One hour of discussion on national issues. After a program devoted to international issues, Emmanuel Macron was again a guest of the political program “L’Evénement”, Wednesday October 26 on France 2, to speak, six months after his re-election, on questions of domestic politics. Franceinfo returns to eight statements by the Head of State.
1Is France doing better than its neighbors to contain inflation?
“We have controlled inflation better than our neighbours”welcomed Emmanuel Macron at the start of the interview. “A little more than half of the shock was taken by the State”, affirmed the President of the Republic. According to the latest figures from INSEE, prices increased by 5.6% over one year in September. As in recent months, it is nevertheless a lower price increase than in our European neighbours. For example, Italy is at 9.5%, Germany at 10.9% and Estonia at 24.2%, according to Eurostat data.
The Head of State praised on France 2 the action of the tariff shield put in place a little over a year ago (blocking of gas prices and increase capped at 4% for those of electricity) and fuel aid introduced in April. According to an analysis by INSEE, the tariff shield has effectively halved this price increase. Without these measures, inflation would have been 3.1 points higher. The national institute of statistics affirms that the most modest French people are those who are most strongly affected by the increase in energy prices.
2Has the government avoided a 100% rise in energy prices?
Asked more specifically about energy prices, Emmanuel Macron quantified the benefit brought, according to him, by the tariff shield, which will be extended at the beginning of next year but will still lead to price increases on the bills of French. “Where there should have been 100% increase in electricity and gas, it will be 15% [début 2023]“he hammered, thus taking up announcements made by Elisabeth Borne in mid-September.
In September, the President of the Republic even declared that a 120% increase in the price of electricity would be avoided thanks to the price cap introduced by the government. Probably an overestimate. Questioned at the end of September by franceinfo, Jacques Percebois, energy economist, estimated that, without a tariff shield, this increase would only be around 63%.
The problem, believes Jacques Percebois, is that we cannot accurately determine the rise in energy prices in 2023. And for good reason: it is on a smoothed average, calculated from data from the end of December. , that we can accurately assess the increase in the price of electricity.
3Has 49.3 on the budget avoided several billion euros of unnecessary expenditure?
For the President of the Republic, the use of 49.3 for the vote on the 2023 budget was necessary to avoid a slippage in public finances. “The government was right to pass this budget, including in the face of all the opposition, which was sometimes in demagoguery”said the head of state.
“He avoided several billions of useless lossy spending, but we already have a public deficit which will be 5% next year.”
Emmanuel Macronat franceinfo
Emmanuel Macron refers to the many amendments voted by the opposition, the cost of which has been estimated at around 8 billion by Bercy, explains Point. In total, by retaining around a hundred amendments (mainly those of the majority), the government has increased the note for the 2023 budget by 700 million euros. But he refused other amendments which nevertheless proposed new recipes, such as that for a tax on the tax exile of business leaders or that for a tax on super-dividends.
4Are several billion euros missing for the pension system?
Emmanuel Macron mentioned a need for future financing of 10 to 12 billion to justify the need for pension reform. According to last report (in PDF) of the Pensions Orientation Council (COR), the French pension system will experience a surplus of 3.2 billion euros in 2022, but the overall balance of the pension schemes will effectively “deteriorate significantly” from 2023. The “hole” anticipated by the COR could reach between 7.5 and 10 billion euros in 2027, then between 12.5 billion and 20 billion in 2032.
Some economists, such as Michael Zemmour, lecturer at the University of Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, however, believe that the deficit announced by the government could actually be lower than expected. “The COR figures cannot be used to really look at the deficit between 2027 and 2037, that is to say precisely the period when the deficit is the highest. We cannot form an opinion on figures that are too inflated by an artefact”, he explains to The Midi Dispatch.
5Has the poverty rate remained stable during the Covid-19 pandemic?
Emmanuel Macron said that the “poverty rate has not worsened” during the Covid-19 pandemic. A study published by INSEE actually found a “quasi-stability of the poverty rate” compared to 2019, despite the health crisis. However, INSEE warns that the measurement of poverty was complicated during this period. The institute warns that its study has limits, because nearly 1.4 million people (such as students, the homeless or residents of retirement homes) could not be taken into account in its scope of study. ‘to analyse.
Insee also writes in a note published in 2021 that it has recorded an 11% increase in the use of food aid as well as a 7% increase in registrations with charitable associations, signs of a worsening of precariousness.
6Is the target of 2 million electric cars produced each year realistic?
The President of the Republic has declared that an objective of “two million electric vehicles” produced in France is set for the end of the five-year term. Is it tenable? The objective is ambitious since it amounts to multiplying current production by more than six (300,000 cars). However, it is not unattainable, if the sector is reorganized profoundly.
To achieve this, French manufacturers will have to produce their own batteries. They are already investing in giga-factories for this purpose. The two main French manufacturers, Renault and Stellantis (ex-PSA), will however have to carry out “a change of culture” to work together and develop a coordinated industrial sector for batteries, in order to reduce their dependence on Asian manufacturers.
7On OQTFs, is the French situation comparable to that of its European neighbours?
“It’s a situation we have everywhere in Europe.” Asked about the difficulties in completing the obligations to leave French territory (OQTF) – only 5.6% of these measures were applied in the first half of 2021, according to figures from the Ministry of the Interior cited in a Senate report – , the Head of State argues that the French situation is confirmed “everywhere in Europe”.
Comparisons in this area are difficult given the differences in legislation depending on the country. But this assertion is rather false, notes Le Figaro. By comparing with several neighbors (Germany, Italy, Spain, Belgium and the Netherlands), France deports on average more in absolute value, but “it is the country in which the OQTFs are the least followed by effects”according to the daily.
In detail, the OQTF execution rate was 15.02% in 2017, 14.63% in 2018 and 12.61% in 2019, according to Le Figaro, which relies on Eurostat data rather than those of the Ministry of the Interior to be able to compare with other European countries. In the Netherlands, for example, this same rate was 39.49% in 2017, 49.23% in 2018 and 43.46% in 2019.
8Has the government succeeded in increasing the number of forced departures?
“We went from 12,300 forced departures over the period 2007-2011 (…) to 19,000 before the Covid. So we have improved significantly”, said Emmanuel Macron. The President of the Republic relies once again on the figures of his administration. According to Interior Ministry data, the number of forced removals was 15,677 in 2018 and 18,906 in 2019, before dropping to 9,111 in 2020, the year of the pandemic. Going back a little in time, we notice that this number was on average 14,000 during the five-year term of François Hollande, according to figures compiled by AFP.
Over the period 2007-2011, the number of forced departures is well around 12,000. But the total number of departures from the territory (forced or not) varies little over the years. We find relatively similar figures in 2011 (32,912) and 2019 (31,404).