CAPEB asks the government to quickly complete its measures to support the building

Added to this is the rise in energy prices since the end of 2021, which is increasing considerably with the war in Ukraine. From now on, a certain number of brands and manufacturers refuse to commit to prices and delivery times. A brutal and particularly anxiety-provoking situation for craft construction companies. To remedy this phenomenon, the CAPEB had urgently requested Minister Bruno Le Maire at the end of last week to ask him to make the building benefit from the measures of the future Economic and Social Resilience Plan.

This plan, which aims to mitigate the impact of the crisis (rising costs of raw materials, energy and supply difficulties, etc.) on companies, has just been unveiled by Prime Minister Jean Castex. While a number of the measures are going in the right direction, CAPEB regrets that certain proposals specific to the building trades that it had issued have not been announced at this stage and calls on the government to complete the measures announced.

For Jean-Christophe Repon, President of CAPEB: “Because they have been strongly impacted by the health context, craft building companies can no longer continue to suffer such significant and unpredictable cost increases. Their survival is at stake! In order to contain the effects of this crisis, we quickly proposed strong measures to the government to be integrated into the Economic and Social Resilience Plan. The Prime Minister's speech this afternoon seems to show that the government has not taken full measure of the consequences of this context on the activity of craft building companies and on the level of learning and employment. We therefore call on the government to take additional measures to cushion this new crisis with our companies, which represent 95% of construction companies! »

CAPEB reiterates its requests to the public authorities so that the Resilience Plan can be supplemented by the following provisions:

• Reimburse, as for the agricultural sector and the Public Works sector, part of the TICPE for fuels used for professional vehicles;
• Impose on banks and credit insurers that they do not downgrade the rating of companies when they decide to postpone the reimbursement of their PGE;
• Ensure that manufacturers and traders or distributors:
  • actively participate in the construction crisis committee set up by the government (an initiative that has encouraged public purchasers to demonstrate understanding and flexibility in the application of public procurement rules);
  • include the fair cost of decarbonization in their prices;
  • assume the risks of price increases with the sector (solidarity and mutual interests of the actors: manufacturers, traders, companies and customers) within the framework of a solidarity charter;
• Require suppliers to warn construction companies at least 3 months in advance of any price increase and to maintain price stability also for at least three months (indeed, current trends sometimes impose a cash payment and price validity of 24 or 48 hours, while the customer withdrawal period is 14 days);
• Accelerate the overhaul of the calculation of the various BT indexes and their publications in a timely manner in view of the current crisis;
• Apply a reduced rate of 5,5% VAT for all renovation work;
• Finally, make automatic, in public contracts, the application of late payment penalties in the event of late payment to companies;
• Put in place a price shield mechanism for the cost of energy at European and French levels to have industrial production at a controlled price and allow the continuity of public energy and environmental renovation policies, directly threatened by the soaring costs of materials.