doubling of medical deductibles for patients, but this very irritating provision must be passed by decree.
A surtax on mutual insurance companies, which many feared would have an impact on policyholders, was removed by the Assembly but it was reinstated in the Senate, for revenue of one billion euros.
- CSG, birth leave and “Ondam”
Proposed by the left but also deleted in the Senate, an increase in the CSG – one of the sources of financing for social protection – levied specifically on venture capital income also returns to the debate. The measure initially voted on in the Assembly was expected to bring in 2.8 billion euros in 2026.
Obtained by the right, a measure extending to companies with more than 250 employees a deduction of employer contributions on overtime is supported by both houses of Parliament at this stage.
The government is also planning the creation of a new “birth leave”, allowing parents to take up to two additional months each to welcome their child.
The creation of a “France Health network” to improve access to care in the territory, one of Sébastien Lecornu’s first announcements, also appeared in the Assembly text, but the Senate deleted it, denouncing it as an empty shell.
Deemed “insincere” and “untenable” by many parliamentarians from both houses of Parliament, the health insurance spending objective for 2026 (Ondam), an increase of 1.6% compared to 2025, continues to be the subject of numerous debates.
The increase of one billion euros, including 850 million to hospitals and clinics, promised by the government, was not enough to convince the Senate, which abolished the Ondam to show its dissatisfaction.