André Laignel, the vice-president of the Association of Mayors of France, welcomes the announcement by Elisabeth Borne of the release of 1.5 billion euros to help local authorities in their energy transition. But he asks to see, citing promises not kept in the past by the executive.
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The first vice-president of the Association of Mayors of France says to himself “skeptical“this Sunday on franceinfo after the announcement in Le Parisien by Elisabeth Borne, of the release of a green fund: one and a half billion euros to help local authorities in accelerating their energy transition. André Laignel, mayor of ‘Issoudun (Indre), emphasizes that “when we are told a billion and a half for a noble cause, the ecological cause, a priori we can only be satisfied”.
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“However, it is clear that the amending finance law was voted three weeks ago, and that there was not a penny voted in this context“, nuance André Laignel, who specifies that several funds for the energy renovation of buildings, wastelands, energy recovery contracts already exist. “We can therefore wonder whether there will actually be new money and cooperation with local authorities.“.
The vice-president of the Association of Mayors of France believes that he has suffered “five years of avalanches of announcements which unfortunately had no future. The crisis has cost the local authorities 7 billion, so this billion and a half is not enough, especially since we are told that there will be a drop in resources for the communities.“He hopes to have more answers this week and is also waiting to see how this fund will be distributed, according to the departments, the municipalities.Everything will be, firstly, in the reality of the announcement, secondly, in the method to implement it“, he indicates.
André Laignel judges that the State is “very late” on the ecological question and underlines that the communities are those “who have done the most in this country. We are in favor of increasing this movement, but when we see France’s budget forecasts in Brussels and the reduction in the resources of local authorities, it is totally contradictory. They can’t take away our credits and tell us, on the other side, they’ll give you the means to invest. If we do not have the self-financing that allows these investments, then it will be a blow in the water.”