Bruno Le Maire, three days after warning the Court of Auditors about the degrading state of public finances, announced Sunday that he would entrust parliamentarians to send him proposals to reduce public spending.
The Minister of Finance indicated that, in addition to the two "priorities", purchasing power and full-employment, "I propose that [we] radically alter the method to reduce government expenditure", during Rencontres economic centres of Aix-en-Provence.
"I propose it is the parliamentarians that take up the topic, and not the government," added the second executive who confirmed the presence Renaissance deputy Daniel Labaronne in a "task team which will fundamentally reform public spending."
Bruno Le Maire, who dismissed "the savings of bits and candles" at the beginning, said "I consider that only the senators and deputies have the legality to do this work".
He laughed and said, "The little planning on the five euro of APL. Not sure that it's our greatest success in the last five years."
He also suggested to organize the "Assises du finances publiques" at the beginning to "look together, Parliamentarians and Government, at what options we are coming to".
Bercy promises a broad mission to parliamentarians, with a 6.4% GDP public deficit and 112.5% national debt by 2021.
The Court of Auditors published its latest report on public finances on Thursday. It expressed concern over the new spending of billions by the government this week to support households in the face of high inflation (5% on a year in June, according to INSEE).
These will "degrade the deficit in 2022 compared to the scenario under the original finance law", which allowed for a deficit of 5% GDP at the end 2022. This target was recently confirmed by government, but is subject to "many dangers", according to rue Cambon's financial magistrates.
For its part, the government assures that new spending will be offset by especially dynamic tax revenues.
Bruno Le Maire, in tax matters specifically, reiterated Sunday his plan to use "all the revenue taxed on fossil fuels" for the fight against global warming.
