Less than a year out from France’s next presidential elections, National Rally (RN) party chief Jordan Bardella is doubling down on a core plank of its: Welfare for nationals, first and foremost.
He restated that family benefits would reserved for households where parents hold French citizenship as part of a broader push for “national priority”.
“Under our leadership, social housing will be allocated as a priority to French families who need it most,” he said during his speech on May 1, Labour Day.
“Social benefits will be reserved for French nationals,” he insisted.
Bardella argued that France can no longer function as what he portrayed as a heaven for foreign-born residents.
“France is not a hotel; it is not a social welfare office whose sole purpose is to subsidise the birth rates of other countries on its own territory,” he said.
He went further, criticising the country’s provision of state-funded healthcare to undocumented migrants, vowing to end what he described as a system offering comprehensive free treatment while, he claimed, many French citizens struggle to afford care.
“We will put an end to this scandal of state-funded healthcare, which offers the full range of free treatment to undocumented migrants, even as one in three French persons goes without medical care due to a lack of funds,” he said.
Bardella’s plan on restricting access to social goods is consistent with a long-standing ideological line within the RN.
The President of the right-wing party framed the policy as a question of fairness: Prioritising those who contribute, particularly in areas where housing and public services are under the greatest strain.
Nevertheless, France’s constitutional framework affirms a right to basic means of subsistence for all individuals unable to work, without reference to nationality.
In April 2024, the Constitutional Council leaned on that principle to block a referendum initiative backed by Les Républicans that sought to tighten access to certain social supports for non-French citizens.
The political current appears to be shifting in Europe.
Similar “national priority” measures are beginning to surface elsewhere in Europe, with Spain’s Aragón among the latest regions to move in that direction.
