“You are right. Since 2017, I have ensured that the sports budget increases every year“, underlined the Head of State in reaction to the text co-signed by some 400 athletes. “We must keep our commitments and provide the means for our athletes and so that the legacy of the Games benefits everyone.“, he insisted, while the government plans to cut the budget by at least a hundred million euros.
Lappartient calls out to Bayrou
The president of the French Olympic Committee (CNOSF) David Lappartient took offense to François Bayrou at the cutting of nearly 30% of the budget of the Ministry of Sports, considering it “incomprehensible“, in a letter addressed to the Prime Minister, a copy of which AFP obtained on Wednesday. After an initial reduction of more than a hundred million euros, apart from exceptional credits for the Paris Olympics, the government proposed the January 16 a new reduction of 34 million euros, which the Senate finally rejected.
“With this new planer proposal, the drop in +Sport+ credits would reach 33%. It's incomprehensible“, writes David Lappartient in this letter dated January 20. The president of the CNOSF evokes “a hard blow to a budget which is already struggling to reach 1 billion euros and already represented barely 0.2% of the budget of the State.”
David Lappartient, president of the UCI and the CNOSF, on the sidelines of the Giro 2024
Credit: Getty Images
-Two columns published Wednesday in the press, one in The Team signed by 425 athletes and the other in Le Parisien signed by more than 5,000 personalities, including presidents of federations or ex-champions, calling for the preservation of the resources allocated to sport. Champions like Teddy Riner and Léon Marchand, whose voice reaches far beyond sport, expressed their indignation on January 16.
“While France lacks clubs, sports equipment and educators (…) the Sports Movement is offended by the incomprehensible budgetary trajectory proposed by the government“, continues David Lappartient. The president of the CNOSF, also candidate for the presidency of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), “demands that sport have its rightful place in the development of the nation's budget“, and asks the government to “return to one's position” regarding the reduction of 34 million euros.
Before the intervention of the President of the Republic, government spokesperson Sophie Primas estimated on Wednesday that this planing was “legitimate“in order to return to”a reasonable low water level“, explaining that budgets for sport had been increased due to the Paris Olympics.
