After the budgetary slippages of the last two years, the Minister of the Economy wishes to “restore confidence in the budgetary speech of the State”. He recalled that the government had presented an “action plan” to improve the management of public finances. © Damian Lemanski/Bloomberg/Getty Images – Eric Lombard’s plan to put public finances back on track. Save save Receive alerts Public deficit How to put public finances back on rails after the 2023 and 2024 slippages? This is the thorny equation that the Minister of Economy must resolve. Eric Lombard was speaking before the National Assembly Finance Committee, which had investigated the reasons for these slippages and whose report published this Tuesday, April 15, makes recommendations to prevent them from repeating itself: improving the quality of forecasts, strengthening the management of public finances and information of parliamentarians. “We share, with the minister (public accounts) many elements of diagnosis” and ” The tenant of Bercy, auditioned by this commission. “What I want, he added is to restore confidence (…) in the state’s budget speech, but also confidence in a close and fruitful dialogue with Parliament.” The report mentions the “disruption of models” of Bercy forecasts in a context of inflationary crisis, which resulted in lower revenues than expected by more than 60 billion euros in 2023 and 2024. To read also: France lowers its growth forecast for 2025, announces Eric Lombard a “new paradigm” to finance public spending also underlines “bias” “Middle term forecasts” and, “to a lesser extent, reasons relating to the behavior of the administrations responsible for forecast”. The question of political responsibility in these forecast differences is not unanimous, however. Éric Lombard recalled that the government had presented on March 3 an “action plan” to improve the management of public finances, with more “transparency”, the creation of a “circle of forecastists” which will examine the relevance of forecast hypotheses and the implementation of an “alert committee” associating the Parliament, which met for the first time on Tuesday. ” We really offer a new paradigm in piloting public finances and we have already started its implementation, “he said. The Minister of Public Accounts Amélie de Montchalin recalled that the administrations now met every month on this subject: “There is no question of hidden deficit,” she insisted. Regarding the “circle of forecasters”, she announced a meeting in May which will examine the differences noted in 2024. A new meeting in July is planned for “the coming year” and “calibrate the models”. To read also: Taxes, Defense … The government timidly lifts the veil on the 2026 budget a public deficit under 3% in 2029? “The idea is to have a form of collective intelligence which combines academic research, the private or parapublic sector of research institutes like the OFCE,” she explained. “The challenge is to improve the capacity of forecastists, in particular of our ministries, to have the most reliable and most enriched forecasts as possible of the expertise of their colleagues.” The public deficit reached 5.4% of the gross domestic product (GDP) in 2023 and 5.8% in 2024, well beyond the European limit of 3%. The government intends to bring it back to 5.4% of GDP in 2025, and go back under 3% in 2029. Receive our last news each week, the flagship items to support your personal finances. (tagstotranslate) d u00e9ficit Public
