It is a ritual of the eve of holidays.
On November 18, a circular clarified the conditions under which ministers could go on vacation.
"With the approach of the end of year celebrations, for members of the government who are absent from their ministry, leave addresses and telephone contacts", can we read in this note specifying that "the ministers must choose a destination which enables them to meet their obligations and responsibilities ”.
Matignon has not made any specific written recommendations related to the particular Covid context.
But it was recalled to "the oral that they apply of course to each member of the government", explains the entourage of Jean Castex.
“You have to be French among the French.
It is not because one is a minister that one does not live things as people live them, translates the Minister of Relations with Parliament, Marc Fesneau, on the eve of the last Council of Ministers of Horribilis. year 2020, scheduled this Monday.
Exemplarity is all the more necessary, as the gauge (ten people) and the late schedule (after the curfew) of the dinner of the majority officials at the Elysee Palace on Wednesday, which preceded the announcement of the contamination of Emmanuel Macron on Thursday, caused controversy.
"The slightest deviation would be judged quite harshly"
"Contact case" isolated in Matignon, Jean Castex will wait until December 24 to join his wife and daughters in Prades (Pyrénées-Orientales).
Also cloistered within the walls of his ministry, Marc Fesneau will make a trip to Isère for a Christmas in a small committee, before returning home to Marchenoir (Loir-et-Cher).
All those we contacted assure it, the expanded formats being banned, it will be "a little Christmas" as a ministerial adviser put it.
No big table, but the only spouses and children for Bruno Le Maire (Economy) in a chalet in the Alps or Marlène Schiappa (Citizenship) in Paris - "I will see the rest of my family during the day, while respecting the curfew , by small group, ”said the minister.
Grandchildren included, for Jacqueline Gourault (Communities) at Chaussée-Saint-Victor (Loir-et-Cher) but "in accordance with the prescribed gauge", takes care to specify those around her.
Four, "all tested", on the side of Roselyne Bachelot in Angers (Maine-et-Loire).
It is a question of avoiding contamination, of course, whereas in addition to Jean Castex and Marc Fesneau, the president of the Assembly Richard Ferrand or the secretary general of the Elysee Alexis Kohler, also "contact cases", are already forced into solitary confinement.
But also that new controversies do not spread.
"The slightest deviation from one or the other would be judged quite harshly", warns a minister.
"You have to be able to return quickly"
Instructions have also been taken to avoid any travel abroad, except in exceptional circumstances.
"We are in crisis management, we must be able to return quickly," recalls a ministerial adviser.
Last year, Elisabeth Borne, then Minister of Ecological Transition, was pinned for flying to Marrakech (Morocco) in the midst of a transport strike ...
This year, the Minister of Labor will take over the direction of Nice (Alpes-Maritimes) - like Eric Dupond-Moretti (Justice) and his partner Isabelle Boulay, who returned from Quebec a few days ago.
And if Jean-Michel Blanquer escapes outside the capital, it will be "a few days in France" specifies his entourage.
"This is not the time to take a vacation," sums up a member of the government, while beyond the health crisis, the country is suffering heavy economic and social consequences.
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And Olivier Véran?
“I don't know,” he confides.
The Minister of Health is on the front line to follow the launch of the vaccination campaign - after the fiasco of the masks, the executive is playing big.
But also to monitor the evolution of the epidemic, while several European countries are toughening their measures.
And that a new variant of the coronavirus is circulating in part of British territory, leading the executive to suspend for 48 hours all travel of people from the United Kingdom at the end of a Defense Council summoned urgently this Sunday.
