Paris, Nov 15 (EFE) .- The French government announced today a further cut of the 850 million euro expenditure in the 2017 budget to guarantee its goal of reducing the deficit public below the threshold of 3% of gross domestic product (GDP), specifically 2.9%.

In a statement issued at the end of the Council of Ministers in which adopted a draft law that rectifies the 2017 budget, the Executive of President Emmanuel Macron stressed that those 850 million will be added to the measures of savings for 4,000 million euros presented this summer.

In addition, the Government clarified that the 3,000 million euros that were not sufficiently covered, as the Court of Auditors had pointed out, will be left with lower payments than programmed to the European Union and tax revenues more important than anticipated.

In an interview published today by "Les Echos", the Minister of Finance, Gérald Darmanin, said that thanks to the VAT will be collected 1,000 million euros more than initially calculated and noted that this results from the economic recovery, but also from a greater confidence, "which feeds consumption".

Darmanin acknowledged that they could have revised upwards their forecast of GDP growth to 1.8% - which is what the National Institute anticipates of Statistics (INSEE) -, but have preferred to stay with 1.7% to be "prudent and demanding".

In any case, and in front of the doubts that the European Commission has expressed about the goal of putting the deficit below the 3% threshold, insisted that they will do "everything" to achieve it.

In the longer term, the Government confirmed that by 2022 it intends to reduce public debt by five points of GDP -it was 99.2% in the second quarter of 2017-, public spending by three points and the deficit by two points.