Last hearing for the Finance Committee on the deterioration of public finances since winter 2023-2024. The senators will hear former Prime Minister Élisabeth Borne this Friday from 3:00 p.m., after having already received Bruno Le Maire, Gabriel Attal and Thomas Cazenave. The event can be followed live on TNT channel 13, our social networks and this live stream.
The former head of government was in office at the time of the debates on the finance bill (PLF) for 2024 at the end of 2023. It was at this time that the Treasury and Budget administration issued the first alerts on the drop in tax revenues. Élisabeth Borne could also be questioned about the decisions which led to not retaining the 7 billion euros in savings voted at the time by the senatorial majority.
Elisabeth Borne evokes an alert on “non-quantified” revenues at the end of 2023
The general rapporteur of the Budget, Jean-François Husson, indicated to the former Prime Minister that he was able to consult a note of December 13, 2023 co-signed by the two ministers of the Economy and Public Accounts “which recommends widely sharing the critical nature of our budgetary situation both within the government but also in public opinion. “What level of importance did you give to these alerts? Why not inform public opinion and Parliament of the critical nature of our situation? “, he asked.
Elisabeth Borne then recalls that at this time “we have no assessment of what the deterioration of revenues could be”. She adds that she met the Minister of the Economy on January 4. “At that time, we discussed the measures that could be added to complement the measures already taken, the increase in energy taxation on 1is January 2024 and prepare for all or part of the credits set aside in the finance law.
“The services were wondering about the real level of unquantified revenue,” she indicates, emphasizing “that the final 49.3 of the finance bill for 2024 occurs on December 20.” “I don’t see how, at that time, with non-quantified information, we could have modified the assumptions for constructing the budget for 2024.”
“I fully supported the desire to control our public spending”
In an introductory statement lasting around fifteen minutes, Elisabeth Borne, who led the preparation of the 2023 and 2024 budgets during her time at Matignon, recalled the context of crisis that she had to face during her twenty months at the head of government. “The preparation of these budgets took place in a context marked by the crisis in Ukraine, the energy crisis and a level of inflation that France had not experienced for decades, which led my government to present as soon as summer 2022 two texts for purchasing power. »
“The various support measures represent a cost of 85 billion euros, including 33 billion for the year 2023,” said the former Prime Minister, who also wanted to highlight her budgetary rigor. “The two budgets prepared by my governments reflected the desire to return below 3% of GDP in 2027 and to begin a reduction in the debt in 2026,” she underlined.
Elisabeth Borne thus recalled the main savings measures taken when she was in office: “I fully supported the desire to control our public spending through various structural reforms. I am thinking of the unemployment insurance reform, adopted at the end of 2022, support for RSA beneficiaries and even pension reform. These three structural reforms generate a saving of around 30 billion by 2030,” she detailed. And added: “These reforms were necessary, everyone remembers that they were not popular. »
Referring to the first alerts, mid-December 2023, on the budgetary slippage and the gap between revenues and the forecasts made by the Ministry of the Economy, the former prefect ensures that she reacted on time: “The alert m “led to the introduction in the final readings of the 2024 budget of the possibility of increasing by regulation the domestic tax on final consumption of electricity (TICFE)”, she indicated. “The alert made in mid-December also led to preparations to cancel at the beginning of 2024 up to 10 billion euros of credits put in reserve in the finance bill. » A measure finally applied by his successor, Gabriel Attal.
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