PRESS RELEASE

10 March 2023

THE ANNUAL PUBLIC REPORT 2023

Key elements

The 2023 Annual Public Report, published today, in figures:

•

572 pages (-18.52 % compared to 2022), including 186 pages of responses from

administrations

•

26 audit recommendations

•

The result of the work of the seven chambers of the Court, fifteen regional Chambers of

Accounts (CRCs), eight inter-jurisdictional committees (common to the Court and a CRC), and

one inter-chamber committee

•

Contributions from more than 40 rapporteurs

Decentralisation 40 years on: centrally important to the 2023 APR

This year, having drawn lessons from the health crisis and its budgetary, financial, economic and social

consequences in the APR published in 2022, the financial jurisdictions have chosen to examine the

performance of our country’s regional structure, 40 years after the first decentralisation laws. The Court

and the regional and territorial audit chambers wanted to assess the current situation and compare the

initial ambitions of decentralisation with the concrete results achieved, in terms of services provided to

the public and businesses. The financial jurisdictions have sought to illustrate their institutional and

financial analysis of decentralisation with practical examples, drawn from an examination of its

implementation in a number of areas of public action shared between the State and local authorities.

As in previous years, this report also includes an introductory chapter focusing on the overall situation

of public finances.

The 2023 APR includes:

•

An introduction to forty years of decentralisation

, looking back at the effectiveness of the local

structure following the law of March 2, 1982 on the rights and freedoms of municipalities,

departments and regions.

•

10 chapters

divided into two parts:

o

An opening chapter, which tackles the overall situation of public finances at the end of

February 2023

.

o

The first part of the APR presents an overall diagnosis of decentralisation and covers its

main issues

: 2 chapters dealing with the impetus to be regained from decentralisation

40 years on as well as the redefinition of the means of financing local finances.

o

The second part of the APR presents a sector-by-sector analysis of decentralisation,

composed of

7 chapters dealing with decentralisation in different areas: the economics

of local authorities, social policies, education, the arts (especially the performing arts),