Repetitive oversight, accusations of conflict of interest and prohibited combination of activities: the case of the High Commissioner for Pensions Jean-Paul Delevoye illustrates the difficulty for certain politicians to comply with the rules of transparency.
The revelations by Le Monde that it is not 3, but 13 additional mandates - including 11 volunteers - that Jean-Paul Delevoye forgot to declare to the High Authority for the Transparency of Public Life (HATVP) made swell, Sunday 15 December 2019, the controversy. Following this publication, the government's "Monsieur pensions" had to revise upward certain remuneration received.
"Delevoye has been used to signing up for boards of directors for years, earning 15-18,000 euros a month ... He may have thought it would pass", his cumulative earnings, tackles a parliamentary source LREM.
How could Jean-Paul Delevoye, who was late in completing his declaration of interest after entering government in September, be negligent? "I was extremely attentive to my declaration of assets", under control by the HATVP and not yet public, and "I admit that I did not pay the same attention to my declaration of interests", he admits.
The first statement verifies that there is no personal enrichment, and is at the origin of most legal cases. The second is to prevent a private interest from interfering with a public service. Both have been mandatory since the previous five-year term for the 15,000 elected officials and public officials.
Jean-Paul Delevoye promises to reimburse the sums collected
Despite the suspicions raised against Jean-Paul Delevoye and in a tense social context due to the pension reform, the government continues to support the High Commissioner. "Jean-Paul Delevoye's good faith is total" and he put himself in order once the shortcomings were reported, says Edouard Philippe.
Minister Julien Denormandie, for his part, considered that "the mandate in which there was remuneration" had been "declared". This mandate in question is the presidency of Parallaxe, an educational think tank, dependent on the IGS training group. However, the Constitution prohibits "any professional activity" to members of the government.
Faced with the controversy and the hashtag #DelevoyeGate on social networks, the high commissioner ended up leaving this function and undertook to reimburse the sums collected.
https://twitter.com/CProcaccia/status/1206027179156541442
But for some elected officials, as for the association against corruption Anticor, the justice should seize this affair. "If a parliamentarian allowed this, @hatvp [the High Authority for the transparency of public life] would forward his case to the courts," tweeted Senator LR Catherine Procaccia. Anticor reserves the possibility of such a referral.
Decision of the High Authority for the transparency of public life Wednesday
A meeting of the college of the High Authority for the transparency of public life (HATV) is held on Wednesday. "Rigorous and independent body" born after the Cahuzac scandal in 2013, the High Authority "will say the law", according to the President of the Assembly Richard Ferrand (LREM).
According to its case-law, it takes legal action in the event of a "substantial omission" of the interests of a declarant having indeed intended to conceal.
In other cases, the HATVP can carry out a simple "assessment", or ask the interested party to "deviate" from the files where he would be in conflict of interest.
With AFP
Newsletter Don't miss anything from international news
Don't miss anything from international newssubscribe
google-play-badge_FR