France plans to impose community service on negligent parents

The French Minister of Solidarity, Personal Independence and Disability, Aurore Bergé, today announced a plan on the challenges of families, which includes the creation of a commission and the option of imposing community work on parents who neglect their responsibility.

Oliver Thansan
Oliver Thansan
09 December 2023 Saturday 15:25
17 Reads
France plans to impose community service on negligent parents

The French Minister of Solidarity, Personal Independence and Disability, Aurore Bergé, today announced a plan on the challenges of families, which includes the creation of a commission and the option of imposing community work on parents who neglect their responsibility.

In an interview published today in the weekly La Tribune Dimanche, Bergé revealed that he is working with the Prime Minister, Élisabeth Borne, and the head of the Justice portfolio, Éric Dupond-Moretti, on different measures, such as parents having to face costs when their children are guilty of "degradations."

Likewise, the Government plans to fine parents when they do not appear at court hearings that concern their children.

In addition, a scientific commission - made up of experts such as demographers, judges or psychiatrists - will be created to study the challenges of parenthood in France and the so-called CAF (Caisses d'allocations familiales), in charge of distributing aid, will be increased by 30%. social to families.

This battery of measures is related to the wave of riots that France experienced between the end of June and the beginning of last July, unleashed after the death of a minor of Maghrebi descent at the hands of the police at a roadblock in Nanterre, on the outskirts from Paris.

In those incidents, in which more than 2,500 buildings were burned or damaged, hundreds of businesses were looted and vandalized and more than 12,000 cars were burned, security forces detained 4,000 people.

A third of those detained were minors and the majority came from single-parent homes, which is why French President Emmanuel Macron then pointed out the responsibility of parents.

"It is clear that authority needs to be restored and it is not old-fashioned or reactionary to say so. We see that parents can feel overwhelmed and disoriented in the face of new risks, such as a sedentary lifestyle and the increasing importance of screens. And all social groups are affected "said Bergé.

For the minister, we must return to the social place that corresponds to parents, who cannot be forgotten by public policies. Specifically, Bergé placed emphasis on single-parent families, in which the father is most often absent.

"Parents cannot be reduced to supporting children. Society has come to accept that women alone have to assume certain responsibilities regarding children. A couple can separate, but the family remains alive: it is not abandoned children," he stressed.