Nicolas Sarkozy faced with the dilemma of rigour

Continue reforms and submit France to a serious austerity cure, or wait and let filer deficits pending a return to growth? Nicolas Sarkozy did not lift the ambiguity to three days of the first round of municipal elections.

Officially, the president stays the course. "I do not believe in discipline plans," he warns in an interview published Thursday by "Le Figaro". His motto: "It is the reform that will bring the economies and it is the economies and growth which will bring deficit reduction."

But "to find room for manoeuvre, it must be said in French: Beware! We can not afford everything, we can not afford everything," he warned Thursday while traveling at Vesoul.

There is therefore no question of a break out after the municipal elections, as has already said Tuesday Francois Fillon, but "accelerate" the reforms undertaken in 10 months.

The program is dense coming months. In the wake of municipal Christine Lagarde present law to modernize the economy, which is to reform the distribution, setting up an independent authority on competition, reduce delays in payment to the small and medium enterprises, or liberalize distribution Booklet A. To halt the decline in purchasing power, a law on the generalization of the incentive was announced for June.

On the front of the labour market, a text on "prožne varnosti" resume before the summer in terms of the agreement negotiated by the social partners, particularly with a new opportunity to "amicable separation" between the employer and the employee, longer periods of testing or the creation of a new contract with a duration of 18 to 36 months, reserved for managers, in order to achieve a "specific purpose".

It is also in this context that the government should bury the 35 hours, by enabling companies to negotiate directly with their employees on the issue of working time.

Meanwhile, Labour Minister Xavier Bertrand has been tasked to prepare a text reforming pensions by the end of the first half. A key: a new extension of the period of contributions.

In Chapter health, Roselyne Bachelot must submit a bill by the summer, on the permanence of the treatment or the distribution of health professionals. The question that angry, ie the financing of the "Safely," was referred to the budget in the autumn of 2008.

On 6 February, Nicolas Sarkozy, however, had hinted that he intended to raise the question of the breakdown between national solidarity and individual responsibility, "given our financial constraints."

The "financial constraints", in this case, but a deficit of Social Security that the government hopes at best to contain 8.8 billion euros at the end of 2008. A bill that would add a new skid of public accounts, reflecting a growth lower than expected: it could be closer to 1.5% in 2008, rather than the 2% expected by the government.

How is France going to pay the bill, while its European partners s'agacent its already lax fiscal? Michel Sapin (PS) is convinced that the government will resort to a "de rigueur" in the form of higher taxes (VAT, CSG), and a reduction in spending in order to find the "20 billion Euro "who fail to finish the budget.

Francois Fillon him almost vindicated Tuesday by referring to "adjustments in spending" on the basis of growth. But he ruled out raising taxes. Remains to be seen whether this will be enough to contain the slide of expenditure ... And if Nicolas Sarkozy would assume the unpopularity of austerity.

The head of state might be tempted to slow reforms and open the floodgates discreetly budget to offset the social impact of the economic downturn and rising prices. Pending a hypothetical return to growth in 2009.

His predecessor Jacques Chirac, convinced that France was reformed in times of growth, and had spent two terms waiting for an upturn.

Already, Nicolas Sarkozy has made concessions by not removing a post on three officials in 2008-instead of a two '-promised, with a lead of 200 euros to retirees, or compensating generously reform special schemes for retirement.

The former Prime Minister Edouard Balladur warned on February 23 in "The World": "we must emphasize reform, without concern of opinion polls," since "2008 will be a decisive year for the success (of) quinquennium