Between stress and fatigue, after months of preparation for the European elections, the employees responsible for organizing the fastest French elections in the history of France feel despised and depressed.
The announcement of the dissolution of the National Assembly by President Emmanuel Macron on the evening of the results was a real shock for the shadow civil servants responsible for organizing the elections.
“It meant going back into battle when we were already exhausted. I cried at work the next day, my nerves gave out. Doing in 20 days what you normally do in 4 months is very hard. There is tension, stress, fatigue. We feel despised by the president,” says Georges*, 35, a young civil servant in the Paris region.
Since the end of May, and the race for the European elections – which took place over four months – Georges has only had two days off, working almost seven days a week. And vacations will have to wait: the agents of the State in Paris are unofficially not allowed to take summer leave during the Olympics.
I am physically and mentally exhausted. I have put my life on hold for several weeks, I no longer see my children, my partner or my friends.
Sonia*, 45 years old
Sonia has been a civil servant for several years in the “Elections Office” of a prefecture in the Paris region. On a daily basis, these offices, present in all prefectures of France, organize professional, local, national and European elections.
PHOTO SARAH NABLI, SPECIAL COLLABORATION
Electoral offices must prepare more quickly than ever for the first round of the legislative elections on June 30.
In France, multiple legal, administrative, financial and logistical steps follow one another to organize elections down to the smallest detail. The biggest workload is “enveloping”: sending candidates’ programs in paper form to millions of voters by post.
Last weekend, nearly 25,000 agents performed this time-consuming work from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. And the work of an election does not stop on the date of the last vote in the prefectures, the work continues well beyond the weeks.
Psychosocial risks
Civil servants are bound by a duty of confidentiality; they are not allowed to communicate with the press. But Sonia needed “to free herself from a weight”, to tell the story of the “distress of these little hands on the front line”. For these fastest elections in history, we must move quickly while respecting the legal and administrative frameworks and the rigor that elections require. “We have no room for error!” »
A critical situation denounced by the unions of civil servants of the Ministry of the Interior. They are alarmed by the psycho-social risks of these early surprise elections.
“Once the nerves go down, what’s going to happen next? », asks Olivier Ortuno, departmental secretary Force Ouvrière at the prefecture of the Lot department.
We don’t judge the political decision, but to string together two elections is a hard blow. Emmanuel Macron did not measure the impact on his services.
Olivier Ortuno, departmental secretary Force Ouvrière at the prefecture of the Lot department.
For its part, the Union of CGT Interior unions sent a letter to the Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin, on June 14 to denounce the working conditions imposed on these services, “which are unacceptable and do not respect regulatory obligations on rest times.
A director of a rural prefecture, who wishes to remain anonymous, however puts the fatigue of civil servants into perspective. “We are coming out of the European elections, the teams are still in place and already well-established, they are used to a fairly sustained pace in the prefecture, and we are calling on other state agents to help us,” he maintains.
The polling station puzzle
“10 days before the first vote, we must find 150 assessors out of 207 for our 34 polling stations, this is unheard of, a very serious situation. So we are looking for volunteers, we publish on social networks, we ask associations. We also had to move a polling station because of a wedding, which meant informing voters in advance and installing signage. We are facing an accumulation of difficulties,” admits Quentin Clarin, deputy mayor, responsible for security and citizenship in Charleville-Mézières, a town of 46,000 inhabitants in the north-east of France.
In Cahors, 21,000 inhabitants, in the South-West, a gastronomic festival complicates the situation for municipal employees.
“On Saturday evening, there is a banquet for 2000 people, organized on the main square, the next day [jour du vote pour le premier tour], a much-anticipated brunch. For the services, it means additional fatigue, work, stress and tension. But for the elections, everyone is mobilized, there is a wave of solidarity to face this historic moment,” insists Vincent Bouillaguet, deputy mayor responsible in particular for human resources and general administration.
*Fictitious name to protect anonymity