The President of the National Assembly Yaël Braun-Pivet announced on Friday that she had referred the case of LFI deputy Andy Kerbrat to the institution's ethics officer, whom Mediapart revealed would have drawn on his mandate fee advance (AFM) to buy drugs.
“Being an MP means having a duty to set an example. The facts reported by Mediapart concerning MP Andy Kerbrat are extremely serious,” commented Ms. Braun-Pivet on X.
“I have contacted the ethics officer so that he can immediately carry out an audit of his expenses. If the facts are proven, I will take legal action,” she continued.
According to an investigation published Friday by Mediapart, the 34-year-old deputy for Loire-Atlantique used his AFM account, supplemented with approximately 4,700 euros each month by the National Assembly, to finance his drug consumption.
The elected official was stopped on October 17 by the police in the Paris metro while buying 3-MMC, a synthetic drug booming in France. He then announced that he was starting a “care protocol” and wanted to “fight” against his addiction in order to be able to resume his parliamentary activity.
According to Mediapart, the MP, currently the subject of legal proceedings, has experienced significant financial difficulties due to his addiction. In this context, he “used his AFM to transfer money directly to his personal account”, asserts Mediapart.
Mr. Kerbrat admitted to the investigative media that he had “done anything” with his mandate fees, admitting to having dipped into this envelope of public money for his personal lifestyle. But he indicates that he then “reimbursed these prohibited expenses”, according to Mediapart.
The use of the AFM by MPs, recalled Ms Braun-Pivet in a press release, is “strictly regulated” and “must be subject to justification for any expenditure incurred”.
“Each year, a third of the deputies are drawn at random to be controlled,” she also specified. Mr. Kerbrat's situation was not examined in 2023 or 2024, but it was “planned that it would be examined in the coming days as part of the end-of-term checks, which are in progress”, a- she added.
“Justice will be seized in the event of misappropriation of public money, especially to finance illicit expenditure,” concluded the President of the Assembly.
