“We warned in April about the historic drought, but nothing was done”. Or : “They were unable to predict”. Critics have not failed in recent weeks to castigate the supposed carelessness of those who govern us, accused of not having taken the right steps upstream to avoid the 50,000 hectares that went up in smoke all over France. Not to mention the mobilization of more than 10,000 firefighters, civil security personnel and European reinforcements.
“To govern is to rain”, had quipped President Hollande, accompanied by a storm on each of his trips. Beyond the joke, everyone wants to ask themselves: but what is the government doing?
Going into the field is always too late in the eyes of those who are in the front row and who have lost everything. As after each crisis – this was the case for the Covid-19 epidemic with the series of masks and resuscitation beds – there is the reflex of “never again”. Contingency arrangements are only made after the disasters, in light of what went wrong, what was not done and the price we are willing to pay to avoid the worst.
Thus, Emmanuel Macron has let it be known from Brégançon that he will bring together “all the actors concerned” at the Élysée in order to rethink the model of prevention and fight against fires. Praying that the floods don’t return by then.
It takes years to reconstitute a Canadair fleet to the level, or even the decimated workforce of the ONF (5,000 cuts in 20 years, nearly four agents out of ten), years to reorganize the maintenance of our forests, too often dormant, or the management of water throughout the territory to cope with drought.
Éric Brocardi, very media spokesperson for the firefighters, is right to call for preparation for the floods to come: place people and sensitive goods on the floors, when possible. But how to erase decades of uncontrolled urbanization which have modified landscapes, soils and exposed populations to a major risk?
It’s easy to raise your index finger and say: we told you so, we warned you. This does little to advance the subject. Because it is now a whole organization of society that needs to be rethought, in the long term. Facing – and this is the difficulty – the climate challenges knocking at our door… right now.