Blood, tears, but phlegm. Guest Thursday evening on the show the Eventt on France 2, Michel Barnier detailed the recipes for the bitter potion of the budget he is preparing for 2025. The bill? A debt reduction of 60 billion euros. The goal? “Safeguard a future”. L’«angoisse» what does the Prime Minister want to conjure? Nothing less than“a financial crisis”. While giving lip service to his predecessor, Gabriel Attal, who achieved “substantial efforts” by freezing credits during 2024, Barnier repeats having been “surprised” by discovering in Matignon, the public deficit forecast: “I didn’t know this figure of 6.2%.” It clearly takes more to panic him. When you are entrusted with an impossible mission, at the head of a coalition that is as weak as it is uncooperative, you don’t have much to lose. “I prefer to take the risk of being unpopular but I don’t want to be irresponsible,” he says. Up for the rigor, chap. “But no, he contradicts. Public spending will continue like last year, we are not in a period of austerity.” What would that be…?
Recalling the ratio provided for in the finance bill (PLF) that the government must present on Thursday October 10 (one third of new revenue for two thirds of savings), Barnier had to, paradoxically, justify himself more on the increases in taxes considered. And this because the Macronists, the first group of “its common base” in the National Assembly, are holding back with all four irons, stuck to their credo of fiscal stability. “There will be no fiscal shock”tries to reassure the Prime Minister who specifies his proposed contribution “temporary” requested from large groups reaping the highest profits: some 300 companies, which achieve a billion euros in turnover, would be targeted for one year, “maybe two”, for an expected gain of “maybe” 2 billion. The richest taxpayers would also be exceptionally involved, added Barnier, citing the example of a couple with an annual tax income of 500,000 euros, “but not below”. To the former Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin, who judged Thursday morning “unacceptable” the draft of new recipes, the Prime Minister retorted, dryly but without an ounce of annoyance: “I have very little time and no desire to make controversies.”
Evasif
It is mainly on the reductions in spending, for 40 billion euros, that it will bleed. But in this matter, Barnier continues to hide his game. The ideas he mentions, this Thursday on the Caroline Roux set, are still vague: “We are going to make public spending more efficient”, “we are going to look at whether certain aid can be better targeted”… Even frankly incantatory: “We can save a lot of money by simplifying people’s lives.” Barnier wants to put his nose into the cost of medical transport or learning aids and intends, evasively, to pass “a contract with the directors of central administrations”. He has just announced his intention to “merge public services” et “without doubt”, not to replace all retiring civil servants. The Prime Minister confirms the possibility of a six-month postponement, to July 1, of the indexation of retirement pensions, which would bring in between 3 and 4 billion. Asked about the possibility of reducing state medical aid (AME) for foreigners in an irregular situation, a fixation of the right, the head of government evades, believing that“we can better manage the AME”, and goes from rooster to donkey: “what interests me a lot is the question of social fraud”he dodges, recalling his wish to better secure vital cards but failing to point out that it is above all the responsibility of companies and not of policyholders. On the other hand, for the heaviest of budget cuts, mystery.
Lucid about his minimal room for maneuver, the Prime Minister admits, without complexes, that he will probably have to have his budget adopted with the forceps of 49.3, since even his “allies” are dragging their feet. In this shattered hemicycle, he hears “try to do the best”a priori not sparks. “I am not going to get into major ideological debates”is “announce laws in advance”. Marine Le Pen, who was already calling for a new text on immigration, will be at her expense. Just as he warns his Minister of the Interior Bruno Retailleau: “I’m the one who draws the line.” Michel Barnier will already strive to enforce the previous law, passed less than a year ago. Vague during his general policy declaration, on the fate of the end-of-life bill, the Prime Minister, favorable to the text presented by the government – more embarrassed by the version rewritten by the deputies -, on the other hand, promised to resume parliamentary examination where it had been interrupted.
