Le Figaro Nantes
Covid has caused requests to obtain an identity card or passport to explode. Many users have had difficulty obtaining an appointment in recent months. If saturation tends to subside, some are still paying the price. Like the administrative formalities officers at Nantes town hall, who took advantage of the municipal council this Friday morning to make themselves heard.
There were around twenty of them from the FO union, gathering in front of the gates of the main courtyard, despite incessant rain, from 8:30 a.m. Five went on strike according to the town hall and municipal services were not disrupted. But this is not the first time that their anger has rumbled. Those who say they are
“out of breath”
denounce a workload that is difficult to contain.
“Unsuitable working conditions”
“The town hall is letting its agents go because the working conditions are not suitable
,” laments Sylvie Daguin, general secretary of FO Ville, Métropole and CCAS.
“As early as January 2023, FO was received by the Personnel representative to explain the situation: we obtained five redundant positions and the hiring of contractual agents to deal with the situation in this service
. ”
Another strike action began in February 2024, leading to the ongoing creation of five new positions. An insufficient number for the union, which also observes sick leave:
“The community has lost twenty positions over the past ten years in this service. For FO, if we do the math: there are still 10 positions missing for the situation to return to normal
. Trade unionists would also like a “passport bonus”.
“They recruit but people don’t stay
,” remarks Isabelle Hihn, who has worked in a local town hall for more than 10 years. She emphasizes that the salaries are not attractive enough. With the increase in administrative titles to be produced,
“the city took more appointments, more equipment but less staff
,” she continues, dressed in an FO chasuble. While knowing that it is necessary to train new arrivals.
Hélène, another agent, says that now the last appointment for a passport is 5:10 p.m., compared to 4:30 p.m. previously. As a result, with her colleagues, they never finish at the scheduled time (5:35 p.m.) long enough to complete all the files.
“We need more time
,” she continues, echoing the 20-minute window for issuing a passport at the central town hall (30 minutes in neighborhood town halls).
“This is the factory. I have to reduce my quality of reception
,” regrets the one who had chosen this profession precisely to interact with citizens. Also, everyone observes that incivility and signs of aggression are increasing.
“Especially since we removed the Plexiglas
,” adds another.
“Solutions provided” according to the town hall
Aïcha Bassal, fourth deputy mayor of Nantes and staff delegate, recognizes that the city has not escaped a
“peak of activity”
:
“Between Covid, Brexit where all young college students needed a passport, Nantes, like all cities, was faced with a very significant demand
. But she defends the deployment of additional resources:
“We hired nine people to come and support them, we took additional biometric stations. There was a whole organization to make the passages more fluid
. In short,
“there were solutions already provided at the time when there was this peak of activity
,” she says. There will therefore not be 10 additional positions as FO would like, nor a bonus because
“we have increased the compensation system like never before
,” she says.
Today, in Nantes, 1,750 weekly appointments are offered for identity document requests each week. In 2023, the city of Nantes indicates that it will have issued 74,300 titles (compared to 61,400 in 2022, which was already
“considerable for a municipality of 320,000 inhabitants”
). In 2024, services expect the same proportions. Since the fall, it has taken 15 days to two months to obtain an appointment.