Minister Olivier Dussopt -
Alain ROBERT / SIPA
Curb spending in the face of Covid-19 ... The Minister of Public Accounts Olivier Dussopt estimated that the year 2021 should mark the end of the policy of "whatever the cost", that is to say the mobilization of all the necessary means in the face of the coronavirus crisis, in an interview with Les
Echos
published on Wednesday.
"If 2021 will mark the end of the crisis and the pandemic as everyone hopes, 2021 must also mark the end of" whatever the cost "," he said.
“Throughout 2020, we have spent massively to support businesses and the French in the crisis.
This was possible because we were coming out of a year 2019 which had been good from an economic point of view thanks to our action, and because we had cleaned up the accounts since 2017, ”he continued.
But, he added, "the level of spending that we know today is not sustainable over time".
"The highest budget deficit in our contemporary history"
To cope with the epidemic, the state has incurred 44.1 billion in additional spending, including 41.8 billion in emergency spending, according to figures from Bercy.
The Minister of the Economy Bruno Le Maire had indicated a little earlier on Wednesday that the crisis and the means deployed by the State resulted in "the highest budget deficit in our contemporary history", during a hearing by the National Assembly Finance Committee.
The state deficit - excluding the perimeter of local communities and social security - has widened by 85 billion euros, from nearly 93 billion last year to 178.2 billion euros.
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