Jérôme Chartier

Family origins and studies

He was born in a catholic family and spent his childhood in the Paris area, between Paris and Domont (Val-d’Oise). When a teenager, he committed himself to the service of other people, as a member of the scout movement or as an instructor for the Red Cross Children’s Hospital in Margency (Val-d’Oise) . After graduating from the Sarcelles secondary school, he entered Paris V University. As he was interested in social sciences, he passed a double diploma in sociology and linguistics, then a public administration bachelor's degree and a political sciences master's degree. Then in 1990, he went to the ESSEC where he studied Urban Economics, which increased his awareness of issues and values in cities and territories.

Professional career

Parallel to his studies, he has always earned his living thanks to student’s jobs, -for instance in the Domont Driving school-, and freelance contribution to news papers such as La Gazette du Val-d’Oise or to free radio stations. After that, he became a half time parliamentary assistant for a Senator, then general secretary of the group of independent senators from 1989 to 1992. In 1993, after his military service, and when he graduated from the ESSEC, he joined a counsel agency as a project manager before becoming a mission manager. This was for him the opportunity to discover the political marketing techniques of the American campaigns. 1995 is the landmark of both his election as the mayor of Domont (Val-d’Oise, 15000 inhabitants) and his active commitment in Jacques Chirac’s successful presidential campaign. His election at the age of 28 made him one of the youngest mayors of France. That same year, he was also elected President of the association for the new developments in the area of “l’Ouest de la Plaine de France”, before becoming the president of the urban community of “l’Ouest de la Plaine de France” in 2001. Anxious to preserve his professional activity in the private sector, he created his own consultancy office, C and C, in 1997and worked successively for investment funds, industrial groups and management societies. In 2000, he parted with his office to create a participation holding society with some partners. He sold it in turn in 2002 after his election at the Parliament to be free to commit himself entirely to his political activities. He was equally in charge of responsibilities within the RPR, and notably became its Secretary for the Val-d’Oise, which is the 10th French federation and was at the same time in charge of the federations. He took an active part in the creation of the UMP and was in charge of the development of the professional federations. He created 21 federations within 6 months, gathering up to 8500 members.

Political Commitment

In 2002 Jérôme Chartier appeared on the political national scene: on 16 June 2002 he was elected deputy of the 7th constituency in Val-d’Oise (townships of Domont, Ecouen, Montmorency, Sarcelles Sud-Ouest) with almost 58% of the votes. He sits in Parliament in the UMP Group. As a member of the Finance Commission he is in charge of the budgetary follow up of state fields: he was appointed official recorder of the Home Office funds (2002-2004), of the Foreign Office (2004-2008) and of the mission for Economy. He notably became official recorder for the Finance Commission for 4 laws: concerning the protection of business companies (2003) the opening up of the DCN capital (2004), the purchasing power (2007) and the bank and financial regulation (2010).Being recognized as a specialist of budgetary matters, he became the UMP Group spokesman on the State budget in 2007. He also got involved in the modernization of French institutions and political life. In 2002 he initiated the creation of a Group of reflection on the modernization of political life and gathered over a hundred members of Parliament of all tendencies. He presided over it until it disappeared in July 2008 after the vote of the constitutional law. On 22 April 2004, the anniversary of the presidential election first ballot, he gave over to the National Assembly President 15 propositions put forward by his group. To continue this reflection, in September 2005, he published Le lifting de Marianne, 50 propositions (l’Archipel), which benefited from a fairly exceptional success for a political book. He suggested propositions for the evolution of the V° republic institutions. Then, in January 2006, he initiated the Convention for the V° Republic, passing references to Arnaud Montebourg’s Convention for the VI° Republic. His propositions were positively greeted notably by Nicolas Sarkozy during his 2007 presidential campaign. He was reelected deputy of Val-d’Oise on 17 June 2007 with nearly 57% of the votes (48% on the first ballot). His commitment in the constitutional debate had been such that, in 2008, he was appointed spokesman of the UMP group for the discussion of the law reforming the constitution of the V° Republic which was voted by the Congress in July 2008. Within the UMP group, he furthered a certain number of propositions and ideas of reforms in economical and social areas: in 2007 he was, notably, the author of a report on social VAT which will be at the origin of the “purchasing power VAT” concept. He became then in charge, within the presidential party, of the debate on purchasing power. In January 2008, he was appointed National Secretary of the UMP, in charge of the reforms follow up, then in September 2008, national spokesman on the reforms for the UMP group. In March 2009, Xavier Bertrand, National Secretary appointed him as National Secretary in charge of the public finances and the tax system. As a candidate to his own re election in June 2012, he resisted the “Pink Wave” and obtained 38.29% of the votes on the first ballot vs 39.35 for his socialist adversary, and finally won with 50.29% in the second ballot. He supported François Fillon’s application to the presidency of the UMP group during 2012 autumn. He became his spokesman and a member of his closest staff. In January 2013, after the agreement between François Fillon and Jean François Copé he was appointed general manager of the animation of the group altogether with Philippe Cochet. In March 2014 he was re elected mayor of Domont with 78.9% of the votes.

Intellectual commitment

Since 2003, he has relaunched Les Entretiens de Royaumont (http://www.entretiensroyaumont.org/fr), created in 1947 by Henri Gouïn and which had disappeared in the early 1960s. In 2013 Les Entretiens celebrated their 10th anniversary and, nowadays, have become one of the major political think tank in France, the absolute must in December for all the decision makers from all horizons. In 2014, Les Entretiens will take on a new dimension with Les Entretiens in Madrid in June, Les Entretiens in Casablanca in October and Les Entretiens in Varsaw in November. He also published in March 2013 an essay on work values: Eloge du travail (Grasset)