AThen toll prices have risen by nearly 5%, further straining the purchasing power of road users, the press has echoed in recent weeks a report by the General Inspectorate of finances (IGF) which proves once again that the profitability of motorways goes well beyond the “reasonable compensation” provided for in the contracts.
Better, to answer the obvious imbalance of the contracts of concession, the IGF recommends to reduce their duration of ten years, to reduce by half the tariffs of tolls or to take nearly two thirds of the profits. The government’s silence and opacity around the conclusions of this report, which it has held for two years, are shocking!
Commission of inquiry, questions to the government, debates in the hemicycles, three motions for resolution… We have been denouncing since 2017, in the Assembly as in the Senate, the double inaction of the government. Nothing is done to rebalance the contracts and no preparation for the post-concessions has started, when they will expire between 2031 and 2036. Worse, the government prefers to garner nearly 50 billion euros in revenue taxes since 2006 (VAT, corporation tax, etc.) on the backs of users thanks to the perfectly orchestrated tango with motorway concession companies, whose profitability will increase further: 40 billion euros between 2020 and 2036 against 24 billion euros over 2006-2019, according to a Senate report.
“Roads of France”
By ignoring the IGF report and our request for an assessment by the Council of State of the economic balance of the contracts and the cost of termination, the government favors the status quo, leaving the profits of the motorways explode, and the rest of the road network deteriorates.
However, the immediate renationalisation of the network promoted by some seems ineffective and costly to us ten years from the end of the contracts, where profitability is the strongest. It goes without saying that the money from possible compensation for motorway companies would be much better used for the renovation of national roads in poor condition, railways and rivers, or to help individuals change the motorization of their vehicles in the age of low emission zones…
This is the reason why it is necessary to build another path to the opposition that has become sterile between renationalisation, which is expensive, and the pursuit of a despoiling concessionary model. This solution inevitably starts with the cessation, recommended by the IGF, of contract extensions and their non-renewal.
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