The Senate widely approved (331 in favor, 0 against) this Wednesday in first reading a bill aimed at regulating the use by the State of consulting firms, seven months after the controversy unleashed by a highly critical Senate report on this “expansion phenomenon”.
The text essentially provides for strengthening transparency around private consulting services performed for the benefit of the State, and strengthening the ethical obligations of consultants who perform missions for public authorities.
The exchanges took place in a generally peaceful atmosphere, with the Minister for the Civil Service Stanislas Guerini placing himself from the beginning of the debates in the same “camp” as the senators, that is, “those who wish to strengthen the State”.
“State Strengthening”
Despite this desire for agreement, many amendments (including the thirteen submitted by the government) were rejected. The senators thus rejected two reforms that aimed to include large local authorities such as regions or departments within the scope of the law.
“We are not going to hastily decide what is going to happen to the communities even if we have not listened to them,” declared the centrist Françoise Gatel.
“It seems essential to us that the framework also applies to local authorities” of more than 100,000 inhabitants, Stanislas Guerini had estimated a little earlier. The Caisse des dépôts et consignations, on the other hand, has been included in the scope of the bill.
Source: BFM TV
