JULIEN DE ROSA via Getty Images Éric Coquerel, here arriving at the National Assembly, June 21, 2022. JULIEN DE ROSA via Getty Images Éric Coquerel, here arriving at the National Assembly, June 21, 2022. POLITICS – Going strong with 49.3 for the 2023 budget, Gabriel Attal “can’t bring himself to do it”. This Sunday, September 4, in an interview with Le Parisien, the Minister Delegate for Public Accounts reached out to the opposition and proposed the launch of the “Dialogues de Bercy” to discuss the content of the text “in anticipation of the parliamentary debate”. The method – inviting the members of the Finance Committee of the Assembly and the Senate to the ministry before the traditional discussion in Parliament – is intended to be unprecedented. It is the sign of a discussion that promises to be tight for a government without an absolute majority. The Republicans, essential to the government to have a comfortable majority, are divided: in the JDD this Sunday, the candidate for the presidency of the party and influential deputy for the Alpes-Maritimes Éric Ciotti made it known that he would not vote for the text, while like Annie Genevard, interim LR president. At the National Rally, the interim president immediately closed the door to Gabriel Attal’s proposal: “No, we will not go”, reacted Jordan Bardella on BFMTV. On the other side, the left refuses to be in systematic opposition and asks to see the content. Not closed to discussions with Gabriel Attal, the deputy (France insubordinate) Éric Coquerel remains no less “suspicious”. “Reading Mr. Attal, I have a little trouble seeing how we could evolve towards each other,” explains in an interview with HuffPost the chairman of the Finance Committee of the National Assembly. Gabriel Attal proposed “Bercy dialogues” open to all parliamentarians from the Finance Committees. How do you receive this proposal? As Chairman of the Finance Committee, I want to ensure that these “dialogues” do not serve to disembodie parliamentary work. We must not encroach on the main role of the Commission and the Assembly. This is where the debate and work on amendments must first take place. And as a member of the opposition, I am a little suspicious of this type of meeting, where everyone is invited in order, in the end, to make people believe that everyone agrees with the government. This was already the characteristic of the first five-year term and I also warned Gabriel Attal on this point since he warned me yesterday of this proposal. You seem quite skeptical. Will you still go to Bercy? I am in favor of discussing it within the NUPES, because it should not be used only for government communication. On paper, I have nothing against going to Bercy. But this cannot replace or anticipate the debates in the Assembly. And for the moment, I especially have the impression, reading Gabriel Attal, that he is in a search for an early majority with the Republicans. You think that the NUPES is invited only for the form? When I see the topics covered, such as pensions, social fraud, what they call “waste hunting” to lower public spending, these are not the topics of the NUPES. Rather those of the Republicans, with their austerity policy. “I have nothing against going to Bercy. But this cannot replace or anticipate the debates in the Assembly. What do you see as the red lines of this 2023 draft budget? It’s hard to talk about red lines when those set by the government are totally contradictory with what we are proposing! The executive refuses any increase in revenue through taxation, that is to say any questioning of gifts to the richest or capital made for five years. We believe, on the contrary, that it is necessary to mobilize the income of those who have too much to meet the needs of the country. Reading the interview with Mr. Attal in Le Parisien, I have a little trouble seeing how we could evolve towards each other. Whatever the cost is not behind us but ahead, it is ecological: mobilizing public power to repair the damage of climate change and initiate an ecological bifurcation to avoid the worst. This is why, above all, we need a sharing of wealth to draw on the historical benefits of capital to respond to social and ecological emergencies. This will, I think, be the meaning of the counter-budget that NUPES will present. You talk about superprofits… Do you still believe in a gesture from the government in this direction? I absolutely do not believe that this will be the case during the Bercy dialogues. To open a debate, we must not start by saying that the two red lines are the reduction of the debt and the refusal to increase the taxes of the richest. Now, this is somewhat what is said by Gabriel Attal. For the time being, they present the taxation of superprofits as an ultimate solution. Would he be able to go that far? If so, of course we’ll take it. But this is not what will change the nature of this budget which remains marked by the politics of supply and neo-liberalism. See also on The HuffPost: Tax superprofits? We went to Medef and it’s not won You cannot view this content because you have refused the cookies associated with content from third parties. If you want to view this content, you can change your choices.