VAT hike, freeze on social benefits or removal of the 10% pensioner exemption… The 'Sages' of Rue Cambon propose shock measures to save up to €38 billion from 2027

Straighten the bar. The Court of Auditors set out, in a report made public this Monday, to chart a path to achieve this, in a degraded budgetary context. If senior officials highlight the efforts made to reduce the public deficit to 5.1% in 2025 (compared to 5.8% in 2024), they also note that public finances have returned to their bad habit this year: a drift towards a deficit of at least 5.4% for 2026, far from the 5% hoped for by the government.

They therefore formulate drastic recommendations, which "do not correspond for the most part to structural reforms involving design and implementation spread over time" - but are measures with immediate effect, to be taken from the next budgetary text. The Court is counting on a reduction, primarily, in public spending, but also warns that a third of the effort is based on "reductions in tax or social spending" - or new levies. 32 to 38 billion euros in savings In total, the proposed measures should enable savings of 32 to 38 billion euros from 2027.

Some of these measures are already found in the Finance Bill (PLF) and the Social Security Financing Bill (PLFSS) - to the tune of 11 to 14 billion. This bitter potion of savings and levies starts firstly through social policies. The Court of Auditors is asking for a “blank year” on social benefits, excluding social minima which will be able to keep up with inflation.

Expected savings? 4.8 billion euros in 2027. Alternatively, it proposes to remove the 10% reduction on retirement pensions in the calculation of income tax (7.3 billion euros).

Other avenues listed: reducing the cost of work stoppages (1.9 billion euros), "controlling the cost of health products" (1.9 billion euros), increasing co-payments in the reimbursement of health costs (1.2 billion euros) or even the "refocusing of employment and vocational training policies" (1.8 billion euros) - this, while the Ministry of Labor has already been a major provider savings in the last two budgets, with reduced credits for local missions or integration projects for the most precarious. Purchasing power attacked, municipalities drained In the midst of massive social protest, the Court of Auditors does not hesitate to formulate proposals which would attack sections of the population already affected by inflation in food, housing or energy. It recommends freezing the advancement and promotions of civil servants (3.9 billion euros) while the salary index point has already been frozen since 2023, preventing any increase in income.

Machine-translated from French