LEGISLATIVE – With the questure and the Perchoir, the presidency of the Finance Committee is one of the most coveted positions in the National Assembly. And it is unsurprisingly towards the latter, devolved to the opposition, that eyes and harangues are turning, this Monday, June 20, the day after the second round of the legislative elections.
The National Rally, the second party in the lower house with 89 deputies, was the first to shoot, notably via the newly elected Oise RN deputy and spokesperson Philippe Ballard. “We are the first party in France” and “the first opposition party, so the Finance Committee is up to us,” he said on franceinfo. Questioned in the morning on BFMTV, Marine Le Pen also engaged, also claiming in passing a vice-presidency of the AN for the RN.
The fervor of the ambitions of the RN is up to the prerogatives conferred by the commission. One of the most powerful in the AN, it has direct control over the budget and the management of state finances. It can lift a company’s tax secrecy, interview the Minister of the Economy, give its opinion on the choice of the Governor of the Banque de France, or even have access to certain information upstream.
“In turn, its president could give his political family useful visibility, in the perspective of a next electoral cycle”, underlines with our colleagues from the MondePhilippe Askenazy, economist at the Center Maurice-Halbwachs.
Opposition at loggerheads
What to understand therefore why the Nupes – and in particular the 72 deputies LFI – does not intend to blow the nose of the succession of Eric Woerth without saying anything. The elected Insoumise Clémentine Autain, re-elected in Seine-Saint-Denis, immediately responded to Marc Fesneau.
On franceinfo, this Monday, the Minister of Agriculture (former Minister of Relations with Parliament) argued that “constitutionally, it is the first opposition group” which must take the head of the Finance Committee. An analysis contested by NUPES. “It’s not the largest opposition group but the candidacy that receives the most votes, with the majority MPs not voting. The NUPES is therefore the best placed”, argued Clémentine Autain.
So who is telling the truth? No traces of precise rules concerning the Finance Committee in the Constitution, on the other hand, the regulations of the National Assembly stipulate that: “cannot be elected to the presidency of the Committee of Finance, General Economy and budgetary control than a deputy belonging to a group that has declared itself to be in opposition”. However, there is no mention of a group. It is by custom and tradition that the position has fallen to the most important opposition group.
A vagueness recognized in half words by government spokeswoman Olivia Grégoire, who stressed on France Inter that the post “must go constitutionally to an opposition group” but that “there is no certainty when we reads the Constitution”.
From unwritten rule to strategy
NUPES and RN will in any case have to rely on a rule: the commissions are composed in such a way as to represent the balance of power within the hemicycle, and on another tradition: during the vote of the presidency for Finances, the majority does not take part in the ballot. Will Macronie choose to respect this tradition?
The solution for the new alliance on the left will perhaps be to propose to this post one or an elected official not coming from France Insoumise in order to temporize the majority – the name of the socialist Valérie Rabault had been mentioned in particular. The second way out could simply be to form a single group in order to weigh against the RN. A political revolution with serious consequences, which is currently more wishful thinking than a realistic vision of the solubility between PS, PC, EELV, and LFI.