French PM says confidence vote ‘a test of truth’, warns of debt threat

France’s excessive debt pile is “life-threatening” for the country, Prime Minister Francois Bayrou said Monday as he defended billions of euros of budget cuts ahead of a confidence vote expected to bring down his government, which he labelled a “test of truth”. His address, Bayrou’s final chance to win lawmakers over, was repeatedly interrupted by heckling from opposition parties in a tense National Assembly chamber.