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CRIME

French ex-minister convicted in fake jobs scam

A French court on Thursday found former justice minister Michel Mercier guilty of embezzlement in a fake jobs scheme he ran for the benefit of family members.

Published: 26 January 2023 17:05 CET
French ex-minister convicted in fake jobs scam
French former Justice Minister Michel Mercier speaking to journalists on March 29, 2012 in Paris (Photo by KENZO TRIBOUILLARD / AFP)

Mercier, 75, who served under former president Nicolas Sarkozy between 2010 and 2012, claimed tens of thousands of euros for his wife and daughter for parliamentary jobs  they never carried out.

The court handed him a suspended prison sentence of three years.

Mercier gave “personal gain precedence over the public good”, the court said in its verdict, calling Mercier’s actions “serious”.

As senator, Mercier claimed 50,000 euros ($54,000 at today’s rate) in salary for his wife Joelle between 2005 and 2009, and  €37,000 for his daughter Delphine between 2012 and 2014.

During that time, Delphine Mercier was living in London and did not set foot in the French Senate, but her father claimed she was acting as his “cultural advisor”.

Neither Mercier nor his daughter were able to provide any proof of actual work done.

Joelle Mercier, meanwhile, claimed during the trial that she had served as her husband’s representative at village fairs and funerals.

She was found guilty of conspiracy to embezzle public funds and of receiving stolen money and sentenced to a suspended prison term of 18 months and a €40,000 fine.

The court handed the daughter a 12-month suspended sentence and a fine of €10,000.

Prosecutors had asked for the ex-minister to serve one year behind bars, accusing him of “creating smoke screens” in his defence and seeking to mislead the court.

Mercier had based part of his defence on his rural roots, pitting his “common sense” against the “Parisians” of the national financial crimes unit PNF.

Several French politicians have been convicted for similar offences committed before France in 2017 banned National Assembly deputies and senators from employing family members.

The move came in reaction to a public outcry over a high-profile case involving former right-wing prime minister Francois Fillon, who was found guilty of providing a fake parliamentary assistant job to his wife that saw her paid hundreds of thousands of euros in public funds.

The “Penelopegate” scandal, revealed in a media report while he was the front-runner in the 2017 presidential race, torpedoed  his political career and cleared a path for then-relatively unknown Emmanuel Macron.

Last year, a court trimmed Fillon’s sentence to four years in prison with three suspended — down from five years with three suspended when he was first found guilty in 2020.

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ECONOMY

S&P downgrades French credit rating in blow to Macron

Ratings agency Standard & Poor's downgraded France's credit score on Friday citing a deterioration in the country's budgetary position, a blow to Emmanuel Macron's government days before EU parliamentary elections.

Published: 1 June 2024 15:44 CEST
S&P downgrades French credit rating in blow to Macron

In a statement, the American credit assessor justified its decision to drop France’s long-term sovereign debt rating from “AA” to “AA-” on concerns over lower-than-expected growth.

It warned that “political fragmentation” would make it difficult for the government to implement planned reforms to balance public finances and forecast the budget deficit would remain above the targeted three percent of GDP in 2027.

The S&P’s first downgrade of France since 2013 puts the EU’s second-largest economy on par with the Czech Republic and Estonia but above Spain and Italy.

The announcement will sting for Macron, who has staked a reputation as an economic reformer capable of restoring France’s accounts after low growth and high spending.

The risk of a ratings downgrade had been looming for several quarters, with the previous “AA” assessment given a “negative outlook”.

The surprise slippage in the public deficit for 2023 to 5.5 percent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) instead of the expected 4.9 percent did not play in the government’s favour.

France’s general government debt will increase to about 112 percent of GDP by 2027, up from around 109 percent in 2023, “contrary to our previous expectations”, the agency added.

Responding to the downgrade decision, Economy Minister Bruno Le Maire reaffirmed the government’s commitment to slashing the public deficit to below three percent by 2027.

“Our strategy remains the same: reindustrialise, achieve full employment and keep to our trajectory to get back under the three percent deficit in 2027,” he said in an interview with newspaper Le Parisien, insisting that nothing would change in the daily lives of the French.

Le Maire claimed the downgrade was primarily driven by the government’s abundant spending during the Covid pandemic to provide a lifeline to businesses and French households.

The main reason for the downgrade was because “we saved the French economy,” he said.

Government critics offered a different rationale.

“This is where the pitiful management of public finances by the Macron/Le Maire duo gets us!” Eric Ciotti, head of the right-wing Republicans party, wrote on social media platform X.

Far-right leader Marine Le Pen called the Macron administration’s handling of public finances “catastrophic” and denounced the government as being “as incompetent as they are arrogant”.

A credit downgrade risks putting off investors and making it more difficult to pay off debt.

Earlier this year, influential ratings agencies Moody’s and Fitch spared handing France a lower note.

S&P also maintained its “stable” outlook for France on Friday on “expectations that real economic growth will accelerate and support the government’s budgetary consolidation”, albeit not enough to bring down its high debt-to-GDP ratio.

“S&P’s downgrading of France’s debt simply reflects an imperative that we are already aware of: the need to continue restoring our public finances,” Public Accounts Minister Thomas Cazenave wrote in a statement sent to AFP.

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