Can a public official go and work in the private sector?

If you plan to work in the private sector after you quit permanently or temporarily your duties in the public service for less than 3 years, you must beforehand obtain the agreement of your employer administration.

If you are a public servant, this obligation applies if you temporarily cease your duties as part of an availability (in particular for personal convenience or to follow your spouse).

If you are contracted in DTA: titleContent, this obligation applies if you temporarily cease to be employed on leave for personal reasons.

This obligation also applies if you permanently cease your duties as a result of, inter alia, your retirement, resignation, dismissal, breach of contract, etc.

This applies whether you are considering working as a salaried or unsalaried employee in a company or as a liberal.

Your employer administration is examining the compatibility of your future private sector activity with your previous public sector duties.

The proposed activity must not adversely affect the dignity of your previous duties in the public service. This would be the case, for example, of a staff member wishing to pursue an activity similar to a regulated profession, without fulfilling the conditions, in particular diplomas.

The proposed activity must not jeopardize or jeopardize the normal operation means the independence or neutrality of the public service. This may be the case, for example, where the staff member wishes to carry out an activity very close to his former duties, sometimes in the same geographical area.

The proposed activity must not adversely affect ethical principles of the public service : impartiality, integrity, probity, secularism, etc.

The proposed activity should not lead to illegal taking of interest.

You must send your employer administration a file containing the following documents:

• Letter expressing your wish to engage in private activity and to be placed temporarily, in a situation in accordance with your status (availability, leave for personal reasons), or to leave your position permanently
• Description of the envisaged project containing all relevant and detailed information enabling your employer administration to examine your application
• Registration extract in the national register of companies (RNE) or copy of the statutes of the organization you wish to join or the statutes or draft statutes of the company you wish to join or take over
• A copy of your employment contract if you are a contractual employee.

If your employer administration considers that it does not have all the information it needs to make a decision, it will ask you to complete your application within a maximum of 15 days of receiving your file.

Your employer administration is responding to you within 2 months.

Failure to reply within this period shall be refusal.

The decision of your employer administration may include reserves to ensure your compliance with ethical obligations and the normal operation of the service.

If your employer authority has a serious doubt about the compatibility of your business project with the functions you have performed in the previous 3 years, she to be submitted for opinion on ethics referent.

The fact that the ethics referee is seized shall not suspend the 2-month period in which your employer administration must respond to your request.

If the opinion of the ethics counselor does not remove the doubt, your employer authority shall refer the High Authority for the Transparency of Public Life (HATVP).

The fact that the HATVP is seized suspend the 2-month period in which your employer administration must respond to your request.

The HATVP may ask you and your employer administration for any information or document necessary for the review of your project.

The HATVP may also collect from public and private persons any necessary information.

It may hear or consult any person whose contribution it considers useful.

The HATVP issues an opinion on compatibility or qualified compatibility (for up to 3 years) orincompatibility.

The HATVP gives its opinion within 2 months according to its referral. Failure to deliver an opinion within two months shall be deemed to constitute an opinion of compatibility.

A notice of compatibility with reservations and/or incompatibility is required from you and your employer administration.

Your employer authority shall make its decision within 15 days after receipt of the HATVP's notice or not more than 2 months after the referral to the HATVP in the absence of an opinion from the HATVP within 2 months of the referral.