Gasoline prices: Bruno Retailleau proposes removing EECs to lower prices by 15 to 17 cents

LR presidential candidate Bruno Retailleau defended on Tuesday the elimination of energy saving certificates (EEC) to allow a reduction of 15 to 17 cents per liter of gasoline, but without touching VAT so as not to further deteriorate state finances.

“I am the candidate who wants to increase the purchasing power of the French without an additional euro of debt,” said during a press conference the president of the Republicans who is seeking to take off this fall in the polls where he is stagnating between 6 and 10%.

The Vendée senator is proposing to eliminate the CEE to reduce the price of a liter at the pump “by 15 to 17 cents”, or “a saving of 8.5 euros per full tank of petrol”, he said. In the spring, Bruno Retailleau had already launched the idea of ​​eliminating the CEE but on the price of electricity to “save the equivalent of two monthly bills” and he is now extending this measure to gasoline, which the liberal David Lisnard also supports. Based on the polluter pays principle, the “energy savings certificates” (EEC) system, created in 2005, obliges energy suppliers to finance actions to reduce energy consumption, improve energy efficiency and now encourage the development of electric mobility.

“Beware of barkers!”

Bruno Retailleau, who continues to warn of France's “bankruptcy situation” with “nearly 3,500 billion in debt,” refuses to “sell wind” to voters by promising measures that would further worsen the state's finances. “Beware of the barkers!”, he said, dismissing out of hand the reduction in VAT on gasoline proposed by RN candidate Marine Le Pen, who reiterated on Tuesday her proposal to reduce this tax from 20 to 5.5% for energy. He estimated that this measure would cost “15 billion without a euro of financing”. “We don’t have the means to do it.”