At the Haute-Garonne departmental council, 500 jobs lost, 2,000 agents on the street – Libération

The banner at the head of the procession sounds like a slap in the face for Sébastien Vincini, president (PS) of the Haute-Garonne departmental council. “Jaurès, wake up, they have gone crazy,” proclaims the inter-union of community employees. After a first massive gathering last week in the interior courtyard of the imposing building which houses the department's services, anger spilled over onto the boulevards of Toulouse. The announcement of the elimination of 500 jobs due to budgetary austerity did not pass. Widely distributed to passers-by, a leaflet written jointly by the CGT, SUD and Force Ouvrière denounces “a social plan” and already predicts “a reduction in benefits for the elderly” or “the increase in school canteen prices” in colleges.

“Precariousness is not a choice”

To pass the bitterness of the pill, the departmental council for its part raises the specter of a virtual “bankruptcy” and the threat of budgetary supervision by the Regional Chamber of Accounts. Like all departments in France, the departmental council of Haute-Garonne must face at the same time the tightening of the screw imposed by the government on local authorities and a drop in its tax revenue based on “notary fees”. There is a shortage of 140 million to complete the 2025 budget, according to Sabine Geil-Gomez, elected official (PS) in charge of human resources. Also mayor of a small town of 5,000 inhabitants north of Toulouse, the elected official of the canton of Pechbonnieu had the bad idea of ​​recording a video to explain the data of the financial dilemma to the staff… under a poster of Jean Jaurès. The figure of the illustrious pantheonized bearded socialist is returned to him like a boomerang.

In the ranks of the demonstrators, some do not hesitate to directly address their elected representatives and «patrons» socialists. Laurence, an employee at the departmental council's documentation center, made a sign with a pressure cooker ready to explode to better challenge “Seb” Vincini. “These staff cuts will impact everyone, in colleges or nursing homes,” alarms the forty-year-old who wears a CGT badge. An announced deterioration of public service which hurts “in a left-wing department”, adds an office colleague. Other demonstrators diverted the posters of the departmental council, ensuring that “precariousness is not a choice”. For Hugues Bernard, CFDT delegate, it is precisely the department's choice to massively hire contractual staff for years that is being called into question today. “Jobs cannot be an adjustment variable like in private companies,” asserts this socialist activist.

“Saving pennies”

In Haute-Garonne, more than 1,000 agents of the department are not civil servants, but employees with contracts of varying length, depending on the unions. Mainly in service professions. In colleges in Revel or Luchon, principals are already worried about how to monitor boarding schools next year without night guards, reports a SUD delegate. The long list of affected public services drawn up in the inter-union leaflet also includes the difficulties in clearing snow from the roads in the event of snowfall this winter. Nearly 700 agents are assigned to the maintenance of the road network, underlines Raphaël Groset, CGT delegate. The representative of the department's first union still wonders where elected officials will find the 20 million savings on payroll announced by Sabine Geil-Gomez in the 2025 budget.

The drastic cuts do not only concern the most precarious staff. The departmental council also wants to renegotiate the agreement on working hours and call into question the days of leave granted to staff during better budgetary periods. “Saving pennies” according to the unions, who estimate the overall envelope at 20 million per year. It is above all the eagerness of Sébastien Vincini's executive to anticipate the austerity plan demanded by the government which calls out to the trade union organizations, all labels combined. “We can understand the tense budgetary context, but the timing seems precipitous to us,” summarizes Raphaël Groset.