The arrival of the former Minister Delegate in charge of Public Accounts, replacing Pap Ndiaye, occurs less than two months before the start of the school year.
For a rumor to be believed, it still has to be credible. That of the appointment of Gabriel Attal as head of the Ministry of National Education, replacing Pap Ndiaye, did not arouse great astonishment. It was formalized on Thursday, July 20, on the occasion of the reshuffle of the government of Elisabeth Borne.
It must be said that the now ex-Minister Delegate in charge of Public Accounts is, at 34, the best student of the macronie. Gabriel Attal supported Emmanuel Macron very early on. He campaigned for him during the 2017 presidential election. Elected deputy in Hauts-de-Seine that year, then re-elected five years later, he exercised his mandate very little and very quickly joined the government.
Spokesperson for Jean Castex’s government during the Covid-19 crisis, dispatched to television sets during the tumultuous sequence of pension reform, he faced more than one storm. A new tumultuous mission awaits him now: to rebuild brick by brick the confidence with the teachers’ unions, damaged during this second five-year term by the announcement of the teacher pact.
“We expect an omnipresent minister”
To meet this challenge, Gabriel Attal will have to listen to the profession and win rue de Grenelle. Where Jean-Michel Blanquer has drawn the wrath of the teaching staff and where Pap Ndiaye has failed to imprint his mark. “Will he accompany the collapse of education or will he have the political weight against Emmanuel Macron to change the course of things?”, asks franceinfo Sophie Vénétitay, secretary general of Snes-FSU. On the side of the SE-Unsa union, we want to believe in this second option. “Because he has the ear of the president, he may be able to make him hear that some choices are not the best”, hopes the national secretary Jérôme Fournier. Fatna Seghrouchni, federal co-secretary of Sud-Education, is convinced that the new minister “will apply to the letter what Emmanuel Macron will ask him”.
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Gabriel Attal already has the experience of the Ministry of National Education. Between 2018 and 2020, the former deputy of Hauts-de-Seine was secretary of state to Jean-Michel Blanquer. His return to the benches of the school therefore revives bitter memories. “We will find the Blanquer tone and style after a one-year break”, dreads Fatna Seghrouchni. “We expect an omnipresent minister, wanting to direct everything, like the former minister”abounds Guislaine David, co-secretary general of Snuipp-FSU.
Under the Blanquer era, Gabriel Attal also launched, in 2019, the Universal National Service (SNU). Promised by Emmanuel Macron, this controversial project must take a new step in March 2024. It will be integrated into school time, with a 12-day internship for volunteer second year high school students. An initiative criticized by the educational community since its origin. After the riots which followed the death of Nahel, in June, during a police check in Nanterre (Hauts-de-Seine), Gabriel Attal did not hesitate to promote the SNU again. “VS’is precisely the reaffirmation of the authority of the State, training in rights and duties from an early age and respect for the representatives of the State”he said in an interview with Figaro.
A “radical change” close to the start of the school year
Unlike Pap Ndiaye, a historian by training with no experience in politics, a more traditional choice was made, opting for a very political profile. For Guislaine David, her appointment is synonymous with “drastic change of character”. “Pap Ndiaye had great principles, even if he didn’t know much about National Education”, believes this union representative. “It’s the start of a minister who will not have been able, not able to weigh as it was necessary”, notes Sophie Vénétitay. However, he held a “clear commitment” on LGBT + issues, racism and school harassment, which Fatna Seghrouchni fears not to find in Gabriel Attal. “Despite our differences on working conditions, Pap Ndiaye will have been a real breath of fresh air”, she admits.
While the start of the school year takes place on September 4, Gabriel Attal has only 45 days to work on his new subject. “A return to school is like a rocket that takes off, there are a lot of things to prepare”, declared three weeks ago to franceinfo the cabinet of Pap Ndiaye. A change of minister within two months of this deadline, “it’s not the best sign in the calendar, because he takes office during the holidays”believes Jérôme Fournier. “The administration will go to sleep during the first fifteen days of August. So what the current minister will have prepared will happen in September”dreads the national secretary SE-Unsa, who adds that, in any case, “A return to school is being prepared from January to June”. The back-to-school circular, which plans the priorities for a school year, has already been published in early July.