France’s new prime minister will never overshadow Macron

Meet Élisabeth Borne, the new prime minister of France. Borne has hardly worked a day in the private sector. She is a technocrat to her bone marrow. She has never been elected to anything. And she will never, ever threaten president Emmanuel Macron. ‘She’s like Jean Castex (the outgoing prime minister) in drag, without the comical side,’ sighs one Paris insider.

The job of prime minister in France is generally hellish, essentially that of a whipping boy, and Borne faces numerous vexing dossiers. At the top of the pile is the cost of living crisis, over which her power seems minimal. She’ll also get pension reform, so she will be blamed for the inevitable riots to come. She’s stronger on running railways than economics.

But her first task is to lead Macron’s slate of candidates in the two-round National Assembly elections in June. She has yet to demonstrate any talent for inspiring voters, but it seems inevitable that Macron will win his presidential majority in any case.

Borne, 61, whose father was a Russian Jewish refugee, is at least not a graduate of the École National d’Administration, but that doesn’t mean she missed out on the indoctrination it offers to the French elite.