It is “the hour of truth”, “France plays its credibility”, according to François Bayrou. This Tuesday, the Prime Minister held a press conference on public finances, ensuring that “the main guidelines” on the 2026 budget would be presented “before July 14”. “Reindustrialisation”, public spending and “French effort” in the defense budget … No announcement has really been made, but 20 Minutes take stock of what to remember from his speech.
France “does not produce and does not work enough”
According to the president of the modem, France “lack of means” to finance its policies because “that it does not produce enough and does not work enough”. “The policy of returning production and reindustrialisation (…) must become an obsession for our nation,” said the Prime Minister. For him, “only an awareness of our fellow citizens can support a determined action”.
He hopes that “confrontation with the eyes open with the truth of our situation” can allow the government to obtain the “support” of the French. “If our production per capita was in the same range as that of our European neighbors, we would not have a budget deficit”, he notably observed, also deploring “a lower employment rate” among young people and seniors.
This leads to an aggravation of debt – 3.305.3 billion euros in 2024, or 113 % of GDP – which becomes “a dangerous trap, potentially irreversible”, according to the Prime Minister. “We will not be able to support the burden sustainably” which could “reach 100 billion euros in 2029”, he warned, judging this “morally unacceptable” for future generations.
“If the interest rates explode, then we will be suffocated, it is the guaranteed explosion” to which no government will resist, he insisted, a longtime leitmotif at home.
The challenge of reducing public deficit
To respond to the issue of the public deficit, expected at 5.4 % of GDP in 2025 and planned at 4.6 % in 2026, “debt is a dangerous, potentially irreversible trap”, and the increase in compulsory levies is “untenable”, he estimates. The Prime Minister did not give any figure on the volume of savings to be made in 2026. He simply described the amount of 40 billion euros announced on Sunday by his Minister of Economy Eric Lombard to reduce the deficit.
As for going through an increase in public spending, “the excess of public spending does not make citizens happy,” he swept. “If we choose to continue to increase these levies, it is our country which, in the end, would suffer,” he said.
Public expenses “do not have the effectiveness to which our fellow citizens should be entitled. To speak simply, they don’t have them for their money, ”decided François Bayrou. “We are the country that spends the most public money in the world,” he continued.
The government wishes to reduce public spending by 6 % by 2029 without resorting to “chainsaw,” announced the Minister of Public Accounts, Amélie de Montchalin during this same press conference. In particular, she wants to fight against “the very large drift” of sick leave. Among the tracks mentioned, the Minister spoke of the merger or the abolition of certain public operators, an action against “the very large drift” of sick leave, the revision of the public purchasing mechanism in order to lower prices, or “free that unleashes” in terms of public services.
An effort of three more billion for defense
During this press conference, the mayor of Pau also announced “an effort of an additional three billion” for the defense in the 2026 budget, due to “the hurricane on the planet” since the invasion of Ukraine by Russia, still “aggravated” by the strategic reversal of the United States.
“The European Union has the imperious duty to build an autonomous defense”, thanks to “an immense shared effort, necessary on the part of other European countries” in which the “French effort” will be “strengthened”. It is the first of the “four orientations” desired by the Prime Minister.
The “major orientations”
The other orientations are the “refusal of over -indebtedness”, considered “politically unbearable” and “morally unacceptable” by the Prime Minister. The third concerns “the refoundation of public action” via “a real overhaul of the missions and budgets of our administrations”. Finally, the fourth orientation aims to encourage and help “economic activity”.
All our articles on the 2026 budget
To carry them out, “we decided to go faster, take the lead, choose a much more ambitious and more demanding calendar,” said François Bayrou. The main guidelines will be known on July 14, in order to allow time to “bring together all contributions, all suggestions, all consultations for a few weeks around the future and the choices we will have to make”. “The survival of our country is at stake,” concluded François Bayrou.
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