Deconfinement: Faced with a busy news, Daniel Gibbs answers questions from journalists

0

As in previous weeks, the president of the Community, Daniel Gibbs took part in the question-and-answer game with the journalists, during the weekly press briefing.

1) The Minister of Overseas asks to "build public order in the territories" to recreate the economy and "accelerate existing projects". For Saint-Martin, could you indicate and specify which projects are proposed?

Public procurement will indeed be decisive in 2020, 2021 and 2022 to revive our island economy.

I would remind you that the Community has drawn up a multi-year investment plan of 230 million euros from 2019 to 2023. It is a colossal effort for a Community like ours.

As a reminder, this ambitious program provides 51 million euros for schools, 25 million euros for sports equipment, 34 million for our infrastructure or 15 million euros for public spaces.

I should also point out that we are restructuring our internal organization in the light of this investment plan. The Community therefore needs to stay the course and continue our efforts to improve our operational capacity.

Public procurement will thus play a large part in the recovery effort. However, it will depend on the impact of the crisis on our finances, which results in a significant drop in our tax revenue.

I repeat, unlike the State, the Communities cannot be in deficit.

It is therefore a question for the Collectivity of adapting its capacities to economic reality. This is why, next Wednesday we will propose a modification of our original budget to the Territorial Council.

The health crisis has not only forced us to have to create new room for maneuver to finance health, social and economic measures, but also to prioritize our investments.

For 2020, an analytical work has thus been undertaken by our services to put into perspective the deadlines for public procurement, our financial capacity and the urgency of projects participating in improving the living environment of residents or economic development of the territory.

Despite the crisis, we are continuing to carry out our PPI. Admittedly, in lesser proportions than those we had anticipated at the start of the year due to the crisis, but we are maintaining this already ambitious course.

2) Regarding the solidarity fund (1st part), a significant number of business leaders eligible for this fund received a negative response from the DGFIP. However, these entrepreneurs had received an initial email indicating that they were eligible for this fund.

This situation leads to 3 questions:

• Among the files already processed, were there favorable payment responses, or did all of them receive a negative response?

• What are the criteria for refusing this fund?

• Do you know the number of Saint-Martin companies that have actually benefited from this fund to date? 

To date, the feedback we have from the Public Finance Center reports that 1248 requests have been made under the solidarity fund.

826 files were processed, 305 accepted, or 37% of the requests.

157 are awaiting processing, or 19% of requests.

364 requests were refused, that is to say 44% because of corporate tax not deposited, of DLCP not deposited or not paid, or not declaration of the income tax for the companies in own name. However, all of them have declared on their honor that they are up to date with their fiscal and social situations ...

The files are investigated by the public finance center, the national rule required that companies be up to date with their tax and social contributions. It is indeed a prerequisite for receiving public aid.

However, some companies claim to be up to date with their taxation. If companies are up to date with their tax and social obligations or benefit from a moratorium, I invite them to approach the Saint-Martin public finance center in charge of examining requests.

3) The Collectivity announced to have released an exceptional fund of 5M € which will abound 0 rate loans granted by ISMA and ADIE. Is this fund already operational? Is it aimed only at companies that have already passed through the ISMA or ADIE circuit, or will all companies meeting the eligibility criteria be able to claim these loans at O ​​rates ?

In fact, 2,5 million euros will initially add to an honor loan fund managed in partnership with Initiative Saint-Martin and ADIE.

These loans will not only be intended for companies benefiting from the ADIE and ISMA networks. All VSEs or SMEs or structures of the social and solidarity economy of less than 20 employees created before February 1, 2020 will be able to benefit from this loan of honor at zero rate up to 15 euros.

These systems will be put in place this week, after the decision to modify the budget in the Territorial Council, a necessary step to sign the agreements with these organizations.

4) Do you plan to suspend the tourist tax this summer to revive tourism in Saint-Martin or to put in place another fiscal measure to support players in the sector?

As such, I would remind you that the Territorial Council voted to abolish the tourist tax and the vehicle rental tax at the beginning of March, just before confinement.

These two taxes have been replaced by a single tax, the TGCA, which we recall, is levied on the customer by the company to be paid back to the Collectivity. It is precisely the occasion to make our visitors contribute to the economic succession of the territory. We cannot ask that public procurement participate in the recovery and be exempt from a source of funding.

To support businesses, we voted to postpone payment of corporate tax and the TGCA and tourist tax from January to April 2020, until December 31, 2020, for businesses in difficulty. I add that the payment of the license was also suspended, until March 31, 2021 for these same companies of which the hotels belong.

Support for players in the sector is therefore already effective.

5) Restaurateurs have obtained authorization to reopen their establishments, from May 18, what about beach restaurants, do they have the right to install deckchairs while the territorial decree currently in force prohibits regroupings on the beaches?

I think we should not rush and want a too fast return to normal. At the moment, the beach restaurants can open, but without the deckchairs. Just as we ask the population not to gather and picnic on the beaches.

In principle and when the time comes, I am in favor of it as soon as the physical distancing measures are respected by the restaurateurs. Their AOT allows them to operate which they must also respect.

The issue will be addressed by government departments as part of the restaurant-specific deconfinement plan. For the moment, deckchairs are therefore not authorized.

6) Why was the advance decision to open the border not made jointly with you and the Prefect? This unilateral decision by the Prime Minister of Sint Maarten on the opening of the border mark a break in cooperation?

You know that the question of borders is a competence of the sovereign States, the French Republic and the Kingdom of the Netherlands. The Community has so far participated in tripartite meetings, but it is not a decision maker in this area.

We did express our opinion on border control, but again, it is an opinion, the final decision is not ours. Our relations with Sint Maarten are excellent, there is no break in cooperation. The question of borders is a sensitive subject which leads to discussions between the two sovereign states. Now we can only hope that this situation will be resolved quickly.

I repeat: we are very attached to our customs and our binationality which are revealed in all aspects of our island functioning. We can measure with this crisis how sensitive the Saint-Martinois are to the question of borders and respect for the Treaty of Concordia.

In any case, we will have to face the reopening of the borders and fight together against the Covid. We have seized the Minister for the overseas departments and we very much hope that a decision intervenes in this direction.

 9,148 total views

About author

No comments

%d bloggers like this page: