New deal for shopping from the beginning of August.
Like what is planned in cafes and restaurants, the French will have to present an up-to-date health pass - PCR test or negative antigen test of less than 48 hours or certificate of vaccination (two doses administered more than two weeks) - to enter a shopping center, announced Monday evening Emmanuel Macron, the President of the Republic.
The same will apply to the staff of these centers.
Measures taken to prevent a fourth epidemic wave of the highly contagious Delta variant.
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For the time being, we do not yet know how these measures will be applied in practice.
Retailers and shopping center professionals are invited to a meeting this Tuesday at 5 p.m. with Bruno Le Maire, the Minister of the Economy.
But it is likely that the meeting does not provide all the answers to the many practical questions that distribution professionals have been asking themselves since Monday evening, which have not been concerted upstream.
What they regret.
Random or systematic checks?
"We are in favor of anything that can accelerate the vaccination of the French,"
explains Gontran Thüring, General Delegate at the National Council of Shopping Centers (CNCC).
But for us, the obligation of the health pass to enter shopping centers is a bad surprise
. ” For the latter, the measures will be difficult to put in place. Will the checks be systematic or random? Who will carry them out? There is also the question of access to people not up to date with their health pass, to hypermarkets where food is sold (the question has not yet been decided in Bercy), as well as to pharmacies in shopping centers.
Moreover, what about employees, often young, who have not yet been vaccinated.
"It would be incomprehensible for many French people that we ask for a health pass to limit contamination in certain places from those French people who will frequent them, but that we do not ask the people who work in these places,"
said Tuesday. morning Gabriel Attal, the government spokesperson on Europe.
Preference of postponement until after the holidays
But professionals are worried about delays. “
It is impossible for unvaccinated employees to receive their two doses by early August. The deadlines are too short,
”suggests Emmanuel Le Roch, general delegate of Procos (Partner of retail and specialized distribution brands).
"We would like for them the entry into force of the measure to take place on September 15, as for caregivers,
" adds Gontran Thûring, who also stresses that employers do not have the legal right to ask their employees they are vaccinated. "
We would prefer that the measure enter into force after the holidays
", agrees Emmanuel Le Roch. How to do ?
"The law will not be applicable from August 1, there will be a few days of delay"
, qualified Tuesday the Minister of Health Olivier Véran on BFMTV.
Some also obviously think of the likely economic consequences of the measure.
“The frequentation of shopping centers and their brands and therefore their turnover may decrease.
We hope that the government has worked upstream to assess the impact, ”
explains Emmanuel Le Roch.
The subject of potential aid to distributors should quickly be put on the table by professionals.
