French government transmits 2027 budget 'offprint' to Parliament, sets spending caps for each ministry

Sébastien Lecornu, at the National Assembly, Paris, July 7, 2026. JULIEN MUGUET FOR "LE MONDE"

The broad outlines of the 2027 finance bill are beginning to take shape. A few minutes before the deadline set by law, the government transmitted to Parliament on Wednesday, July 15, the traditional "offprint"—a preparatory document summarizing the spending caps and expenditures retained for each ministry for the next budget. The Lecornu government intends to once again place this exercise under the sign of budgetary control.

In this document, the executive displays its desire to "continue efforts toward the recovery" of public finances. A necessity, according to the government, given the budgetary context—even as the goal of reducing the public deficit to 5% of GDP in 2026 already appears "difficult to achieve," it conceded on July 7.

According to its initial arbitrations:

• State and operator spending would reach 708.4 billion euros in 2027, compared to 683.3 billion euros in 2026.
• These "will grow significantly slower than inflation," the government argues.
• Spending is "constrained" by:
• An increase in debt service costs: +12.3 billion euros
• The ramp-up of the military programming law: +6.4 billion euros
• For the rest of ministerial spending, the executive intends to limit the increase to a level "strictly below inflation."
• Target retained: +0.4%, or four times less than the expected inflation in 2027.

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