Two hours of occupancy: nearly forty taxis parked, on Monday December 2, 2024 between 1:15 p.m. and 3:15 p.m., all around the Bessines roundabout serving in particular the Deux-Sèvres primary health insurance fund, including they blocked the main access, via rue des Iris. Enough to cause traffic jams, especially from the city center of Niort, and the irascibility of certain motorists, ready to take a forbidden direction under the eyes of the police.
This action was the culmination of a snail operation begun, for the demonstrators of Thouarsais, from the beginning of the morning before a regrouping in Parthenay and a journey towards the capital of Deux-Sèvres: after a break on the from Espace Émeraude to Échiré, the procession set off towards Niort and its ring road to reach the A10 motorway and Saint-Maixentais. Before returning via the departmental 611, a new passage via the Niort ring road then the Bessin stop.
We agree to save money, but not at any cost!
François Brandy, honorary president of the Departmental Union of Taxi Craftsmen of Deux-Sèvres, Bessines
This was an opportunity to distribute leaflets, explaining the reasons for the taxis' anger: national in scope, it crystallizes around the Health Insurance convention for the period 2025-2029. In question, the 300 million euros of savings envisaged on medical transport to meet the requirements of the Social Security budget passed on the afternoon of Monday December 2, 2024 through the use of the article 49.3: the reduction would only affect professional seated transport.
In other words, and read on the posters hung on cars with warnings activated, “Health Insurance wants to kill the taxi”.
Half less
“It will impact a lot of businesses, assures Alexis Ferrier, president of the Departmental Union of Taxi Craftsmen of Deux-Sèvres. We will lose between 30% and 40% of turnover. »
-The demonstrators improvised a cold buffet: as at the Deux-Sèvres prefecture a little later, a delegation went to CPAM 79 to deliver their grievances in writing.
© (Photo NR)
Honorary president of this same Udat 79 and vice-treasurer of the national federation, the Niortais François Brandy develops: with this project, including a discount rate even « plus important », “When we take someone for a consultation and we wait one or two hours, they no longer want to pay us for the wait. And when we hospitalize someone and come back empty, they no longer want to pay us back. The profession is in danger. We agree to save money, but not at any cost! »
“Straight to the stop”
At Ambulances Parthenaisiennes, manager Hervé Mallais has made his calculations: medical transport represents €300,000 of its annual turnover, or more than 50%. If the new rules were to be applied, “I would have to lay off three people out of seven”. For Damien Parnaudeau, independent based in Saint-Pardoux-Soutiers, it would even be “directly the stop”.
The procession of angry taxis, here rue du Maréchal-Leclerc in Niort before turning towards the ring road then the A10 motorway.
© (Photo NR)
Jean-Luc Lefèvre, for his part, acquired a license already approved by CPAM in 2023 in Niort, for €100,000: “After a year, I learned that my salary was going to be halved! » The Thouarsaise Cécile Paillat makes 90% of her turnover in the medical sector: this would be “dramatic, we will end up choosing the races according to their profitability”.
The thirty-year-old will be one of the “six to seven” minimum taxis who must reach Paris this Tuesday early in the morning from Deux-Sèvres: this delegation is supposed to take part in the national demonstration planned to last several days.
