40 billion euros. This is the amount of savings to be made by the government to deal with a public deficit that has reached records. The task is not going to be easy and we will have to roll up our sleeves. Especially since the budgetary exercise for the year 2025 is part of a context “unpublished”insists Jean-François Husson, senator from Meurthe-et-Moselle. “There is very little time left to get to grips with financial texts”the Constitution imposing a deadline of 70 days, recalls the general budget rapporteur in the Senate.
“With the absence of government, we lost three months of work”he regrets, reporting a financial situation “deeply degraded”. If today the repayment of the debt represents the first item of expenditure behind education, the trend could be reversed “by 2027”.
Thus, between December 2023 and September 2024, “ we note a slippage of 50 billion euros”. “As there has been no amending finance bill, we risk reaching 60 billion euros by the end of the year. » An imposing situation “a certain number of decisions”. Starting with the increase in taxation to which Jean-François Husson is not closed, quite the contrary. The option had elsewhere been mentioned by the new Prime Minister, Michel Barnier, having proposed a roadmap composed of “a third of taxes and a third of a reduction in spending”. “I’m not a fan of tax increases but we can’t keep telling stories; we will not be able to obtain results solely by reducing public spending, that would be lying to the French. » An effort that will however be necessary “compensate” by investing in public infrastructure and equipment, he adds.
Supply and spending
However, for months the senator from Meurthe-et-Moselle has continued to alert the government about the spiraling public deficit. So much so that he has become the bête noire of the former Minister of the Economy, Bruno Le Maire, whom he criticizes, as well as the President of the Republic, for not having been honest with the French on the state of public finances. Faced with the seriousness of the situation, he did not hesitate to invite himself to the Ministry of Economy and Finance last March to obtain the information he requested. “Last year the senatorial majority voted seven billion to reduce public spending which the government did not take into account. However, when you choose a supply-side policy, you must reduce public spending. » According to him, the problem dates from before the health crisis and it is too easy to hide behind the famous policy of “whatever it costs” applied during this period. “Since 2017, the state deficit has increased from 77 to 154 billion euros. This is not new. »
Other avenues under study
At the same time, the senator identified “133 policies on which savings are possible”. “We are in the process of carrying out the assessment because it is necessary to measure how quickly these measures can be implemented and with what impact. » Among the avenues under study, the elimination of the bonus of 6,000 euros for the hiring of an apprentice whose level of training is higher than bac + 3 within companies with more than 250 employees, “the equivalent of 700 million euros in savings in one year”. Measure already proposed in 2023, underlines Jean-François Husson. Or the reestablishment of the internal tax on final electricity consumption. He also points to the personal training account system deployed since 2018. “We must not only look at the policy of numbers but also to what extent this training has borne fruit. I plan to take stock of the situation at the beginning of next year. »
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