Shock result as French voters lurch to the left and thwart Marine Le Pen’s right wing party

A far left coalition formed just three weeks has beaten Le Pen’s far right wing party in the final round of parliamentary elections, leaving chaos and uncertainty.

France is poised for a rocky future with a shock result in Sunday’s final round of parliamentary elections showing a hung parliament.

Instead of a swing to the far right, the elections have shown voters supporting the far left.

The official exit poll shows last gasp manoeuvring by the far left and centrist parties have thwarted the prospects of Marine Le Pen’s National Rally from winning an absolute majority in the parliamentary elections.

The far left coalition called New Popular Front (NPF), a cobbled together alliance of greens, socialists, communists, and Trotskyists that came together just three weeks ago, has reversed the first round support for Le Pen’s right wing National Rally.

The exit polls show the NPF winning the election but without enough support for an outright majority.

French Rassemblement National (RN) far-right party's leader Marine Le Pen talks to media following the first results of the second round of France's legislative election in Paris.

The NPF are predicted to win 172 to 192 seats with the coalition of Emmanuel Macron appearing to finish second predicted to win between 150 and 170 seats. The National Rally, is now expected to finish third with between 132 and 152 seats.

If these results are confirmed in official counting overnight, there will be no clear majority or obvious alliances to form a government.

It could be that Mr Macron, who will remain as president until 2027, may govern the national assembly in a “technical sense” for the next 12 months before a fresh election can be held if he cannot successfully negotiate with the opposition parties. He had called the surprise snap election to test whether EU election support for Le Pen’s party, seen as a protest to his governance, would translate to the domestic scene.

The National Rally leader Jordan Bardella said France has now fallen into the hands of the far-left after his party’s defeat.

Mr Bardella accused Mr Macron of “pushing the country towards instability and depriving many people a response to their daily difficulties.” He warned that “the incendiary extreme left won’t lead the country anywhere.’’

The massive turnaround came after days of negotiations between parties to eliminate any split vote against the National Rally.

“The first round was a referendum of the Macron government, the second round was a referendum on the extreme right,” French political analyst Dominique Morsi told Sky News, saying the result was not unexpected.

“Fear of the unknown has prevailed over the hatred of the president.”

The seismic shock of a far right party being in a position to win an majority or being the biggest party in the French parliament – a situation not seen since World War II – mobilised the French voters not seen for four decades, analysts say,

Voter turnout was two-thirds, the highest since 1981.

Within minutes of the poll being released, the far left leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon demanded the resignation of the prime minister and insisted the left coalition had “saved the Republic”.

He said the results were an “immense relief for a majority of people in our country” and insisted that Mr Macron had to acknowledge the authority of the The New Popular Front and allow it to govern.

France's Prime Minister Gabriel Attal gives a speech following the first results of the second round of France's legislative election at Matignon in Paris.

Prime Minister Gabriel Attal said he would offer Mr Macron his resignation on Monday but was ready to serve “as long as duty demands”, notably in light of the imminent Games.

NPF was hastily formed after Macron’s calling of a snap election after dismal polling in the European elections, and it has a far ranging list of policies from tax rises, reinstating the previous retirement age, blocking price rises, increasing minimum wages and net zero commitments.

However there is uncertainty whether the NPF alliance will be able to hold together in the medium term. The projected breakdown among the left-wing parties was 68-74 seats for La France Insoumise, 63-69 for the Socialists, 32-36 for the Greens, and 10-12 to the Communists.