The Wise Men validated this Friday the bill on purchasing power and the amending finance bill including the abolition of the audiovisual license fee.
The Constitutional Council, seized by more than 120 deputies and senators from the left, validated with reservations on Friday the two texts of laws on purchasing power, framing in particular in “unpublished” terms certain provisions of the energy part. With these two decisions rendered on Friday, the Sages also validated with “interpretation reservations» the abolition of the audiovisual license fee.
Regarding the draft law on emergency measures for the protection of purchasing power, the Elders expressed reservations “unpublishedon the commissioning of an LNG terminal off the coast of Le Havre and on the increase in the ceiling for greenhouse gas emissions from certain facilities producing electricity from fossil fuels.
For the Constitutional Council, these provisions are “likely to harm the environment“. And “unless the Environment Charter is ignored, these provisions can only apply in the event of a serious threat to the security of gas supply” and of “threat to the security of electricity supply in all or part of the national territory“, indicates the Council.
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The Sages add that “the preservation of the environment must be sought in the same way as the other fundamental interests of the nation“, a “reservation of interpretation formulated in new terms“, they specify. Regarding the relaunch of power plants using fossil fuels, the Council has set “an obligation to offset greenhouse gas emissions“. The Rebellious and environmental deputies, at the origin of the appeal, considered that these provisions violated the Charter of the environment of 2004, which is part of the preamble of the Constitution.
The Elders have reservations about the abolition of the audiovisual license fee
Regarding the amending finance bill, the second part of the purchasing power bill, the Constitutional Council, seized by the Nupes intergroup and the socialist senators, ruled that the abolition of the planned audiovisual license fee was “liable to affect the guarantee of the resources of the public audiovisual sector, which constitutes an element of its independence“.
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The Elders enjoined the government to “set the amount of these revenues so that the companies and the public audiovisual establishment are able to carry out the public service missions“. The deputies of Nupes had judged, in their appeal, that the alternative financing mechanism proposed (allocation of part of the VAT) “does not make it possible to ensure the security of the funding of the establishments» audiovisual. On the other hand, the appeals on the monetization of the RTT and the Arenh ceiling were rejected.