Management of the health crisis, reforms of personalized housing aid (APL), vocational training, organization of conferences: the Senate commission of inquiry into the use by the State of consulting firms denounced in its report published Thursday March 17 “sprawling phenomenon” of their presence in the public sphere.
The senatorial report ventures for the first time to deliver a figure, although imperfect: the senators counted 945 consulting missions. The worldwhich investigated in parallel, identified hundreds of others, arriving at a total of nearly 1,600 contracts since 2015, for an estimated amount of nearly 2 billion euros – figures probably lower than reality.
The Senate report also reveals that the American consulting firm McKinsey & Company has paid no corporate tax in France for ten years. Revelations that have made several candidates in the presidential election react, who accuse the head of state and his government of having resorted too frequently to these structures. “Emmanuel Macron must explain himself”immediately demanded on Twitter the LR candidate, Valérie Pécresse: “How could he not know that?” The outgoing president must be held to account., she wrote. And Xavier Bertrand, one of his advisers, to question: “How could the government entrust around fifty missions to a firm that has not paid corporate tax for ten years? Why didn’t he carry out these checks? Why do we have to wait for the Senate to take it up? »
“Total Drift”
On the sidelines of an event at the French Olympic Committee on Thursday, the environmental candidate, Yannick Jadot, denounced to the press “a total shift in the place of consulting firms, including American ones, which are at the heart of French public policies”and Emmanuel Macron’s links with “the lobbies”. “This government is definitely caught in the honeypot of American expert firms and tax evasion”, he added. The interim president of the National Rally, Jordan Bardella, estimated for his part that” Come in [les] questionable benefits [du cabinet]its close ties with Macronie and its tax optimization, this is yet another state scandal”. “Copying at the highest peak of the state, scandalous tax optimization: the McKinsey scandal is a wonderful illustration of the weakening and disarmament of the state by Emmanuel Macron”lamented for his part Eric Zemmour.
Guest of Franceinfo Friday morning, the communist deputy, Fabien Roussel, also denounced “a state scandal” and one “Fiscal scandal”. “I would like tax evasion to be at the heart of this presidential election, that we attack these multinationals which pay 4% to 5% tax, or even zero, like McKinsey, while our SMEs or us, simple citizens, we must pay ruby sur ongle”he continued, proposing “the withholding tax on the profits of multinationals”. In particular, he criticizes the government for having paid nearly four million euros to the McKinsey firm for a two-year mission on the reform of the APL. A mission that did not prevent the appearance of serial computer bugs when the reform was deployed, at the start of 2021.
Communist Senator Eliane Assassi, rapporteur for the Senate Committee, felt that it was “time for the State to take back control of its public policies”. She also said she hopes to present ” in autumn “ a cross-partisan bill on the subject of consulting firms.