‘BUDGET 2025: an austerity plan that doesn’t say its name!’ declared French trade union federation Force Ouvrière (FO) on Tuesday.
A FO press statement said: ‘The 2025 finance bill presented to the Council of Ministers confirms an unprecedented budgetary effort of 60 billion euros savings.
‘The spending ceilings drawn up by the outgoing government were taken up again, arguing that in the absence of recovery measures, the budget deficit would be around 7% in 2025.
‘The stated objective is to reduce the deficit to 5% by 2025 and to put in place a new budgetary trajectory in order to avoid the excessive deficit procedure initiated by the EU and to reassure the financial markets.
‘More than two thirds of the effort concerns public spending, i.e. 40 billion euros taking into account inflation: minus 20 billion euros on State spending, minus 1 billion for operators, minus 15 billion euros for Social Security and minus 5 billion euros for local authorities.
‘This is a real blow that is being prepared for public services.
‘In detail, this budget recognises more than 2,000 net job cuts in the State civil service and among operators on essential missions such as education (– 2,030), the fight against tax fraud (– 500), agriculture (–101), work and employment (– 973).
‘FO points out that the Civil Service already has many vacant positions and suffers from a lack of attractiveness linked to significant losses in purchasing power for more than twenty years due to not linking salaries with inflation!
‘On the revenue side, the government is announcing “exceptional and limited” measures when the reduction in expenditure is obviously sustainable! The choices remain quite derisory given the 76 billion in tax cuts enacted since 2017 that have led to this budgetary drift! Thus, a corporate tax surcharge for large companies with a turnover of more than 1 billion euros and an exceptional contribution on the wealthiest individuals are illusory given the mobility of taxable bases and tax optimisation strategies.
‘On the other hand, still nothing on the most important tax loopholes such as the Research Tax Credit (CIR), where expenditure on research and development can be deducted from a company’s tax bill or a taxation of financial income!
‘However, FO has constantly pointed out that the policies of support for businesses without conditionality and the tax breaks for the wealthiest households implemented over the past seven years have neither helped to restore public finances nor to revive economic growth or investment.
‘This assessment is carefully obscured by anxiety-provoking rhetoric around the deficit.
‘In any case, this austerity cure risks plunging the economy into stagnation or even recession, with immediate losses of purchasing power in sight for all retirees and consumers with the consequent increase in the electricity tax (TICFE).
Meanwhile, La CGT French trade union federation, said on Monday: ‘The day after a “working meeting” with 21 prefects, the Minister of the Interior last week announced two future circulars in line with the far-right doctrine according to which we must “deport better and regularise less.”.
‘Bruno Retailleau therefore wishes to cancel the circular of 28/11/2012 known as “Valls” which sets the criteria for regularisation through work and also allows parents of school-age children to obtain a “private life family life” residence permit.
‘The CGT recalls that this circular, won through the struggles of undocumented workers from 2008 to 2012, even if it is imperfect and applied in different ways by the prefectures, is the only way for these workers who participate in the social and economic life of the country to be regularised and to assert their rights against employers who take advantage of their administrative vulnerability to underpay them and impose unacceptable working conditions on them.
‘Regularising these immigrant workers therefore means acting for the essential principle of equal rights for all workers, regardless of their origin, nationality or skin colour, and ensuring that there is no worker in this country forced to submit to the sole law of the boss.
‘The Interior Minister’s plan to attack the rights of immigrant workers is therefore a bad blow to the entire world of work and in particular to the collective guarantees won through decades of struggle.
‘The CGT will not be impressed by the xenophobic and anti-social actions of a Minister of the Interior and a government that continues to give assurances to the Far Right, in order to better push through its policy of social destruction and the destruction of collective rights.
‘On the contrary, the CGT will continue to demand for immigrant workers a full residence permit based on simple proof of work, the end of the employer’s power in issuing the residence permit, the taking into account of the specificities encountered, in their lives and at work, by migrant women and the possibility of regularisation for platform workers and those with self-employed status.
‘Finally, the CGT demands that staff numbers be increased in the prefecture so that the obstacles to administrative procedures encountered by the vast majority of foreigners to renew their residence permit and the right to work for asylum seekers during the examination of their file are eliminated.
‘The CGT, together with immigrant workers, will respond to this aggression against the world of work and will oppose all xenophobic policies whose sole aim is to create division in order to better exploit.’
Earlier, the CGT expressed its concern about the announcements made by Prime Minister Michel Barnier concerning housing.
The union federation said: ‘The proposals announced during his speech on 1 October are both risky and insufficient to create the long-awaited supply shock.
‘By focusing mainly on home ownership and the relaxation of environmental constraints, the government is not responding to the urgent need for affordable housing for the majority of employees. The CGT calls for more ambitious actions, in particular the construction of 500,000 homes per year, half of which will be social housing, to guarantee decent and affordable housing for all.
Social housing
should not be reserved for the poorest
‘The CGT is firmly opposed to the idea that social housing should be reduced to a simple “stage” in the residential pathway, exclusively reserved for the most deprived. Social housing must be accessible to all, in particular to the 70% of employees who should be able to benefit from it.
‘It must also be part of a logic of reindustrialisation, by being adapted to employment areas to promote mobility and access to employment. We defend a real social mix, without ghetto or stigmatisation. It is urgent to reverse the measures that are suffocating social housing and to open up real development prospects for it, to meet the needs of the population.
Risk of increased
household debt
‘By focusing on home ownership and expanding access to the Zero-Rate Loan (PTZ) nationwide, the government is exposing the most vulnerable households to a risk of increased debt. In a context of economic insecurity and rising interest rates, it is crucial to remember that housing-related expenses should not exceed 20% of household budgets. Without solid guarantees, these initiatives risk transforming home ownership into a real financial trap, particularly with high interest rates and insurance that increase the overall cost for families.
‘The CGT is calling for the implementation of strengthened mechanisms to secure these paths, by guaranteeing accessible borrowing and insurance conditions, in order to avoid any over-indebtedness. The State must ensure that home ownership remains a real opportunity for low-income households, without the risk of financial destabilisation, while continuing its efforts to develop accessible social housing.
An inadequate response to environmental
expectations
‘The relaxation of the ZAN (zero artificialisation of soils) objective, proposed by the Prime Minister, constitutes a direct threat to our environment. The CGT recalls that the fight against artificialisation of soils is essential to protect our biodiversity and limit urban sprawl.
‘By seeking to relaunch construction without taking these issues into account, the government is choosing to sacrifice the ecological transition, while solutions exist to develop sustainable and environmentally friendly infrastructures.
‘For the CGT, the Finance Bill (PLF) must absolutely include an ambitious budget for the thermal renovation of housing.
‘It is urgent to renovate the 7 million homes in France that are still thermal sieves. This initiative is essential not only to combat energy insecurity but also to initiate a real sustainable ecological transition. By investing in thermal renovation, we also help promote energy sobriety and significantly reduce the energy bills of many low-income households, thus improving their purchasing power.’