The “Marseille en grand” plan dear to Emmanuel Macron in the viewfinder of the Court of Auditors

POLITICS – Marseille smaller than expected. The Court of Auditors denounces monitoring « indigent » you plane “Marseille on a grand scale”three years after its launch with great fanfare by Emmanuel Macron in 2021, regretting the “lack of consistency” and the “intrinsic inadequacies” Who “weigh on its implementation”in a report published this Monday, October 21.

As a result, this plan is progressing very slowly: at the end of 2023, only 1.31% of the total amount announced – more than 5 billion euros – had been disbursed by the State, according to the report presented to the press by the president of the chamber regional accounts department Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur, Nathalie Gervais.

Renovate unsanitary schools, develop public transport in an area which has only two metro lines for more than 870,000 inhabitants, reduce the geographical and social divide between the northern and southern districts, strengthen the police force: this plan , intended to make up for the historical delays of the second largest city in France, some of whose districts are the poorest in Europe, was intended to “exceptional” by its amount and content.

However, considers the Court, “the reality of the exceptional and global nature of the Marseille en Grand plan deserves to be nuanced”. Thus, the new co-financing actually amounts to only 28% – or 1.55 billion euros – of the total amount announced.

Barely a third of the announced funding materialized

“Conceived in a rush” et “without prior consultation with the stakeholders”the plan presents “a lack of overall coherence”. Furthermore, he suffers “a major lack of formalization” since he “is not based on any document other than the transcription of the speech of the President of the Republic”September 2, 2021.

The report also points out the absence of “overall calendar” et “the insufficient nature of governance and management means” between the different actors that are the State, the city of Marseille led by the various left-wing mayor Benoît Payan and the metropolis led by the various right-wing Martine Vassal. “The resources that the State has devoted to monitoring the plan are not up to the challenges and can be described as inadequate”she insists.

However, “this plan is an opportunity for the people of Marseille”nuanced Nathalie Gervais on Monday, noting in particular “results with the first school deliveries” new or renovated. The report notes, however, that the plan does not integrate “no specific measures aimed at improving the school climate, strengthening student health or increasing social diversity”.

On the transport side, as many local players have already insisted: the 15 projects planned by the plan “only partially meet the State’s stated objective of opening up the northern districts” which do not benefit from any direct connection with the city center. On housing, “the plan does not provide for any action relating to the strengthening of social diversity and the fight against residential segregation (between the north and south of the city, editor’s note), nor on the issue of housing production, particularly social housing”. On employment, the measures are limited to“entrepreneurship of young people from disadvantaged neighborhoods” without taking into account “the diversity of audiences affected by difficulties in accessing employment”.

Lack of frameworks, organization and calendar

Overall, the Court considers, the plan “presents intrinsic and organizational inadequacies likely to compromise the full satisfaction of the needs that it primarily targets”. The Court therefore recommends defining “a contractual framework” accompanied by a timetable and an evaluation system, and “formalize governance arrangements” by associating “the different actors within the same body”.

In their responses to the Court, State, town hall and metropolis passed the buck, the Prime Minister’s services emphasizing a “lack of consensus between local actors” and incapacity “local authorities to adhere to the ambition of the plan”. On several occasions, Emmanuel Macron, who has never hidden his affection for Marseille, coming on multiple occasions to embody this plan, had already regretted the “local chicayas”.

The statements collected by The World illustrate this lack of cohesion and the uncertainty that reigns regarding the future of the presidential project. “Until I see the government, I cannot know what the intentions are regarding the plan”declared at the beginning of September, the mayor of Marseille (various left), Benoît Payan, when the entourage of the president various right of the Aix-Marseille-Provence Metropolis Martine Vassal claimed to have contacted Michel Barnier to “ talk to him about it as soon as possible. »

For everyone, the report comes at a very bad time in a period of budget cuts. In its report, written before the change of government, the Court already underlined that, due to lack of “formalization” you plane, “some of its financing has not been the subject of any legal commitment and is therefore not guaranteed”. Especially since, in the government of Michel Barnier, the portfolio of city policy, until then occupied by the Marseillaise close to the Macron couple Sabrina Agresti-Roubache, was eliminated.

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