“The way Parliament discusses the budget leads to the development of ineffective strategies” | EUROtoday

HASfter his election, each parliamentarian shortly learns, and all the time with a sure ache, what article 40 of the Constitution is.

Incorporated in 1958 into the constitutional textual content to stop monetary slippage by a Parliament which could possibly be tempted to be excessively spendy, article 40 prohibits parliamentarians from discussing proposals or amendments which might result in a discount in income or ” the creation or aggravation of a public charge”. To put it simply, parliamentarians cannot propose that the state spend more in one place, unless they cut an equivalent expenditure in another place – unless the government authorizes it.

We are therefore purely and simply prohibited from voting, and even debating, investment budgets in sectors of the future, energy transition, education, research, health, if the government is not prepared to allow these investments. At least that is the way in which this provision is applied; the way in which, today, we consider what is a “public charge”what costs and what brings in the State.

Purely accounting and annual assessment

And this, even when these investments are profitable, or even very profitable in the medium or long term. An amendment aimed, for example, at better financing cancer screening campaigns will be declared inadmissible, even though we know full well that early detection saves lives but also reduces expenses by avoiding heavier treatments.

It is this approach, in my opinion, that we urgently need to review. Because beyond the question of the necessity or political legitimacy of the rationalization of Parliament in budgetary matters, the entire conceptual framework underlying our procedure is flawed.

To declare the various amendments admissible or inadmissible, the administrators of the finance committee of the Assembly or the Senate only look at one thing: will we take more or less money out of the pockets of the State in 2026? This purely accounting and annual assessment, without any consideration of the dynamic effects of certain public expenditures – or certain absences of public expenditures – in the medium or long term, is not validated by any scientific data.

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