French Govt Pressure on Health Spending

France's Social Affairs Minister, Simone Veil, has said the government is to intensify the effort to control health spending.

She told a parliamentary debate on the social security budget that the area of spending reforms already achieved has been considerable, but the main uncertainty remains the health service budget. "There is no responsible scenario which allows us to evade a policy of spending control," she said, and a return to a break-even position on the health budget was possible under "very strict conditions."

Most members of parliament aligned with the policies of premier Edouard Balladur have indicated support for Mrs Veil's new tough approach. Moreover, supporting the recent statements of presidential election candidate Jacques Chirac, Gaullist party deputy secretary general Elisabeth Hubert said the health budget forecasts of the government for 1995-97 were "optimistic and even unrealistic," and added that she suspected the government of wanting to replace a health service regime based on medical criteria with one based on the principles of accountancy.