Bruno Le Maire announces a future plan to fight against this “worm that can rot democracy”

The Minister of the Economy, Bruno Le Maire, announced new measures to fight corruption on Saturday on X (formerly Twitter). This plan aims to improve the current law which dates from 2016.

Bruno the Mayor announced on the X network that he wanted to continue the fight against corruption, this “worm that can rot the fruit of democracy”. The Minister of the Economy posted his message on Saturday December 9, on the occasion of the International Anti-Corruption Day organized by the UN: “This world anti-corruption day is an opportunity to recall that, for 7 years, we have strengthened our systems for preventing and detecting violations of integrity thanks to the compliance programs led by the AFA. We want to continue in this direction. At the beginning of next year, we will have the opportunity to announce new measures on this subject.”

France already has an organization designed for this purpose, the AFA, the French Anti-Corruption Association, whose mission is to prevent and detect all illicit corruption activities, which sometimes lead to criminal acts. The subject is taken seriously and the Ministries of Economy, Justice and Public Accounts are working together to prepare new measures which will be announced in early 2024.

All sectors targeted

Asked about the question, the Ministry of the Economy does not provide details for the moment. It simply specifies that the future anti-corruption plan will concern both private companies and the public sector. It is not excluded, for example, to modify and strengthen the current legal arsenal.

Part of the system dates from 2016 with the so-called “Sapin 2” Law, named after the former Minister of the Economy Michel Sapin. The text notably created the Judicial Convention of Public Interest, a system which allows companies suspected of corruption to escape criminal prosecution by paying a fine. A principle of self-reporting which makes it possible to identify cases upstream and sanction them downstream. Deterrence-punishment in a way. The message is as follows: the administration has spotted you, you stop your little game and you pay a fine, otherwise we will go further with the sanctions.

Extend monitoring to SMEs

Since the entry into force of the Sapin 2 Law, 20 procedures of this type have been initiated and agreements signed with large groups such as Google or McDonald’s, which have been sanctioned. These procedures have so far only targeted large groups or multinationals, but the objective is to raise awareness among SMEs (small and medium-sized enterprises), which are not affected by the 2016 text.