Loosen the corset of the state of health emergency without lowering their guard against the Covid-19: the deputies examine Monday, May 10 the crisis exit project providing for the gradual lifting of restrictions, but new measures such as the "health pass" make a few cringe.
Last step before the end of the tunnel?
The text sets to music the measures and the deconfinement schedule announced by the Head of State at the end of April but it
"is not a tipping point"
, warns the Minister of Health Olivier Véran.
"It does not mark a clear break between the constraints linked to the epidemic and the return to life before,"
adds the minister.
To discover
Covid-19: find the detailed timetable for the progressive deconfinement
Read also: Does the health pass infringe our fundamental freedoms?
Contamination figures, although declining, remain at high levels, while leading epidemiologists and caregivers are reluctant to relax anticovid rules.
This is the second time in a year that the government has presented a transitional regime for exiting the state of emergency.
At the beginning of the summer of 2020, deputies and senators voted for a text whose bases are similar to that which will be examined in the hemicycle of the Palais Bourbon, then in the Senate on May 18.
In the meantime, the exceptional regime introduced in March 2020 was reactivated in October, then extended in February, while the human toll of the pandemic in France exceeds 100,000 deaths.
"Red line"
In fact, the eight articles of the draft law on "management of an exit from the health crisis" will continue to grant the government from June 2 to October 31 health police powers deemed exorbitant by the oppositions and certain defenders of public freedoms. . It's
"a bit like Canada dry, it's akin to an outing that isn't one,"
comments LR MP Philippe Gosselin. The executive retains, for example, the possibility of imposing, in the event of an epidemic resumption, local confinements in territories which can bring together up to 10% of the French population.
After its passage in the Laws Committee in the Assembly, the government also gave itself the means to maintain curfews and strengthened its project for a “health pass”. The tool initially reserved for travel to or from abroad could make access to large gatherings or places of more than 1,000 people subject to three conditions. To participate in a festival, for example, a music lover may have to present the negative result of a virological screening, proof of vaccination or attesting to his recovery following contamination. However, despite government assurances, this device, which is not reducible to the controversial "vaccine passport", is ticking even in the ranks of the majority.
Read also: In the majority, the use of the health pass is debated
"It looks like discrimination, for me, it's a precedent"
, put forward the "walker" Pacôme Rupin.
The deputies wanted to further frame the measure by explicitly excluding daily activities: restaurants, cinemas, theater, etc.
"It's a red line"
, confirms the LREM reporter of the text, the deputy and doctor Jean-Pierre Pont.
The examination in session should make it possible to further refine the measure, in particular on the places and gatherings concerned.
“1,000 people on five hectares is not the same as 1,000 people on 500 m²”
, argues Jean-Pierre Pont.
"There will be no limit in discrimination"
, however predicted Eric Coquerel (LFI), for which even if the law prohibits it, such or such restaurateur will require the "sanitary pass" to access his establishment.
Discussions on the total duration of this transitional regime as on the review clause before Parliament in the event of a return to local confinement should animate the debates. Last summer, during the vote on the previous bill to end the health crisis, the majority gave a large discharge to the government. The oppositions had voted against. The president of the Senate Gérard Larcher already warns, in
Le Figaro
, that he will say "no" to the two months during which the government can declare a state of health emergency
"on part of the territory"
.
"It can only be done under the control of Parliament."