Four years after the McKinsey affair, the state has divided its spending on consulting firms by four

Four years after the McKinsey affair, the State has divided its expenditure linked to external consulting firms by more than four, reduced to 60 million euros in 2025 compared to 272 in 2021, according to a budget document published Thursday. The strategy for controlling these expenses, which do not include IT consulting, “has borne fruit,” Pierre Bouillon, head of the interministerial directorate for public transformation (DITP), welcomed Thursday during a press briefing.

These 60 million euros cover eight types of services, from legal advice to technical studies. Strategy and organization consulting now represents only a quarter, compared to more than half in 2021. Half now goes to technical studies and business consulting. This decline was not continuous: expenditure rose by 31% in 2024, to 96 million euros, a “slight jump” linked according to Pierre Bouillon to coincidences in the calendars for administration projects.

The government had undertaken to regulate the use of private firms by a circular in January 2022. Two months later, in the middle of the presidential campaign, a senatorial commission of inquiry revealed that ministerial consulting expenses had more than doubled under Emmanuel Macron's first five-year term. She pointed out in particular the case of the American firm McKinsey, in great demand during the Covid-19 crisis, which had not paid corporate tax in France for at least ten years.

The national financial prosecutor's office has since investigated the firm for "aggravated money laundering and tax fraud" and announced in September the seizure of 65 million euros. The State will also divide by eight, from 200 to 25 million euros, the ceiling of its interministerial advisory framework agreement for 2027-2031, which must be published in the coming days. This market, dedicated to strategy, organization and transformation consulting, is only one of the channels through which the State purchases consulting: it was only used for around 5.6 million euros in orders in 2025, including public establishments.

To reduce the bill, the State is banking in particular on the “reinternalization of consulting skills” via an internal consulting agency created two years ago, assured Pierre Bouillon. With its sixty employees, it would avoid, according to the DITP, 11 million euros in consulting services per year.