The Administrative Court of Montreuil gives 40 days to the mayors of Seine-Saint-Denis to apply the law.
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No question of escaping the law, even if we contest the foundation. The Administrative Court of Montreuil (Seine-Saint-Denis) has not fallen before the arguments of the five Communist mayors of the department who refused to work their municipal agents at least 35 hours a week, as forces them, since the 1 ” sup> January, the law of August 6, 2019 on the transformation of the public service. In an order made on 31 January 2022, the Tribunal orders the mayors concerned to make a deliberation on the working time of their agents within a forty days.
The decision of the administrative court, the first rendered in France in this context, constitutes a victory for the government. Symbolically, it marks the concrete entry into force of the 35-hour law in the territorial public service, and the failure of opponents. Despite the many challenges that this text has been the subject, all officials must now work at least 1,607 hours a year, including local communities. It is the end of the derogatory regimes, more favorable to the agents, who had been put in place in some cities, like Bobigny, where the communal staff works on average 1,544 hours per year, or 63 hours less than The new legal obligation.
“A terrible law of social regression”
The verdict of Montreuil was very expected, even if it is only a prescription. “By assigning by the prefect five mayors of Seine-Saint-Denis, the government had launched a test ball, estimates Denis Öztorun, the Communist Mayor of Bonneuil-sur-Marne (Seine-et-Marne), which. opposes, too, at 35 o’clock. The state probably did not want to start with the Seine-et-Marne, the department from which the protest is part of, and where the elected officials are very mobilized. But now, I expect to meet me too quickly in court. “
In the face of the conjugate pressure of the government and justice, recalcitrant mayors now have no choice. For most of them, they are preparing to apply the law, while trying to penalize their staff as much as possible. “I’m not an offender,” says Denis Öztorun. So if I’m forced, I will apply, and the municipal agents will devote to the municipality of an additional 1 hour per week. They can, for example, participate in sports and cultural workshops. If they want to make yoga or boxing, why not? “Similarly, in Montreuil, overtime taxes imposed on officials could be employed in training, sport, or bodybuilding for collegeists .
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