What do HATVP checks include? | EUROtoday

From a number of hours to forty-eight hours flat, to keep away from casting errors. Over the weekend, as quickly as they’re validated by Emmanuel Macron, the names of the thirty-eight ministers anticipated to be a part of the long run Barnier authorities should be transmitted, in full confidentiality, to the groups of the High Authority for Transparency in Public Life (HATVP).

The mission assertion is proscribed: to confirm, earlier than the normal official proclamation on the steps of the Elysée, that no potential minister is in bother with the tax authorities or has a transparent battle of curiosity together with his future portfolio, and even has a problematic point out on his felony report. In different phrases, it’s a query of limiting the danger of a future scandal that might be revealed by the press. On Friday, September 20, the HATVP however declared to the World what “neither confirmed nor denied that checks had begun”the method resting “on a particularly strict principle of confidentiality”.

Created in January 2014 after the Cahuzac affair, revealed by Mediapart – the previous socialist minister had hidden the existence of a international account – the HATVP's position is to observe, intimately, the belongings and doable conflicts of curiosity of members of the federal government, elected officers and senior civil servants, after their appointment. Although the regulation doesn’t require it, the opportunity of contacting the HATVP earlier than the appointment of a authorities rapidly grew to become widespread observe.

In reality, if this early probity evaluate, carried out in a restricted time by a really small crew, doesn’t represent management within the sense of the regulation – however “transmission of information”, in keeping with the HATVP time period – or perhaps a discharge for future ministers, it nonetheless permits the manager to equip itself with a tightly-knit security web. Emmanuel Macron had thus not did not open the HATVP umbrella earlier than validating the Philippe (2017), Castex (2020), Borne (2022) and Attal (2024) governments, as François Hollande had achieved earlier than him, from the 2016 reshuffle.

Identify dangers of conflicts of curiosity

In concrete phrases, the names chosen by the Prime Minister, Michel Barnier, which should be transmitted by the Head of State to the ethics watchdog, in keeping with the process, are meant to be scanned earlier than any public announcement. The info obtainable on them by the HATVP (declarations of belongings and pursuits if they’re former elected officers or senior public officers, preparations made to entrust the administration of their monetary investments to a 3rd celebration, and many others.), the tax administration (tax conditions) or different competent administrations (doable ongoing circumstances) will likely be carefully analysed, as will every other info revealed by the press. The thought is to not perform an exhaustive test – unimaginable within the time obtainable – however, on the one hand, to detect what may stop sure appointments and, however, to establish dangers of conflicts of curiosity.

In this respect, the work in progress on the HATVP is not going to differ from earlier instances, besides that the record proposed by Michel Barnier tends to make the groups' activity simpler. Many future ministers have certainly held elective mandates, and due to this fact have already submitted to the HATVP, as required by regulation, declarations of belongings (actual property, financial institution accounts, monetary belongings, and many others.) and pursuits (paid actions, previous or current, and many others.).

In actuality, if the train may tackle an unprecedented character this 12 months, it’s as a result of the president of the HATVP, Didier Migaud, may himself seem on the record of ministers chosen by Michel Barnier, in keeping with Agence France-Presse. Which would lead the High Authority to have to hold out checks on its present president.

If the schedule is revered, the discussions which were or are about to be initiated, significantly with the tax authorities, by e mail and by phone, ought to proceed over the weekend, and till the final hours earlier than the announcement on the Elysée, scheduled “before Sunday [22 septembre] »according to Matignon. A summary of the work integrating the salient elements of this first analysis work will be submitted to the Elysée and Matignon, so that the political decision can be adjusted by confirming its choices or by rectifying the situation, to delete the name of a prospective minister or modify his portfolio. In fact, custom dictates that in the event of identified or anticipated difficulties, the High Authority informs the President of the Republic.

A control that is not infallible

However, once this stage has been completed, it is only once the members of the government have been officially appointed and installed, and their declarations of assets and interests have been received by the HATVP – that is, at the latest, two months after their appointment – ​​that the real work of in-depth control by the administrative authority can begin, always in coordination with the tax authorities.

History has shown that the HATVP's checks, which have no real investigative powers and must base themselves on what is revealed, are not infallible. In recent years, the administrative authority has imposed numerous deportation decrees on ministers to prevent their private interests from influencing their public decisions, and has uncovered significant shortcomings in the context of its in-depth checks for which it has taken legal action – such as, for example, the real estate assets deemed undervalued of the former Minister Delegate for Local Authorities Caroline Cayeux, who was forced to resign in 2022. But other cases have escaped its control due to a lack of publicly available information. This was notably the case of the former High Commissioner for Pensions Jean-Paul Delevoye, whose The Parisian revealed in 2019, just three months after entering government, that he had failed to declare certain income. Or the conflict of interest attributed in 2022 by the site Disclose to Agnès Pannier-Runacher because of her family's links with the oil company Perenco, which forced the then Prime Minister, Elisabeth Borne, to impose a retraction on the subject.

In any case, the work carried out by the HATVP marks a considerable step forward compared to the recent past. Indeed, while the controls were previously unofficial and partial, the 2013 laws on transparency in public life have allowed them to be carried out under the leadership of a body independent of political power and for probity to no longer be an ignored value.

This year, and as it had already done once for the Attal government, in order to improve the effectiveness of its action and accelerate its controls, the High Authority plans to encourage members of the government, once appointed, to pay particular attention to the prevention of conflicts of interest, by filing their declaration of interests within eight days of their appointment.