To be positive about the past year while planning for the future… The Élysian wishes have always been a high-flying exercise, particularly in a world in eruption. A year ago, at the end of his first five-year term, Emmanuel Macron spoke at length about Covid-19 and predicted that 2022 would be “the year of all possibilities”. At the turn of a sentence on the upcoming presidential election, he poured out: “No one can uproot my heart” from France. In the meantime, the President of the Republic, re-elected, has actually taken root a little more. But the “possible” have turned into new crises with the war in Ukraine, inflation which undermines the purchasing power of the French, and the relative majority in the National Assembly.
Saturday December 31, back from a few days at Fort Brégançon (Var), the Head of State will dive into 2023, a year filled with uncertainties and complicated projects. It remains to find the right words to reassure his compatriots in the face of this maelstrom of crises, which one wonders if they are temporary or the first signs of the world after, that of “the end of abundance”.
“You have to find a story to put it all into perspective.deciphers Emmanuel Rivière, international director for political studies at the Kantar Public Institute. With the Covid, for example, the French could hope for an end. With inflation, which had started before the war in Ukraine, everything is even more blurred. Why do we suffer it? Because of the post-Covid recovery? Conflict in Europe? Climate transition? Will it have an end or is it the sign of the beginning of something else? This uncertainty is very anxiety-provoking. »
January promises to be explosive
From the end of the truce, the month of January promises to be explosive. Firstly because the rise in prices will continue and will appear even more painful, with the 15% increase in those of electricity and gas. “We will keep a high level of inflation in the coming months, I have never hidden itdeclared the Minister of the Economy, Bruno Le Maire, Thursday, December 22 on Sud Radio. This assumes that our measures are more targeted and less massive. » Thursday, Matignon sent a press release to remind that an energy check would be paid to the twelve million least favored French people on December 31, and to specify the outline of the fuel allowance.
With this targeting, the executive hopes to reduce the scope of massive aid. A way to gradually get out of energy “whatever the cost”. Bercy and several ministries are betting on a decline in inflation from mid-2023 with their eyes fixed on food prices. And hoping that power cuts, always possible despite the mild winter, do not irritate the French a little more.
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