Whoever it may be, the next Minister of Economy and Finance will have as his first task a goal worthy of Mission impossible : Complete a budget within ten days, fifteen at the most, taking into account constitutional deadlines. Then have it voted on.
Choose priorities
The new state financier will not be starting from scratch. On his desk on the sixth floor of Bercy, he will find a draft budget for 2025 drawn up by the resigned ministers Bruno Le Maire and Thomas Cazenave, as well as the letters sent to the ministries on 20 August to set spending limits. But will he have to remain faithful to this text which essentially renews the initial budget for 2024, without increases or decreases, and perpetuates the savings urgently decided in the first half of the year? Or on the contrary, will he have to leave a mark in one direction or another?
Nothing is less neutral than a budget. It is here, in each of its countless lines, that most of the political options take shape. However, the projects of the different parties competing for the key role in the new Assembly have little in common.
For the left coalition that emerged first, the main thing is “responding to the social emergency, the climate challenge, and the repair of public services” and create “More tax justice.” This requires significant public spending, accompanied by new taxes. Thus, the New Popular Front (NFP) programme provides for an increase in the rate of civil servants by 10%, an increase in the value of housing benefits, investment in ecology, etc. Not to mention the repeal of the pension reform, also advocated by the National Assembly (RN), which would increase pensions payable. In total, the NFP has estimated the cost of its programme at 25 billion euros in 2024 and then at 100 billion in 2025.
The right, on the other hand, wants to reduce taxes, “put the accounts in order”. In their “emergency legislative pact”, the head of the right-wing Republican deputies in the Assembly, Laurent Wauquiez, and the head of the Les Républicains (LR) party in the Senate, Bruno Retailleau, propose saving 25 billion euros. The Macronists, for their part, want above all to preserve the supply-side policy, favourable to businesses, with the idea of removing the brakes on private initiative to support growth. They also want to reduce the budget deficit to 3% of gross domestic product in 2027, compared to 5.5% in 2023, as they have committed to do.
Whether to increase or reduce spending, raise or reduce taxes, respect or not the European objectives, seek continuity or mark a break: at this stage, all decisions are yet to be made. Then we will have to find a majority that supports them. Or, at least, one that does not oppose them to the point of overthrowing the government.
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