these are “makeshift solutions”, denounces a PCF senator

Ian Brossat calls for the creation of “10,000 emergency accommodation places”.

Families with children sleeping on the streets in Paris have been accommodated in schools. “We are looking for makeshift solutions”, reacts Ian Brossat, senator from Paris and spokesperson for the PCF, Sunday November 26, on franceinfo. “It is estimated that across Paris, there are 400 children sleeping outside.adds Ian Brossat. “It’s a situation that is unbearable and undignified”. According to the PCF spokesperson, “The urgency is that the State and the government open accommodation places. We consider that across the country we are short of 10,000 accommodation places.”

franceinfo: Are there really no other solutions than opening schools to house these families?

Ian Brossat: These are families who currently do not have papers and I hope that they will have them and that tomorrow they will have the possibility of living in social housing. In the meantime, we need additional accommodation places. It is estimated that across Paris, there are actually 400 children sleeping outside. Across the country, UNICEF estimates that there are 3,000. It is a situation that is unbearable and undignified in the 7th economic power in the world. The urgency is that the State and the government open accommodation places. It is estimated that across the country we are short 10,000 accommodation places. It is high time that the government created them and helped deal with this situation which has been going on for too long now.

Is it only the responsibility of the State that is at stake in this matter?

Obviously, since emergency accommodation is a state responsibility. In this case, it was the city of Paris which requested the opening of these high schools which today are empty and the region ended up agreeing to do so. We are dealing with makeshift solutions. The only structural solution is the creation of accommodation places and for the moment the government is not doing this. I remind you that in the National Assembly an amendment was adopted which allowed the creation of these 10,000 emergency accommodation places. And within the framework of 49-3 the government completely brushed aside this proposal. I will come back to the Senate because we need these places.

Why, in your opinion, is the government not creating these accommodation places?

I think that the government is making a completely cynical calculation which consists of degrading the reception conditions for families who come from abroad to find refuge here. They are convinced that by degrading reception conditions we will dissuade people from coming. The reality is that for years, reception conditions have been degraded and yet there are still families who come. What creates the departure are the unworthy conditions in which they live in the country where these families find themselves when they decide to leave. In any case, these are families who are there and it is shameful that France is not capable of offering them shelter. We are talking about children who are sometimes a few months old, who are one or two years old and who find themselves on the street or in makeshift shelters. All this cannot continue.

What should be done first before the construction of this emergency accommodation?

Everyone sees that on one side we have empty buildings and on the other side people sleeping outside. I propose that local authorities be transferred the right of requisition, that communities, cities, when they wish, have the possibility of requisitioning vacant buildings such as offices, hotel buildings which have sometimes been empty for years so that no one sleeps outside anymore. Today the right of requisition is in the hand of the prefect and for the moment the prefects never apply it. Every time we report empty buildings to the prefect, he tells us that he only requisitions if the owner agrees, the result is that he never requisitions.