The file, it should be remembered, aims to extend the Paris-Bordeaux high-speed line to Toulouse and Dax. The government must present this February 15 the financing plan before the Council of State. However, this Monday at 5.30 p.m., just before the elected officials approved the text presented to them “at high speed”, ironically Christophe Duprat (LR), 225 million euros were missing out of a total estimate of 14 billion. euros.
It was therefore at the express request of Jean Castex – “an ultimatum” for the communist Frédéric Mellier – that Alain Rousset agreed to advance this sum which is added to the 710 million euros already voted by the Region. “From 2024, the Region’s share will therefore increase from 17.7 million euros per year to 23.4, over a period of 40 years, underlines the vice-president of finance, Sandrine Derville. It’s not nothing but it’s little in an overall budget of around 3 billion euros, one third of which is for investment. »
In exchange for this advance, “this securing of the project” prefers to say Alain Rousset, the Region will receive as a priority “the good fortunes” tax and returns of rail tolls, promised by the Prime Minister and evaluated between 800 million and one billion euros. “It’s a bet” recognizes the President of the Region who persists in thinking that it is impossible to miss “such a historic opportunity for the Region”. As an elected official, Christophe Duprat reminds us that the cost of a construction site is rarely the same on arrival as on departure, and always on the rise.
“Totally indecent”
This same Duprat who is surprised that a certain number of communities, such as the department of Lot-et-Garonne or the Basque conurbation refuse to participate when they will benefit from the fallout from the LGV. “Once again, it is the communities that are putting their hands in their pockets when it is the State which should have made the advance”, outbids its group president, Nicolas Florian.
“Badly put together”, “amateurism”, “Europeanist naivety”, the president of the RN group, Edwige Diaz did not mince words to justify her vote against, while deploring, like other elected officials, that the deliberation lands so on the lectern of the elect. “A small democratic problem”, for Geneviève Darrieussecq, president of the centrist intergroup. “A lack of respect for elected officials” for Christine Séguinau (EELV). In December, you voted for a financing plan that was not finalized. »
“This billion euros from the Region for the LGV is totally indecent”, protests Nicolas Thierry, the president of the EELV group. But, oddly, none of the elected environmentalists brandishes the argument of the mayor of Bordeaux, Pierre Hurmic, for which it is not 225 million euros which are lacking but nearly 770, a figure disputed by Alain Rousset and his executive. But the vice-president of Transport, Renaud Lagrave, assures that other communities could ultimately participate.
A biodiversity vigilance committee
A plenary session of the Region would not be what it is without the now traditional brawl (verbal) between Alain Rousset and his former ecologist allies on one side, and with Jean Dionis on the other. That of this Monday kept its promises after a long budgetary debate, without surprise since the exercise of 3.3 billion euros was voted, with the only voices of the majority group, all the others voting against.
On behalf of the Modem, the mayor of Agen stepped up in favor (and in vain) of a financial effort on the roads. “It’s not her that’s carbon, it’s the car. Let’s make the road greener instead of demonizing it. What annoy the president who explodes when Jean Dionis reminds him that he had warned him “against the insufficiency of the GPSO financing plan”. “I have no lesson to receive from an elected official who has lowered the participation of his agglomeration”, replies Alain Rousset.