According to the former Finance Minister, “France’s debt reduction was his obsession during his seven years at Bercy. “It’s a good thing you say that, because unfortunately the facts heavily contradict you”.François Husson, General Budget Rapporteur at the French Senate, curtly retorted. Early on Thursday morning, in the austere atmosphere of the room that was once the chapel of the Palais du Luxembourg, Bruno Le Maire was auditioned by senators in the hope of getting him to confess his faults in the ongoing slide in the public deficit. Denouncing “attacks and “lies” which he claims have been aimed at him since “monthsthe former treasurer hammered home that he wanted to expose his “truth to the Senate Finance Committee, which – in advance of the National Assembly’s commission of inquiry on the same subject in the coming weeks. – has begun a series of hearings for an information mission…