“We are attached to this police station, everyone cares about it”

The report has only been out for a few days, but its contents are generating increasing reactions locally. The Court of Auditors looked into the distribution of French territory between police and gendarmerie. And finds a lot to say about it. Particularly in OccitanieOr many inconsistencies are pointed out.

The Lozere is cited there numerous times. For what ? Because the department of France “the least affected by acts of delinquency, has a ratio of police officers and gendarmes per 1,000 inhabitants higher than that of the Rhône, a department five times more criminogenic”. There was 26.1 incidents of delinquency per 1,000 inhabitants in 2022 in Lozère, which has 4.2 police officers and gendarmes per 1,000 inhabitants.

As a result, the Court recommends transferring all of the municipalities in the department, including the capital, to the national gendarmerie. Lozere (like Gers, Ariège and Lot in Occitania) could therefore lose his policy…

“Sword of Damocles”

A threat that does not pass muster. Where we are used to this type of “recommendations”. “Since 2020, we have been cited. Now it's a little more. We have a sword of Damocles permanently hanging over our heads,” says Stéphane Cellier, the boss of the Alliance union in Lozère.

The departmental secretary regularly fights not to lose staff, while the Mende police station has 74 members all positions combined. A figure that constantly fluctuates. “The workforce is a constant fight. I go door to door to elected officials for that. We have big recruitment problems, particularly for assistant police officers,” the official said. Occitanie News. remembering that a police station is complicated day-to-day management in terms of human resources, since it operates 24 hours a day.

Elected officials also react

This time again, politicians were alerted. And they reacted quickly. The senator Guylène Pantel took advantage of the presence in the Senate of almost the entire government to relay orally and in writing two questions which were transmitted to me by actors on the ground”. One of them came from local police officers. A letter addressed to the Minister of the Interior Bruno Retailleau.

For her part, the deputy Sophie Pantel also contacted the minister to “defend the Mende police station”.

View or download the file.

“In the event of a transfer from the police zone to the gendarmerie, we can fear an overall drop in the number of officials in charge of security in the department; in short, there is no guarantee that 70 gendarmes would replace the 70 police officers” , she believes for example.

“We are attached to this police station, everyone is attached here”wants to believe Stéphane Cellier, who is waiting for a return from the authorities. “I want to know if the new prefect has instructions to close the police station. I want reassure the population and defuse this threat,” he adds.

“We are within the norm, it’s the others who are not doing well”

A threat that is “not tolerable” because it is also poorly argued according to him. When the report talks about the number of civil servants compared to the number of inhabitants, the police officer prefers to use other figures. “There were 540 incidents of delinquency in our country last year. But with 72% elucidation”, he pleads. “The support is also provided in less than 15 minutes in 91% of cases”, notes Stéphane Cellier, adding: “We are within the norm, it is the others who are not doing well”.

The threat of a “security desert”

Clearly, there is no need for fewer law enforcement officers in Lozère due to the low number of inhabitants. But no more police everywhere else. “Delinquency does not stop at the gates of large cities,” still believes the trade unionist.

“Lozériens are not sub-citizens”

Taking the Olympic Games as an example, during which the delinquency rate fell in parallel with the increase in police resources, the official insists: “If we put in the resources, delinquency decreases, that’s factual.” And promises to continue this fight in the face of the threat of a “security desert”.

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