France’s Planning Office Backs Longer Paid Leave and Guaranteed Childcare to Confront Birth Slump

Overview

• The Haut‑Commissariat à la Stratégie et au Plan, which released its diagnosis Tuesday, urges a bonused birth leave and a promise of a childcare place from a child’s first birthday.
• A new national leave scheme is set to start July 1, 2026, allowing each parent up to two extra paid months, with pay at about 70% of net salary for the first month and 60% for the second.
• The report proposes a third paid month only if the father takes at least one month, a push to share care more evenly after fathers made up just 6% of a key parental‑leave benefit in 2023.
• It calls for guaranteed access to formal care from age one to cut the career cost of a baby, noting uneven access today as 57% of under‑threes use formal care, 19% for poor families versus 71% for dual‑earner households.
• France logged about 645,000 births in 2025 as deaths outnumbered births and fertility fell to 1.56, and the planning office presses a wider debate on longer work, higher productivity through technology, and targeted economic immigration as politicians pitch rival fixes such as a flat family income.