We have known it since Sophocles: “Bad news is fatal to the one who brings it” (Antigone). Bruno Bonnell knows his classics. In an interview with Point, on April 3, the general secretary for investment, placed under the authority of Matignon, took charge of executing the messenger himself. “The objective of increasing the share of industry in GDP to 15% in 2030 is perfectly achievable,” staunchly maintains the former Lyon boss, who has become Emmanuel’s personal chief of staff for two years. Macron in the “mother of battles”: the reindustrialization of France.
Unfortunately, therefore, for Olivier Lluansi, the expert commissioned by Bercy who must submit a report at the end of April on the French industrial recovery. According to his calculations, the most “realistic” horizon would be to aim for a manufacturing industry of around 12% to 13% of GDP, compared to 10% today, by… 2035. “Experts, I I have 70 at the general secretariat for investment, scathes Bruno Bonnell, there are also hundreds among our operators, without forgetting those of France Stratégie. If Bruno Le Maire entrusted a mission to Olivier Lluansi, that does not induct him not as a sole specialist in French industry […] Experts like Mr. Lluansi reason with Excel. I suggest they add rows and columns to their spreadsheets!”
Horn concert at the top of the State
The charge, severe, is all the more confusing as it targets one of the best experts on the subject. Former student of Polytechnique, chief engineer of Mines, director of Saint-Gobain in Central Europe, advisor to François Hollande at the Elysée then interministerial delegate for industry under Macron’s first five-year term, the person concerned does not really pass for Charlot at the factory.
His fault? Invite the executive to be more pragmatic in assessing the immense challenges facing French industry: competitiveness, productivity, attractiveness. And advocate for a densification of the already existing fabric, by further supporting SMEs, on the model of Middle stand German. A speech unfortunately inaudible in the concert of horns orchestrated at the top of the State with each announcement of a “giga factory” or “mega foreign investment”.
At the heart of an Express report widely commented on in the political-industrial world last week, Olivier Lluansi delivered the following observation: “These gigafactories are important symbols and are the pride of the territories which host them. But geopolitical change at work is it so major that it justifies subsidies at 40% of the investment? The question arises, knowing that these sites will not bring about reindustrialization alone.” According to him, such factories will represent at best 20,000 direct jobs, when 500,000 would be needed in the coming decade to make the industry take off again.
For a few sentences of this ilk, which were not fortunate enough to please those in high places, he is forced to wall himself in silence until the finalization of a report of which everything now suggests that he will end up in the basket. “After magic money, we are served with magical thinking,” laments an industrialist, dismayed by the sequence. “The mother of battles” is far from won. But it has already claimed one victim: the serenity of the debate.
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