• Marine Le Pen spoke on Wednesday, during her debate against Emmanuel Macron, of the bank of democracy.

  • The concept was in the projects of Emmanuel Macron, under the supervision of his ephemeral Minister of Justice François Bayrou.

  • How would this bank of democracy constitute, and why does it get stuck?

“If I was forced to make a loan abroad – it is public knowledge – it is because no French bank wanted to grant me a loan, launched Marine Le Pen to Emmanuel Macron during the presidential debate on Wednesday.

You found it so outrageous that you passed a law on the bank of democracy that you never implemented.

»

This bank of democracy is one of the great sea serpents of the Macron five-year term, with pension reform and other projects postponed.

And since the concept may seem a bit vague,

20 Minutes

recaps the story for you.

What is this concept?

The idea of ​​a democracy bank is to create a public bank, inspired by the Public Investment Bank, intended to enable parties to fund themselves transparently without going through a private bank, and to enable all parties with the necessary guarantees to be able to campaign.

"The goal is to offer candidates in the face-to-face loans from a benevolent public company to organize their campaign, and which offers a lower interest rate than a private bank", contextualizes François Levêque, professor of economy at Mines-ParisTech.

What are the origins of this project?

Let's go back a five-year period.

During the 2017 electoral campaign, François Bayrou, president of the Democratic Movement (Modem), offered the candidate Emmanuel Macron his support under conditions.

One of them is the creation of this famous bank of democracy.

Once elected, Emmanuel Macron appoints François Bayrou Minister of Justice.

The neo-Keeper of the Seals places his idea of ​​a bank in his bill for confidence in political life.

He cites in particular the difficulties of his own party, the Modem, to find campaign funds during the previous presidential elections.

During the presentation of his bill, in June 2017, the minister declared: "It is unbearable that a private bank has the right of life or death over a political formation"

So everything is off to a good start for the bank of democracy.

But politics is like football: everything goes very fast.

François Bayrou returns to his minister's apron after only one month and four days, caught up in the case of the Modem parliamentary assistants in the European Parliament.

The law for confidence in political life was nevertheless adopted on September 15, 2017. In particular article 30, which authorizes the government to take, within nine months, by ordinance, the necessary measures so that "candidates , political parties and groups can, in the event of proven market failure, ensure, from November 2018, the financing of electoral campaigns by obtaining loans, advances or guarantees”.

Why did the project never come to fruition?

Two weeks after the beginning of the examination of the text, the Council of State is skeptical about the usefulness of such a bank of democracy, being afraid of a duplication with another creation of the Law for confidence: the mediator of credit to candidates and political parties, supposed to help parties finance themselves.

End of the story in July 2018, when the Minister of Justice at the time, Nicole Belloubet, buried the bank of democracy project.

Always with the justification of the credit ombudsman, supposed to be enough to help the parties.

The interest of such a bank is very limited, according to the Minister, because, she says, "access to credit, to focus on this subject, is less a matter of a lack of banking offer, than fill the bank of democracy, only questions of information or deadlines,

"We are then, and still today, in an economic period where the interest rate of private banks is low, which makes the interest of this bank of democracy even lower," adds François Levêque.

Can this law come back?

But as Marine Le Pen's reference on Wednesday evening shows, the idea is not buried for everyone.

The National Rally, which says it was forced to borrow from a Russian bank in 2014 because no European or French institution wanted to lend it money, reignited the debate.

François Bayrou, now High Commissioner for Planning, often raises the subject.

In 2020, the appropriations rapporteur for the "financing of political life" mission, Senator Les Républicains Jacques Genest, estimated that "the financing of political life comes up against certain market imperfections" and that "we must not close the file of the bank of democracy”.

But this 2022 presidential election could on the contrary convince people not to carry out the project, according to François Levêque: “Seeing parties like EELV or LR having to reimburse their campaign expenses shows that borrowing should not be facilitated too much, and that it is good and healthy to limit election expenses by making it difficult to borrow money.

The country suffers from a great distrust of parties and politicians, I am not sure that receiving public aid to launch campaigns improves things”

Elections

Presidential 2022: François Bayrou will sponsor Marine Le Pen in the name of democracy

Policy

Wishes: For Bayrou, France "can get by" with a "new democracy"

  • Economy

  • Bank

  • Emmanuel Macron

  • Francois Bayrou

  • Presidential election 2022

  • Marine Le Pen

  • Debate