Born in Walhain in Walloon Brabant in 1955, André Flahaut was very involved in politics, influenced by his grandfather, a railroadman. His school curriculum passes through the Athénée Royal of Gembloux and continues at the University in Brussels where he obtained his Master’s degree in Political Science and Public Administration.
In 1973 he joined the Socialist Party (PS). From the communal council of Walhain and Wavre to the Presidency of the House of Representatives, the journey has been rich with high responsibilities and diversified functions, each translated and matched by values of tolerance and solidarity.
In Walloon Brabant, he was President of the PS Federation from 1981 to 1995 and President of the Socialist Mutuality from 1993 onwards. He remained more intermittently (put on holiday), as federal or regional functions you were assigned.
Before obtaining a ministerial mandate, André Flahaut, a director of the Emile Vandervelde Institute (the PS study center) and a president of ONE (Bureau of Birth and Childhood). It was 1989 to 1995.
In 1995, he became Federal Minister of the Public Service, in charge of the “Régie des Bâtiments” and Minister of Veterans Affairs. It supports this last function for more than twelve years, engaging with force and conviction in the work of memory and democratic vigilance.
On 12 July 1999 he will remain Minister of Defense during two legislatures, 3085 days while he will implement a profound reform of the army both in terms of its internal organization and the level of the humanitarian dimension that it has not ceased to integrate in its action.
In 2009, he was appointed “Minister of State” by King Albert II. He resumed parliamentary work as a federal deputy until July 2010 when he was appointed President of the House of Representatives. On 22 July 2014, he’s living the Federal Government and become the Minister of the Budget, Civil Service and Administrative Simplification in Wallonia-Brussels Federation. He is also a commune councilor in his town : Nivelles.