To get his message across to his EU partners, Bruno Le Maire decided to set out his budgetary vision on Sunday in an interview with no less than seven European newspapers, including

Les Echos

.

In it, the Minister of Economy and Finance above all considered “obsolete” the European rules governing the public debt of the Member States.

The Stability and Growth Pact "as a whole is not obsolete, but the public debt rule is", he argued as France took on January 1, for six months, the Presidency of the Council of the European Union.

Under this rule, the public debt of member states must not exceed 60% of their GDP and their deficit cannot exceed 3% of their GDP.

Several proposals to reform the Pact

“Before the crisis, there was a gap of almost 40 points of GDP between the most and least indebted members of the euro zone.

There is now a gap of more than 100% between them,” noted Bruno Le Maire.

To reform the Pact, “there are several proposals on the table, in particular that of having different timetables and objectives for each country”.

“Others put forward the concept (…) according to which it should be up to the Member States to define the steps and the necessary changes to their economic policies, which would allow them to return to sound finances”, an “interesting” track according to The Minister.

Ultimately, it will be necessary to “find the right balance between the investments needed to meet the challenges of the 21st century and the need to return to sound public finances.

»

The person in charge of the Recovery within the French executive also said he hoped to get rid of “all the health restrictions” linked to the Covid-19 pandemic by the end of the year.

"Now that we are coming out of the crisis, we must of course end the 'whatever it takes' to adopt a tailor-made approach, supporting the last sectors which are still suffering from the consequences of the crisis".

Thus, the minister's wish is that by “the end of 2022, we will get rid of all health restrictions and end financial support for any sector” of the economy.

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