Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu asked his ministers to “correct” the requests of their administrations and to identify “real political priorities” for the 2027 draft budget, in a letter he sent to them mid-week and revealed by Les Échos, Saturday June 13.
“As part of the preparation of the finance bill for 2027, the budgeting conferences revealed more than 30 billion funding requests, including 24 billion to implement new spending,” worries the head of government, in this letter consulted by AFP.
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These requests from the services would lead to “the creation of more than 23,000 jobs (for the State and its operators, Editor’s note) from next year and around 40,000 over the period 2027-2029”, underlines the missive, the subject of which is explicitly entitled “Framing letter for the preparation of the finance bill for 2027”.
In fact, it is rather a reframing in due form that is in question. Regretting “budgetary requests (…) clearly not prioritized”, and “unrealistic”, the Prime Minister further considers that they “disregard the urgency of restoring public finances”, “a determining element of our sovereignty, especially in the current geopolitical and macroeconomic context”.
A reframing all the more necessary as the government has promised to table a budget without tax increases.
New budget cuts
“I ask you, therefore, to take control of the requests expressed by your administrations and to correct them. Your discussions with the Minister of Action and Public Accounts will make it possible to identify real political priorities, but also productivity gains and transformations (…) It is in the light of this work that I will make my decisions,” continues Sébastien Lecornu. “We must be serious”, “I am counting on you”, he insists in this letter.
The government must present the broad outlines of the 2027 budget in mid-July. Before that, a public finance alert committee is planned for the end of June, which could be an opportunity to announce new budget cuts while the war in the Middle East weighs on the economic situation. A three-week cycle of bilateral discussions between the Minister of Public Accounts, David Amiel, and his colleagues began these days.
The government is currently counting on a deficit of 5% of GDP this year, after 5.1% in 2025.
