In an interview given to La Tribune SundayÉric Lombard speaks out for “very limited” tax increases in the next budget.
Loan to “compromise”and concerned “that a budget be adopted”the new Minister of the Economy Éric Lombard will try to proceed “through dialogue” by inviting all parties represented in Parliament to come and discuss it in Bercy. “At the request of the Prime Minister, I will call on the political parties represented in the National Assembly and the Senate, as well as the parliamentary groups, to come and dialogue at the ministry with Amélie de Montchalin, the Minister of Public Accounts, and myself »assured Éric Lombard in an interview with La Tribune Sunday.
The Minister of Finance plans to contact everyone “from (Sunday) morning”judging that “all elected officials are legitimate”. He thus seems to want to avoid recent controversies, such as that caused by his predecessor Antoine Armand who, from his first interview at the end of September, indicated excluding the RN from the republican arc, to the great irritation of Marine Le Pen. He did not mention any precedence: “The order of passage will depend on their availability, and the configuration will be the one they want”says the minister, whose door “will remain open until January 14, date of the general policy speech” by François Bayrou, but “also afterwards”.
“We’ll see”
“The results of this dialogue” will be presented to Prime Minister François Bayrou, “so that they translate into government proposals”. The man who was until Monday general director of the Caisse des Dépôts, the leading public financial center, recalls having been “as such in permanent contact with elected officials, local or national”.
While the first secretary of the Socialist Party Olivier Faure, who does not rule out censoring the Bayrou government, nevertheless recognized Tuesday on BFMTV that Éric Lombard was “a man of the left” et “a friend”the new minister evaded: “I will dialogue with everyone and I will have the same speech with all elected officials. Some may be more committed, others more reluctant. We will see”. “We have to find compromises, it’s essential”he added.
He counts “to arrange” the finance bill prepared by the Barnier government, left pending during the parliamentary shuttle by the censorship of December 4. The minister believes that possible tax increases will have to be “very limited”and that it will be necessary “additional savings”. The deficit would be included in the text at “a little above 5%” you PIB, “in order to protect growth”.
“Scale indexing”
Before concessions to the opposition which did not avoid censorship, Michel Barnier stated the intention of reducing a public deficit of 6.1% of GDP this year (which earned France a procedure for excessive deficit in Brussels), to 5% next year. Éric Lombard also removes the risk of a possible increase in the number of people subject to income tax next year. If the special law, which will allow the strict functioning of the State at the start of the year, were to persist, it would not authorize the traditional indexation of the scale of this tax to inflation.
“We will have a budget which will include an indexation of the scale” Eric Lombard said. “The French who do not pay income tax today will not pay any tomorrow”. Il “issues a condition”moreover, to a future adjustment of the law on pensions, affirming that the discussions “must not increase the old age insurance deficit”. There is “grit to grind within this constraint”he explains. The minister hopes that “the construction of a credible budget will be a response to the concerns (of) the markets” on French public finances. He finally judges “very serious” the threat of customs barriers raised by President-elect Donald Trump. “We must prepare for a very vigorous response”more “the European Union has the necessary weapons”he assures.
