Lyon Capital obtained an internal memo from the Metropolis detailing the new criteria for caring for single mothers in its emergency accommodation systems. As expected, they are restricted.
In mid-July, the Métropole de Lyon announced to its social workers, without public communication, that it would pause the reception of new isolated mothers with children in its emergency accommodation system. At the time, Renaud Payre, vice-president in charge of housing, had to defend to our colleagues from Progrès a decision taken due to a “constrained budgetary situation“. Inaudible for associations, in particular the president of Samu social, Maud Bigot, who then put her indignation on paper, creating strong political and media reactions.
Read also: Single mothers: the Métropole de Lyon resumes support but tightens its criteria
Asylum seekers excluded from the system
A few weeks later, the environmentalist president of the Metropolis of Lyon, Bruno Bernard, announced to the press the resumption of care, while assuming to toughen a territorial criterion, which however remained to be specified. In short, the community explained that it would henceforth only take care of people with “a link with its territory“. But an internal note sent to the social workers of the Métropole de Lyon, revealed by our colleagues from rue89Lyon that Lyon Capital obtained, reveals a more general tightening of the criteria for the care of single mothers.
Thus, the Métropole de Lyon reduces its intervention to the strictest public for which it is legally responsible: isolated women, with children under the age of three, excluding asylum seekers. The internal note, which without being definitive, is indeed effective according to several political and associative sources, now indicates that the “implementation of material reception conditions falls within the competence of the State and the French Office of Immigration and Integration“. When contacted, the socialist vice-president in charge of housing did not respond to our request. Neither did the Métropole de Lyon, at the time of writing these lines. To our colleagues from rue89Lyon, Renaud Payre indicated that the decision in charge of asylum seekers (competence of the State) by the metropolis of Lyon could not “not last”.
Conditions “neither applicable nor tenable for social workers”
Also, social workers will now have to assess “mother’s isolation” and seek the presence of a father. A mission that they will have to reconcile with another of their legal prerogative: that of restoring possible family links, in particular with an absent father. But by seeking to restore links with a father, social workers could at the same time bring the mother and her child under the jurisdiction of the State, and thus cause them to lose the emergency accommodation available to them. Furthermore, an assessment of the situation of the people being accommodated will have to be made. now be carried out once a month, compared to once every three months previously.
The territorial criterion is detailed. A “domiciliation must be
effective when requesting shelter“, demands the Metropolis of Lyon. Furthermore, and as announced to the press by Bruno Bernard, for “mothers whose asylum request is rejected in another department, a referral will be made to the department in which the asylum request was made“.
A toughening that Nathalie Perrin-Gilbert denounced during the Lyon municipal council on Thursday September 26, during her preliminary intervention: “The conditions put in place by the Metropolis to accommodate single women and children under the age of three will be neither applicable nor tenable for social workers. In fact, and again, infants risk experiencing the street when they leave the maternity ward. The famous regression of the metropolis did not, in fact, take place.”
Read also: Housing: Grégory Doucet takes the State to court
“The State does not fulfill its obligations“, justified Bruno Bernard
For their part, associative actors remain cautious and refuse to comment on these new instructions which are presented as transitional and which should be adopted, and possibly revised, at the beginning of 2025. However, they all express their concerns, aggravated by the national political context with the he coming to power of a right-wing government. As a reminder, Bruno Bernard had justified the tightening of his reception conditions by “inability“of the community”to be in a permanent increase” of the number of emergency accommodation places, while its budget dedicated solely to the care of single mothers with a child under three years old reached more than 11 million euros in 2024, in a context of decline in revenues to which was added high inflation.
The environmentalist president then recalled that more than 1,100 people including 731 children are currently sheltered in the Metropolis’ reception facilities, while calling on the State and neighboring departments to take their part. “The State does not fulfill its obligations, we are doing more than what we should be doing within our competence” assured Bruno Bernard.
Read also: Emergency accommodation: at least 160 families on the streets in the Rhône according to a report
