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Europe 1
The lifestyle of our elected officials
Indemnities, expense reports, benefits in kind ... Despite the commitments to transparency and rigor in times of crisis, our survey shows that the gray areas and small arrangements remain
Nicolas Sarkozy continues to burn. According to the calculations of the deputy PS René Dosière, who has made a specialty of tracking down the Châteaux's accounts, his expenses - 113 million euros - increased by 18,5% last year: "Operating expenses - receptions, supplies, telephone, internet ... - doubled and travel increased by 26%. We are told that we are putting suppliers in competition, but the July 14 reception cost 475 euros last year, compared to 000 a year earlier. ” More troubling: the accounting reveals a hole. "The presidency has spent 413 million euros more than the budget allocated to it," explains René Dosière. To justify this difference, the Elysée claims that this is an amount owed by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Funny accounting! In any case, the will to save displayed by Sarkozy is not reflected in the figures. With one exception: social assistance. This envelope which is used to give boost to the French in trouble has been reduced by 000%.
In times of crisis, the lifestyle of elected officials is obviously an extremely sensitive subject. In the United Kingdom, the scandal of the phony bills of parliamentarians provokes a regime crisis (see opposite). The oldest democracy in the world is touched to the heart. What about in France, where the Republic was sunk in the palaces and the splendours of the Ancien Régime? Certainly, real progress has been made. In 2002, Lionel Jospin put an end to the reign of secret funds, this black money which was used to remunerate the ministers and their cabinets (see p. 16). Three years later, the scandal caused by the temporary housing of the short-lived minister Hervé Gaymard (2005) precipitated the adoption of regulations ... and prompted a good part of the government to give up this advantage (see p . 16). Better: after the excesses of his predecessor Christian Poncelet, Gérard Larcher, the president of the Senate, has imposed himself a discipline: to halve the surface of his accommodation. As for Nicolas Sarkozy, it must be recognized that he broke with the hypocrisy of these predecessors by lifting a corner of the veil on the rich hours of the Elysée.
But, precisely in times of crisis, did the morale of the French need to know "that"?