“Nobody takes the pretext of a sporting event to solve a humanitarian problem”, assures the Minister Olivier Klein

“No one uses a sporting event as a pretext to solve a humanitarian problem“, assured Wednesday May 24 on franceinfo Olivier Klein, Minister Delegate for the City and Housing, while since mid-March, the government has been asking the prefects to create “regional temporary reception areas” to welcome the homeless in Paris, in order to “unclog accommodation centers” from Ile-de-France as the Rugby World Cup and the 2024 Olympics approach.

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Olivier Klein responds to the concerns and criticisms of those who believe that this will empty Paris before the Olympics. “It does not mean anything. These are the same people who reproached me a few weeks ago for leaving families and children on the street.”

The minister defendsan operation that makes it possible to better support families in emergency accommodation“. According to him, people and families “who are volunteers“will”much better accompanied in these places in the Province than they can be in Ile-de-France“.

“Regional reception areas” to better accommodate the homeless

At present, “nearly 100,000 places“accommodation”of the 200,000 are in Ile-de-France. The processing of these special cases cannot be done on such large numbers“. He assures that “social and administrative support is of much higher quality for small numbers“.

Olivier Klein recalls that these “regional temporary reception areas” were set up “with associations“and in connection with local authorities, while some local elected officials, including the mayor of Bruz, near Rennes (Ille-et-Vilaine) deplore the conditions for installing the device.

“We can’t install a center like that and an elected official discovers it at the bend of an announcement“says the minister who points”a special case“.”It is something that is being prepared, which is accompanied on the basis of voluntary action by the cities. We are not going to impose this system, which must be worked on by the prefects in the regions hosting these people in emergency accommodation.“This accommodation must be done”for a short period of evaluation of the social and administrative situation.” “It is in the interest of these people to have this much more personalized and effective assessment to build with them the rest of their journey.“, adds Olivier Klein.