A “visit duty”. This is the proposal launched by the President of the Republic on Wednesday, during an interview at She. Emmanuel Macron explained that he wanted to open a debate on the establishment of a “duty to support, until adulthood, children”, which would allow single mothers to “demand” involvement and regular visits of their ex-spouses. But what exactly is he talking about? Why does this provoke debate? How is the government defending itself? 20 minutes takes stock for you.
What did Emmanuel Macron say?
Emmanuel Macron estimated in the columns of She that “there must no longer be just a right but a duty of visitation, a duty of monitoring, of education, of continuing the parental project beyond the couple”.
In a video broadcast Tuesday evening by the magazine, the president wants “we can open this debate, which is basically both a debate on parenthood and a debate on equality between women and men, which is that of establishing a duty of visitation, a duty of support until adulthood, for children.”
“When there is a father, he must exercise all his duties and the mother, when she is in this situation, can demand regular visits,” he adds, considering that, “including for the child, it’s better.” This proposal comes at a time when in France, one in four families is single-parent (i.e. two million families and 3.1 million minor children) and is headed by a woman in 82% of cases, recalled a recent senatorial report. .
Why is this debated?
This proposal has raised questions among associations, concerned that these compulsory visits are not always in the interests of families, particularly in the event of conflictual separations or intra-family violence.
“Duty of visitation = dangerous idea: a violent, abusive, failing man is not a good father. The right objective: the best interests of the child. With or without a father,” the Dare to Feminism association wrote on X. “It must really be in the interest of the child and the mother, we cannot decree that without protective measures,” reacted Véronique Obé, representative of the Union Federation of Single-Parent Families, who brings together around fifteen associations.
For socialist senator Colombe Brossel, co-author of the senatorial report published in March, “making the non-custodial spouse responsible is not only symbolic” with a visitation duty, “but also increasing the amount of alimony” and lowering the “staggering rate of 25% of unpaid alimony”. “As is often the case with the president, he takes a little measure and pretends not to see that the fight against inequalities is systemic,” she criticized.
How does the government argue?
Questioned on CNews and Europe 1 this Thursday, the minister responsible for gender equality assured that it was “not a reactive debate” but “necessary”. “Obviously, the question is not to force a relationship when there is a risk of violence,” assured Aurore Bergé.
Society has become too “accommodated to the idea that women could take on everything on their own and that it was not a big deal” if fathers “limited themselves to alimony which, sometimes, they did not pay”. according to the minister.
Conversely, mothers who “refuse the presentation of a child because there will be a risk of violence, on the other hand, are immediately reminded of the law,” she observed, denouncing a “ imbalance of responsibility”. This “duty of visitation” could materialize in various ways, she said, such as “sanctions for fathers who should already assume their right of visitation and do not assume it”.
