A recognized annoying habit and a return to the administration. Guest of France 3, this Sunday, Bruno Le Maire was asked about the significant use of ministries to consulting firms like McKinsey. And on the two investigations opened by justice on the intervention of the said cabinets in the electoral campaigns of Emmanuel Macron in 2017 and 2022.
The Minister acknowledged “abuse” or “drift” concerning the habit of calling on consulting firms, but did not venture into the investigations. “I do not comment on ongoing legal proceedings. »
“Relying on the administration”
“I readily admit it, we have gone too far, for years, it’s this government, previous governments, previous majorities… We had probably gotten too used to saying ‘the administration is not able to do this work, we will outsource and ask consulting firms”, conceded Bruno Le Maire.
“I think that there has indeed been a drift, that this drift has been corrected”, in particular by a circular from Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne asking the government to reduce the use of consulting firms by 15%. According to him, Bercy reduced the use of these companies by 34% between the 1st half of 2021 and the 1st half of 2022.
“I think it’s the same trend elsewhere,” he said again, about other ministries. “There have certainly been abuses. We must first rely on its administration, especially when we have an administration of the exceptional quality of the Ministry of Economy and Finance, reduce the use of consulting firms”.