the Renaissance group in the Assembly wants to propose savings to the government

Bruno Le Maire has already warned that it will be necessary to find at least 12 billion euros in savings in 2025. The presidential majority wants to participate in this hunt for savings by involving deputies more.

Sylvain Maillard, boss of the Renaissance group in the assembly, wants the deputies of the presidential party to get involved in the search for savings for the 2025 budget. He is just waiting for the appointment of a budget minister, to have an interlocutor, before recalling the troops. A working group is already working, informally, on possible savings around the budget rapporteur Jean-René Cazeneuve, especially with elected officials from the finance committee, but Sylvain Maillard’s objective is for all Renaissance elected officials to think about the subject. “It’s interesting that everyone participates ahead of the budgetary sequence” he confides. The objective is to make proposals to the government as early as March.

A desire to get to work early because in the Assembly and the government, we share the same concern about the fact that the 2025 budget will be complicated to construct. With 3,000 billion in debt, “the road to restoring public finances will be very difficult, confides a minister, significant spending cuts will be required.”. Massive economies are never politically painless, so we might as well prepare our minds.

Preparing for a future 49.3

We must also anticipate a probable slowdown in the economy, which could cost the state budget more than spending here and there, such as the 400 million recently released for farmers. The other reason for starting so early is that we already know the end of the story, namely that in the fall the budget will be adopted by 49.3, due to lack of an absolute majority in the Assembly.

Who says 49.3, says shortened budgetary debates in the hemicycle. The opposition sees this badly, but also many elected representatives of the majority who have the impression of not “useless”. In the Assembly, we are therefore pleading to co-construct the budget with the government in advance.

Some hope that this opportunity will make it possible to avoid “the inflation of spending amendments” at the last moment, and which each time give Bercy a cold sweat. “There are fights that we cannot fight, because we do not have the financial means” assumes a deputy. Another suggests having “the courage to eliminate ineffective public aid” citing for example aid for hiring apprentices. A voluntarism in terms of spending cuts which should please the future budget minister, but perhaps less so with the French.