PARIS (Reuters) - French Prime Minister Edouard Philippe said on Saturday that the tax burden will be reduced as of next year by around 7 billion euros (6.19 billion pounds), financed by reining in spending and measures to be specified in the new budget.
Philippe has said that France's objective was is to reduce the budget deficit below an EU-agreed cap of 3 percent of economic output this year.
"We are going to do it without increasing taxes in 2017," Philippe told a convention of LREM, President Emmanuel Macron's centrist Republic on the Move party.
"We will therefore, thanks to savings measures to control the spending, keep commitments imposed on France by Brussels," he added.
Philippe's commitment to stick to the deficit target despite over-spending this year by the previous government has raised concern among some economists that tax cuts promised by Macron may have to be pushed back, diluting their positive impact on the economy.
"Taxes will fall starting from 2018 by about seven billion euros by reining in spending and implementing the president's commitments coherently and over time starting with the 2018 budget bill," Philippe said.
(Reporting by Caroline Pailliez and Maya Nikolaeva; Editing by Leigh Thomas)