Budgetary principle of unit

the budgetary principle of unit is one of the four large budgetary principles of the Public finances. The four budgetary principles are:

the budgetary Principle of yearly recurrence,
the budgetary principle of unit ,
the budgetary Principle of speciality,
the budgetary Principle of universality.

The budgetary principle of unit is a principle appeared under the Restauration. It implies the existence of only one budgetary document in which the whole of the budget would be detailed.

Leon Say was of interest of this rule in these terms “It is necessary to lock up the budget in a monument which one can easily appreciate the ordinance and seize the broad outlines at a glance”.

Significance of the budgetary principle of unit

Traditional design

The respect of this principle imposes the meeting of 3 elements:

the whole of the expenditure and the receipts must appear in a single document
They must be presented in a detailed way
They must be of comparable nature to be able to be added

This principle allows an increased control of the members of Parliament on the Public finances. It also makes it possible to ensure the clearness of the presentation of the budget. It makes it possible to check if the budget is really in balance, to avoid the existence of accounts out-budget and to highlight the total volume of the national expenditure.

Modern design

This principle is reaffirmed by article 2 of the ordinance of the 2 January 1959. It supposes that all the operations of expenditure and receipts are recalled in the budget of the State. One can however note that because of Décentralisation, the local government agencies profit from the legal Personality, the national expenditure for these communities thus do not appear directly in the budget of the state. It is also the case of the public corporations, the state enterprises and the organizations of Social security.

This principle thus implies also the existence of a single budgetary document presented to the vote of the members of Parliament. However, the Constitutional council, in a decision of December 24th, 1979, required that the first part of the finance law be adopted before passing to the second. It thus has, in fact, caused a break in the annual finance law. In addition, the corrected finance laws modify the text in the course of exercise and come to be added to the initial text.

Installations with the budgetary principle of unit

There exist two legal installations with the budgetary principle of unit:

Additional budgets

They appeared with the law of August 9th, 1836 and regulated in article 20 of the ordinance of January 2nd, 1959. There exist 6 additional budgets:

currencies and medals
the official journals
civil aviation
the order of the release
the order of the legion of honor
agricultural social security benefits

These services do not have the legal Personality. The character of budget annexes their was conferred to give them a financial independence. However, the existence of additional budgets undermines the integrity of the budgetary principle of unit. the organization of these budgets was called in question with LOLF (see low)

Separate accounts of the Treasury

They are accounts open in the writings of the Treasury to recall operations of receipts and expenditure carried out apart from the general budget, by services of the State which are equipped neither with the legal Personality, nor of financial autonomy. They are used to enter provisional budgetary operations intended to balance itself in balance, like the loans and the advances. They also make it possible to derogate from the rules of the public accounts for the operations related to commercial industrial and carried out by administrative public services.

The existence of these separate accounts of the Treasury calls into question the budgetary principle of unit because there are some enormously. One counted 400 in 1947 of them! The ordinance of the 2 January 1959 tried to limit them by founding 6 categories of accounts. The separate accounts of the Treasury must return in one of these 6 categories to be used.

the organization of these accounts was also called in question with LOLF (see low)

Exemptions from the budgetary principle of unit

There exist indeed two means of derogating from the budgetary principle of unit:

The debudgetisation

This technique consists in reducing the general budget of the State by deferring some of the expenditure which it supported until there towards the additional budgets and the separate accounts of the Treasury. In this case, parliamentary control is always possible because the expenditure remains in the public accounts.

Another solution consists in deferring certain expenditure towards moral persons private or public to escape parliamentary control.

The debudgetisation goes sometimes even further. Indeed, it happens that the State makes weigh on other moral persons whom him it financing of certain expenditure that he had habit to ensure. It is the problems of the funds, like the Fonds solidarity old age created in 1993. The finance law for 1995 laid down " sortir" budget annexes agricultural social security benefits certain increases of pensions for the agricultural pensioners of professions. The Constitutional council estimated that it possible “was had regard to the purpose of (it) expenditure”. In other words, this technique circumvents the principle of the budgetary unit. But the Constitutional council takes care.

Autonomous budgets

They are those of the public agencies or deprived, equipped with the legal entity and ensuring a public service mission. Their accounts are not integrated in the finance law because they have their own budgets. However, they receive subsidies on behalf of the State and however do not appear with the budget.

Changes brought by the LOLF to the budgetary principle of unit

The organic law concerning with the finance laws, called LOLF brings some changes to the budgetary principle of unit.

The additional LOLF and budgets

LOLF limit the benefit of a budget annexes “" to the only operations of the State not equipped with the legal entity resulting from their production activity of goods or performance of service place gave to the payment of redevances" ”. It makes disappear the additional budgets from the agricultural services, about the Legion of honor and the release.

The LOLF and separate accounts of the Treasury

LOLF reduces the number of separate accounts of the Treasury on 4 accounts:

special appropriation accounts : (Article 21 of LOLF) which stipulates that there must be a direct relationship between the receipts and the expenditure. There are six currently two very important (98% of the appropriations of the special appropriation accounts in 2006) that of the pensions, of the operations of patrimonial nature related to the management of the financial participations of the State.
accounts of trade : (Article 22 of LOLF) it relates to the services of the State which do not have the Legal entity, and have industrial activities and commercial, most important is that of the management of the Dette and the treasury of the State (94% of the authorizations of discovered accounts of trade).
monetary accounts of operation : (Article 23 of LOLF) milked technical subjects which are the subject only of an evaluation in LFI (loss on transactions on foreign currency, emission of coin, operations with the the IMF…).
accounts of the financial contests : (Article 24 of LOLF) they are the whole of the loans made by the State, which must be in bond between the amount of the loan and the quantity of the expenditure concerned. Most important relates to the " advances with the Territorial collectivities ": the State which can lend the product of the Tax S which the communities voted.

LOLF thus reinforces the budgetary principle of unit which was somewhat chipped by the number of separate accounts of the Treasury.

The LOLF and exemptions from the budgetary principle of unit

Like known as previously, the system of the debudgetisation and that of the autonomous budgets undermined the budgetary principle of unit. LOLF has as an ambition to make function the budget of the State with that of the social security and those of the local government agencies in order to reinforce the budgetary principle of unit.

See too

Budget of the State French
Organic law concerning with the finance laws (LOLF)
Gate on the Public finances

External bonds

finance laws, on the site of the ministry for the Economy, Finances and Industry
finance laws, on the site of the National Assembly.
the site of the ministry for the Economy, Finances and Industry devoted to the budget of the State
the site of the ministry for the Economy, Finances and Industry devoted to the budgetary reform

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