The looming 2024 budget is not to Medef’s taste. Its members are even “quite worried” about “several signals” which, according to the president of the organization Patrick Martin, contradict the government’s commitments to pursue a policy favorable to businesses.
“I am of course thinking of the taxation of transport infrastructure managers,” declared Monday in an interview with Echoes Patrick Martin, in reference to the tax announced last week by the government and which targets in particular air and motorways. Both sectors have also increased criticism against this project.
Government choices that “cause tensions”
Patrick Martin also mentioned “the announcement of the increase in the mobility payment of Ile-de-France companies to finance public transport, which will cost them 400 million more per year, and this with the support of the government”. Also noting “the resources announced for the public hospital and not for the private hospital”, the boss of bosses stressed that “these government decisions are causing tension in our ranks”.
Concerning the government’s temptation to recover at least one billion euros from the surplus funds of Agirc-Arrco, a private supplementary pension scheme, in order to finance the expected revaluation of small pensions, Patrick Martin was also very critical. “There is no question of Agirc-Arrco, which was very well managed in very difficult periods, becoming an adjustment variable for the schemes managed by the State,” he denounced. According to him, on this issue, as well as on that of Unédic which the government wants to drain by two billion euros in 2023 then in 2024, “this is the test of truth with the State as to the future of joint management to which Medef is viscerally attached”.
Last Thursday, unions and employers denounced in a joint declaration an “unacceptable drain” of revenue from Unédic (which manages unemployment insurance) by the government.