“It’s a fantastic opportunity to give our teams confidence in the future,” assures the group’s CEO.

The group of private nursing homes, in financial difficulty, has just come under the control of the Caisse des Dépôts. Laurent Guillot, general manager of Orpéa, was the eco guest of franceinfo on Friday.

Two years after the scandal that broke out when the investigative book was released The Gravediggers by Victor Castanet, revealing mistreatment and financial irregularities under the former management, the group of private nursing homes, in financial difficulty, came under the control of the Caisse des Dépôts on December 19. The group represents 350 establishments in France and nearly 1,000 worldwide. This takeover by the financial arm of the State takes place as part of a procedure which should help them regain financial balance.

Laurent Guillot, the general director of Orpéa, who took over the reins of the group in May 2022, was the eco guest of franceinfo, Friday December 22.

franceinfo: Health authorities are concerned about the delays in vaccination campaigns against flu and covid this year, particularly for vulnerable people, and therefore for the elderly. Where are you at Orpéa?

Laurent Guillot: In our establishments, we have been running campaigns for several weeks now and today, we have approximately an 80% flu vaccination rate among our residents and approximately 70% for covid. And for our staff, we are well below that. We are more around 40%. But it’s a campaign that we are doing and continuing to do every day to convince them and to convince that it is important for us and for our loved ones to vaccinate.

Your general meeting was held this morning. The new governance is ratified, there is a takeover by the Caisse des Dépôts, the financial arm of the State. What is Orpéa’s financial health today?

It’s not quite the last step. If there is still a capital increase coming in the first quarter. And the company will be 50.2% controlled by Caisse des Dépôts, but also Maïf, MACSF and CNP Assurances, who are partners in this group which now controls Orpéa. Today was the general meeting in which we somewhat materialized this takeover and then also the entry of these players into the capital.

These are arrivals which will reassure ?

This is a great sign of confidence because it is first and foremost a sign of confidence that we have for the team in place, both the management team and especially the teams on the ground, in the establishments that do their job with our patients and residents every day. But it is also a fantastic opportunity to give confidence to our teams about the future since they are long-term shareholders, to our patients, to our residents who come to us, but also to our partners and then also to the State, in fact, to all our stakeholders. This is likely to reassure them. And when you asked the question earlier also to reassure them on a financial level because it helped save the company.

It’s been a year since you launched this overhaul plan. Today, you who have been in office for 18 months, can you ensure that we no longer see in any of your establishments the practices of mistreatment that were revealed in The Gravediggers ?

So, the profession of care and support are very difficult professions. What I can say is that the improvement is spectacular, in terms of care, support and food. We have incurred expenses and made investments in terms of staff ratios. Today, we have increased this supervision rate by 10% compared to a year ago. That is to say that for each resident, we have increased the number of collaborators next to them by 10%, which is a very significant investment. There are around 0.75 caregivers and companions for one resident. The sector average is 0.65 and the government’s long-term target, as described in its PLFSS, is 0.72. So, you see, we are beyond the target set by the government.

You committed to reviewing your human resources policy, what is the situation today? Are you able to recruit and retain your staff?

We are able to recruit. We have made a huge effort to promote these professions. These are professions which are extremely important and in which it is necessary to guarantee health and safety at work which is fundamental. It is one of the most accident-prone sectors of the economy and we have reduced these lost-time accident statistics by more than 10% and more than 20% in France. It’s a job that needs to be better paid and for the first time in Orpéa’s history, we signed with the organizations representing NAO staff at the start of the year, which led to an increase in remuneration of 4% and the gradual implementation of a 13th month, the implementation of restaurant vouchers. This is a fundamental axis of our policy. It is also the first axis of our rebuilding to take care of our teams.

And once you recruit them, do these people stay ?

The staff turnover rate is still too high. It fell compared to last year by three points. But it is still much too high and it is work that will take several years to reach levels that I would say are comparable to other sectors. Today, it is still around 25%, that is to say that one in four people leaves us within the year. This is a little less than the sector, but it is still very high.

Have you managed to restore confidence in families? ?

I believe. When I walk around the establishments, when I go to see them and when I interview the families, I feel great confidence in the transformation that is underway, whether in the Parisian establishments, in the establishments where I was not very long ago, in the north of France or in Burgundy, I had exceptional feedback from families who now tell me and in any case they have great confidence in the work we do. Who tell me that things have changed over the past year, so not everywhere, not uniformly. We are not at the end of the road. I’m not saying that everything is done. We still have a gigantic job to do because it’s a difficult job and a job where any progress is called into question every day. And so you have to work every day, every day, progress.

The book investigates The gravediggers had highlighted the consequences of a frantic race for profitability. Today, does profitability remain one of your objectives? ?

Profitability remains one of our objectives, but I was going to say in the middle of a series of objectives and in particular the majority, for example, of my remuneration is indexed rather on the well-being of our residents, the quality of the work that we work with union organizations to improve the working conditions of our employees. And that represents the majority of my personal goals. And this is what we also do with all our employees so that these personal objectives are deployed effectively within the organization. The fact remains that having a sustainable policy also means having a policy where we do not lose money permanently and therefore it is important to have the means to constantly improve the work we do. ‘we do.