Is the French government returning to Versailles?

French President Emmanuel Macron is considering convening a joint session of parliament in the palace of Versailles to address deputies and senators, government spokesman Christophe Castaner said on Sunday.

Members of the French Republican Guard wait along a red carpet prior to the arrival of the Russian president at the Versailles Palace, near Paris, on May 29, 2017. STEPHANE DE SAKUTIN / AFP

Speaking on LCI television, Castaner said he could not confirm or deny that July 3 was the date when the National Assembly lower house and the Senate upper house could hold a rare joint Congress at Versailles - something promised by Macron during his election campaign.

"I do not know the date. (But) it is important that he sets a direction," he said.

Macron's year-old Republic on the Move party (LREM) won a huge parliamentary majority on June 18 that boasts scores of lawmakers never before elected - unprecedented in France and central to his promise to clean up French politics.

Convening a Congress at Versailles, the palace of France's former monarchy, is a procedure generally reserved for constitutional revisions and major presidential speeches.

Former conservative President Nicolas Sarkozy addressed a Congress at the 17th-century palace in 2009, at the height of the global financial and banking crisis. Sarkozy's successor, Francois Hollande, convened a Congress in November 2015 after militant Islamist attacks, declaring France "is at war".

French parliamentary deputies usually meet in the National Assembly and senators in the Senate, both in Paris.