TODAY’S WEATHER

🌤️ It’ll be a bright and dry day for Glasgow, Edinburgh, Aberdeen and London. (Here’s the UK forecast).

THE BIG STORIES
France in political chaos | Trump “letter to Epstein” is released | Glasgow leader warns of migrant “disaster”

📣 France has been plunged into political chaos after Prime Minister François Bayrou lost a vote of confidence and was forced to resign.

The vote was, in essence, a decision by the French parliament to reject attempts to reduce the country’s growing national debt and high spending.

Beyrou had proposed a £38 billion plan of cuts for next year: his fate will be watched with some concern by several European capitals, facing similar challenges in the months ahead. (Independent) (BBC)

• Why events in Paris offer French lessons for Downing Street - below ⬇️

📣 A sexually suggestive letter purportedly signed by Donald Trump to convicted paedophile Jeffrey Epstein has been released by US lawmakers, further shining a spotlight on Trump’s friendship with the disgraced banker.

The letter was included in a 50th birthday album of keepsakes that was compiled for Epstein. Trump has said he did not write the letter or draw the image of a woman that surrounds its words, and filed a $10 billion lawsuit against The Wall Street Journal for suggesting that he had. (BBC) (AP)

• The album also includes a message from Lord Peter Mandelson, the British Ambassador to the United States, in which he calls Epstein “my best pal”. (BBC)

• See the letter and an analysis of the letter bearing Trump’s name (🎁 The Wall Street Journal has the exclusive - gift link)

📣 Glasgow City Council’s leader has warned that a crackdown on hotel stays for asylum seekers will be “disastrous” for Scotland, as thousands of people with leave to stay in the UK suddenly find themselves needing to secure accommodation.

“It’s hard to see it being anything other than disastrous for refugees and for the communities trying to support them when the Home Office washes its hands,” said Susan Aitken. (The Daily Record has the exclusive)

IDEAS
Why events in Paris offer French lessons for Downing Street

🗣️ Misery loves company. And so we in the UK might view events in France over the last 48 hours - or perhaps the last couple of years - as showing us that, however bad we think things are here, others have it a bit worse.

To catch you up: the French government collapsed yesterday when Prime Minister François Bayrou lost a confidence vote that he’d called over €44 billion (£38 billion) in proposed budget cuts, and the removal of two national holidays. President Emmanuel Macron now faces the prospect of appointing his fifth prime minister in less than two years.

Pressure on Macron has been ratcheting up since he called snap elections in 2024, intended to slap down the far right, but which ended up costing him his parliamentary majority. That was an act of political self-harm that we can place in the same league as David Cameron’s decision to call a referendum on Europe to hush the eurosceptic wing of the Conservatives for a few years.

In the Times, former Tory leader - William Hague - reaches even further back for historical precedent, to the French Revolution of 1789, which ended with the execution of Louis XVI on the guillotine. He’s not suggesting the same literal fate for Macron, but metaphorically it might be a different story.

“Louis XVI appointed one finance minister after another - Turgot, Necker, Calonne - who tried varying reforms to save the French state from its eventual bankruptcy,” writes Hague. “Each of them knew they needed to be radical, but all of them were thwarted by the vested interests of their day: tax-exempt nobles and churches, restrictive trade guilds and regional parliaments.

“France in 2025 offers some disturbing parallels. The fourth prime minister in two years, François Bayrou, has fallen - like his predecessors - because he proposed measures to rein in an unsustainable state budget. Today’s vested interests are trade unions and political parties who refuse to take any responsibility.”

France’s fiscal position is worse than the UK’s: the country’s debt ratio sits at around 113% of GDP versus our 101%, according to Roger Bootle of the Telegraph (£). Their budget deficit for the year will be around 5.5% of GDP, versus our 4%. Government spending accounts for 57% of GDP, while in the UK it’s 44%.

But, for both countries (and others, including Germany) those numbers are historically high, with spending during Covid racking up the debt, and spending since at historically high levels. Both countries have relatively high taxation, which means it’s unlikely they can simply raise taxes again to reduce the losses and pay off the debts.

That leaves only expenditure to look at, which is what Bayrou was attempting to tackle when he got the metaphorical chop, and what Rachel Reeves will have a go at in late November, when she presents the UK budget.

The weekend reshuffle shows Keir Starmer knows “he has the chance - just - to save himself and make essential changes,” writes Hague. But there’s no suggestion his backbenchers will vote with him.

And that has been the problem in France, too. Sky News’s European correspondent, Alistair Bunkall, notes that “The National Assembly, like many a political chamber, voted according to its own interests.

“The Socialists feel overlooked by Mr Macron and want their own person installed as PM; National Rally, the far-right party of Marine Le Pen, want new elections because they are confident of success, and the far left simply want to bring down the French president.”

Bayrou's argument for economic reform, however sound, fell on deaf ears, he notes. “His opponents didn't buy it - they accuse him of scaremongering and blame the instability on Mr Macron's eight years in power.”

The New York Times (£) reviews Macron’s options for a new Prime Minister: he’s tended to look to the centre-right for “politicians who he believed were skilled enough to survive while preserving his flagship reforms, like raising the legal retirement age.”

But he might, this time, turn to the left, and Éric Lombard, “the economy minister, who has good relations with the Socialists and who recently told the Financial Times (£) that budget compromises were needed”.

Others are urging new elections. But Macron may, quite sensibly, decide not to vote for Christmas. Not again. Polls suggest the far-right National Rally and allies would get a third of the votes, and it’s far from clear how another election would shake out in parliamentary terms. Macron - low in those polls - could resign, but has repeatedly vowed to stay to the end of his term.

So it’s far from clear how it will all pan out: expect more disruption and protests from a new leftist movement called “Bloquons tout” (“Block everything”), in an echo of the Yellow Vests uprising of 2018, while the country’s politicians bicker about whether the fiscal threat is real.

What is clear France’s predicament isn’t an unusual, standout case. It’s simply the first to have to confront it. So their misery will be keenly watched by the rest of Europe’s politicians - and especially those in Downing Street - not with any sense of schadenfreude, but with an eye to self-preservation.

AROUND SCOTLAND

📣 John Swinney has flown to Washington on a mission to attempt to reduce import tariffs on Scotch whisky. (STV)

📣 The Scottish victim of the Lisbon funicular crash was an 82-year-old heritage tram and train enthusiast, it has been revealed. His family said he died doing what he loved. (Daily Mail)

📣 Fireworks ban zones in Edinburgh don’t fully cover areas that have seen some of the worst bonfire night violence in recent years. The botched plans include running a dividing line down Hay Avenue in Niddrie, where fireworks were thrown at riot police during a stand-off two years ago. (BBC)

AROUND THE UK & WORLD

📣 The Guardian has released its “Boris Files” - a “trove of leaked data from Boris Johnson’s private office” which shows how the former Prime Minister has been profiting from contacts and influence he gained in office.

The title claims the papers show a possible breach of ethics and lobbying rules. Johnson did not respond to the Guardian’s requests for comment. (The Guardian has the exclusive)

📣 Newly-appointed Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood says the UK will suspend visas from countries that don’t “play ball” and take back migrants from the UK. She said she would go “further and faster” than her predecessor on illegal migration. (Independent)

📣 Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch says she is “really worried” the UK will need a 1976-style bailout from the International Monetary Fund. (BBC)

SPORT

⚽️ Ben Gannon Doak was the standout star for Scotland as they overcame Belarus in an empty stadium in Hungary, in a game eerily reminiscent of those early games of the Covid era. The 2-0 win gives Steve Clarke’s men four points out of six, and leaves them on track in their World Cup qualification quest. (Daily Record) (Scotsman) (Sun)

⚽️ Nottingham Forest have sacked Nuno Espirito Santo after his relationship with owner Evangelos Marinakis broke down. Former Tottenham and Celtic boss Ange Postecoglou is the favourite to take the City Ground hotseat. (Mail)