There are 7,500 private schools under contract, which welcome two million students and to which the State pays 8 billion euros each year. And yet, in a report published this Thursday, June 1 on private education under contract, in the middle of the debate on social diversity in schools, the Court of Auditors notes that very few controls are carried out.
"The financial control of private institutions under contract, which is the responsibility of the departmental and regional directorates of public finances (DDFiP and DRFiP), is not implemented, write their authors. The pedagogical control, carried out by the inspectors of regional educational academies-inspectors (IA-IPR), is exercised in a minimalist way. Administrative control, which is the responsibility of the General Inspectorate of Education, Sport and Research (IGÉSR) and the rectors, is only mobilized on an ad hoc basis when a problem is reported. »
It appeared to the auditors that "few institutions indicated that they sent their accounts to the departmental or regional director of public finances within three months of the end of the financial year", in accordance with the law. On the other hand, "the regional directors of public finances solicited as part of the survey (Hauts-de-France, Pays de Loire and Brittany) indicated that their services did not carry out these controls," says the report.
"The monitoring of contracts is not very rigorous"
This is surprising when we know that these controls are necessary legislatively. Since the Debré Act of 1959, private schools have entered into a contract with the State which commits them to teach the curricula defined by the Ministry of National Education and to welcome all pupils without discrimination. "Contract monitoring is not very rigorous," the report says. Some rectorates do not possess these documents on the basis of which substantial sums are nevertheless paid".
These amounts are mainly used to pay the 142,000 teachers who teach in private institutions. But also to pay their management, school life, administration and health staff, via what is called the day school package, and which was supplemented by the State to the tune of 686 million euros in 2022. This public money represents 55% of the funding of private nursery and elementary schools and 68% of that of middle and high schools.
According to the Court, these checks would make it possible, for example, to ensure that a teacher does not teach on his service time to pupils who are schooled in a class outside of contract. Or that the teaching hours paid to school heads are well done.
"There is clearly a deficiency of state services"
To explain these non-controls, the Court of Auditors mentions, as an aside, the lack of resources. "There is clearly a deficiency of state services, says a magistrate. These controls on private education are therefore not a priority. »
However, for the Council of State: "This non-application of the texts is not admissible and must be corrected as soon as possible".
