“The motto in France is: continue to spend and refrain from reforming”. The formula is signed Bruno Retailleau, the president of the LR group in the Senate, who is preparing his return from his Vendée.
Republicans want to poke the government where it hurts when considering the 2023 budget in the fall. LR parliamentarians will not vote on the finance bill if it does not contain strong measures to relieve public finances. For Bruno Retailleau, “debt is a reverse redistribution which consists in taking today from the purchasing power of future generations.”
Public debt is an Everest! It is INSEE who says it: the public debt has exceeded 2,900 billion euros, or 115% of GDP. The symbolic bar of 3,000 billion will soon be crossed, enough to make you dizzy. The public deficit will also remain high next year, above 5%, warns the High Council of Public Finances, a body attached to the Court of Auditors, which is rather strict with the government.
The Minister of the Economy Bruno Le Maire has a lot of fun repeating that the 44 billion voted in favor of purchasing power have not burdened the budget, we still do not have the beginning of the beginning of the measures listed in the column recipes.
Thierry Breton warned on Tuesday Martin on franceinfo: “I am saying clearly that we will have to return to the 3% deficit.” The European Commissioner for the Internal Market recalled that the authorization given to Member States to derogate from it ran until next year, no more.
The return to 3% is not planned by the government before 2027. All this smacks of the finger of honor in Brussels. That’s good, the French don’t care. On the one hand you have campaign promises on better purchasing power, on growth and full employment, promises made to an opinion that demands more policemen in the streets, teachers, caregivers, public services. And on the other, inflation, insufficient wages, rising rates, record taxation, empty coffers and this abysmal public debt.
The budgetary battle will be settled in part in the hemicycle. But no one holds the philosopher’s stone. Neither in the political class, nor among the population. Everyone will have to take a step, even a modest one. There will be no solution without an awareness of the whole of French society.