Eagerly awaited at the Conference on the financing of public transport in the Ile-de-France region, which was held on January 23 at the Ile-de-France Regional Council at the invitation of its president Valérie Pécresse, the Minister Delegate for Transport, Clément Beaune, had announced the launch of an “expert mission” on public transport in the region. A report of which Le Figaro was able to consult elements, five months after it was presented.
As a reminder, this “expertise mission” carried, according to the words of the minister at the time, the double objective of allowing on the one hand to “update the figures” of attendance as well as the operating costs of public transport Ile-de-France residents and on the other, “list a certain number of new avenues”, in particular fiscal ones, which could be launched in the coming months to help finance the public transport of tomorrow. Tracks which will be able to “take up some of the proposals” of Valérie Pécresse, who is none other than the president of Ile-de-France Mobilités (IDFM), he had assured.
This report must now “feed the work and the discussion” between the State and the region “to ensure the long-term financing of public transport in the Ile-de-France region”, before the next finance law is discussed in parliament. The mission – entrusted to the General Inspectorate of Finance (IGF) and the General Council for the Environment and Sustainable Development (CGEDD) – thus made it possible “to establish a globally shared diagnosis of the need for financing of IDFM”, estimated “at 500 million euros from 2024” with “a peak of 1.5 billion euros in 2031”. An amount revised downwards compared to IDFM’s expectations, in particular thanks to “commercial receipts” and “future performance of the mobility payment”, paid by Ile-de-France companies.
In addition, the report underlines that “by activating the levers at its hand to increase its existing revenues and limit investments, IDFM could reduce the financial impasse”. Among them, the increase in tariffs, which it would thus be “necessary to index to inflation”, with the possibility “of changing certain tariffs more quickly than others” while guaranteeing a “policy of social tariffs for certain audiences.
It also reviews a whole series of “new resources” that could be mobilized in addition to the levers that are in the hands of IDFM. We note in particular the idea of ”an additional tax to the tourist tax, which could represent 200 million euros from 2024″, “a tax on vehicles over 1.4 tonnes” or even “a tax on air travelers”.
In addition, State aid could also go indirectly through a reduction in the remuneration owed by IDFM to the Société du Grand Paris, while the law now provides that the latter receives a fee from the Ile-de-France authority ” estimated until then at 0.8% of the total cost of the Grand Paris Express”. The mission indicates that it would then be “possible to halve this expenditure for IDFM, making it possible to reduce the cost for IDFM by 140 million euros in 2030”.
On the side of Ile-de-France Mobilités (IDFM), we did not wait for the official release of the report to respond to this list of proposals. In a press release issued on Monday, June 19, the organizing authority for public transport in the Ile-de-France region – headed by the president of the Île-de-France region Valérie Pécresse – expressed “its great concern” on reading this report, explaining in particular that the commitment made by Prime Minister Edouard Philippe in 2020 “on the need to grant permanent additional revenue to Île-de-France Mobilités” has “unfortunately remained unfulfilled”.
While the report mentions a financing need of 500 million euros from 2024, with a peak of 1.5 billion euros in 2031, IDFM for its part recalls its financing need forecasts, which are 800 million euros in 2024, and approximately 2.7 billion euros in 2031. This report “reduces the financing needs linked to the opening of the Grand Paris express lines from 2024 and which does not sufficiently explore the necessary sustainable and autonomous tax revenue tracks”, regrets IDFM.
In this press release, the Ile-de-France authority – which is moreover the sole decision-maker in the matter – also categorically refuses the scenarios “based on increases” deemed “preposterous in tariffs” proposed by the mission. An increase “which would be socially unbearable for the inhabitants and ecologically harmful to the region, because it would lead to a postponement in the use of the car”, according to her. In a context where the price of the Navigo pass increased by 12% on January 1, 2023, from 75.20 to 84.10 euros per month.
It also calls for the “abandonment of the Covid debt of 2 billion euros”, like what has been done in Germany, Spain or Great Britain. “The other countries have in fact massively compensated for the losses of Covid revenue from their transport operators”, continues the press release from IDFM, deploring that the State “heightens the debt trajectory” of Ile-de-France transport at the very time when it had been decided “the total renewal of the rolling stock of very dilapidated lines”.
Nevertheless, IDFM receives very positively “certain leads such as the reduction in the fee paid to the SGP or the increase in the hotel tourist tax”. Essential revenue according to the Ile-de-France authority “to cover all financing for the opening of new lines”. Because, according to her, there is no question of adopting an unbalanced 2024 budget without compromising – “if the necessary financing is not provided sustainably” – the opening “in 2024 of the extensions of Éole, line 11 and the line 14”.
“What we want is a global response until 2030 to be able to see it coming serenely, and to be able to open these lines serenely. If we are not able to finance its operation, I will not open the lines in 2024”, she had threatened at the end of May. “Or else it is the RATP and the SNCF which will take charge of the opening of these lines”.
