Savings on payroll, budget cuts for purchases or travel, reduction in office space… The Minister Delegate in charge of public accounts, Thomas Cazenave, began to detail, Monday February 19, the way in which the government intends to achieve savings on the budgets of the various ministries as part of a savings plan worth 10 billion euros, announced on Sunday by the Minister of the Economy, Bruno Le Maire.
This state regime, in order to achieve the objective of a public deficit of 4.4% of gross domestic product (GDP), will not only concern operating expenses, but will also involve freezing certain credits allocated to public policies. The Ministry of Sports and the Olympic and Paralympic Games (JOP), like all the others, will not escape this. Even if 2024 is synonymous with an Olympic year.
Those around Amélie Oudéa-Castéra say they have started to look at what proposals can be made to Bercy, but we already recognize that these will relate in part to intervention credits intended for public policies to promote sport.
With, however, a red line: there is no question, a priori, of touching the financing of the preparation of the Games (credits paid to the Olympic works delivery company, the purchase of tickets, etc.), including those of its sports component (the “Win in France” program which should place the country’s athletes in the best conditions, bonuses for medalists, etc.).
Defer certain payments?
The ministry, which hopes not to cut back too much on what it has invested in favor of sports practice in this Olympic year through various programs, could play on the pace of disbursement of certain credits. That is to say, postpone payments until 2025.
This could for example be the case for the “Generation 2024” plan, an extension of the plan for the creation-renovation of sports equipment launched in 2021, which must benefit from an envelope of 100 million euros per year for three years (after 200 million euros in total in 2021 and 2022). However, this is not currently an avenue that the ministry wishes to pursue.
What will be the scale of the savings for a ministry whose budget for 2024 was planned at 1.02 billion euros, including 889 million for public sports policy and 134 million for the contribution to the preparation of the Games? This should amount to tens of millions of euros. “All ministries will contribute up to what they represent in the national budget”, specified Bruno Le Maire. The Ministry of Sports and JOPs represents 0.18% of the state budget.