Bogazici University- Center for European Studies
Tel : 0212 359 70 26
Faks : 0212 359 70 26
Email : ces@boun.edu.tr
Address : Boğaziçi Üniversitesi Avrupa Çalışmaları Merkezi Kuzey Kampüs Kuzey Otopark Binası Kat: 1 No: 118 | 34342 Bebek İstanbul
France's Hollande Outlines Austerity Goals
(by GABRIELE PARUSSINI and GÉRALDINE AMIEL)
French President François Hollande on Sunday sought to brace the nation for its toughest budgetary effort of the past six decades, as he outlined a raft of austerity measures—including a controversial tax on the rich—to shore up public finances.
In a television interview, Mr. Hollande said he has given himself two years to turn around France's economy and acknowledged the gravity of that task. He said the country's growth prospects have clearly deteriorated and significantly downgraded the growth forecasts to "barely above zero" for this year and "about 0.8%" for 2013.
France's first Socialist president in 17 years used his prime-time television slot to seek to counter criticism that he is moving too slowly to fix France's problems and that he has failed to be decisive.
"I'm not going to do in four months what my predecessors haven't done in five or 10 years," said Mr. Hollande. "I am in combat mode." He said he was "accelerating things."
This excerpt was taken from The Wall Street Journal. To be able to read the whole article, please visit this link.