The government is bringing together parliamentarians from the majority and the opposition on Thursday afternoon at the Ministry of the Economy and Finance to try to find savings after France’s deficit soared to 5.5% of the GDP in 2023. Wednesday evening, Prime Minister Gabriel Attal reaffirmed on TF1 his government’s “cap”: bringing the deficit below 3% in 2027, an effort estimated at 50 billion euros by the Court of Auditors.
To do this, the Minister of Economy and Finance Bruno Le Maire “will meet parliamentarians, elected officials, social partners” on Thursday and “make proposals” with a view to the 2025 budget, which will be presented “at the end of June”, recalled the Prime Minister. If it has already recorded 10 billion euros in savings for 2024, the executive is under double pressure from the rating agencies, which should update the French credit rating in the spring, and from political opposition.
“Additional savings in 2024
On Wednesday, the Moody’s agency considered it “unlikely” that the government would reach its deficit target of 4.4% of GDP in 2024, even taking into account the 10 billion in budget cuts. The Senate Finance Committee also announced the launch of an information mission to “shed complete light on the deterioration of public finances since 2023”, a year which was initially expected to end with a deficit of 4.9 % of GDP according to government forecasts.
After the 10 billion cuts announced in February, “there will be additional savings in 2024”, the amount of which remains to be specified, Minister Bruno Le Maire indicated on Tuesday during an exchange with journalists.
The Republicans declined the invitation
It is to find “realistic, documented and significant” savings and reflect on the 20 billion additional cuts announced for 2025 that Bruno Le Maire and his colleagues Thomas Cazenave (Minister for Public Accounts), Catherine Vautrin (Labour) and Frédéric Valletoux (Health) invited deputies and senators Thursday to Bercy.
Among the guests are the presidents and general rapporteurs of the Finance and Social Affairs committees of the two houses of Parliament. In addition “all parliamentary groups were invited” and only the deputies and senators Les Républicains “declined”, according to Bercy.
Senator LR, Jean-François Husson will be present but in his capacity as general rapporteur of the Finance Committee. “I’m not going there to receive lessons,” he has already warned. A second meeting in Bercy has been announced for April 9, in order to look, with associations of local elected officials, for ways to save money within local authorities.