An "administrative investigation" will be carried out on the "failures" of the care of a family from Noyelles-sous-Lens (Pas-de-Calais), announced Monday Charlotte Caubel, Secretary of State in charge of Childhood, visiting the prefecture of the department to take stock of the file.
Known to social services since 2013, the family had not been the subject of a particular report, while the parents have just been sent to justice for the abuse of their ten children.
Arrested at the end of August, after the call of one of the eldest siblings to social services, the couple of forties must be tried in January, suspected of serious educational deficiencies and "violence on a minor of 15 years by ascendant".
Read alsoPas-de-Calais: tied up children, deplorable hygiene … parents summoned to court
The police officers who intervened at the family home had notably "noted that two children aged two and five" were "attached to high chairs, so as not to let them move", and in a "deplorable state of hygiene", according to the wooden floor.
“We did not link the issues”
"We will conduct an administrative investigation" with "the inspections of social affairs, justice and national education, alongside the department" to "decipher" why "it gave rise to such a late reaction", he said. - she announced, recognizing “failures”, in particular in terms of “coordination and exchange of information”.
“There were several cases taken in charge”, “reports”, in particular from National Education, but “which were not necessarily cross-checked”, she regretted.
Read alsoAbuse of minors: the Council of State cancels a sanction against a doctor who had refused to be silent
"All the departments supported them, each in their silo", but "we did not link the problems of the big brother with those of the infant" and "we did not realize the recurrence, and increasing difficulty," she observed.
Visits from social services also took place, but the couple warned in advance "may have been putting their house in order with good will or consciously to hide their reality", she noted.
"Poverty, the extremely important situations of violence in this department also justify" the establishment of a "reinforced monitoring committee" involving all the actors, she said.
Such a monitoring committee - an experiment permitted by a law passed in February 2022 - will be set up in Pas-de-Calais to improve "coordination" and "exchange of information" between the various actors in the protection of childhood, including the prefecture, the department, Justice and National Education.
