The JDD. Thomas Perroto died a year ago, on November 19, 2023. Do you have any news from his family?
Marie-Hélène Thoraval. It's a family as devastated as a year ago, that I try to support by calling them regularly. They are also the families of the physically and psychologically injured who are struggling to recover. And finally, an entire region is struggling to calm its anger. An anger rekindled by the more recent death of Nicolas, at the entrance to a nightclub, a few kilometers away. This time, we hear about an intimidation strategy linked to drug trafficking, and we discover that our prisons house real criminal command centers… How do you expect the French to put up with this information any longer?
Concerning Thomas, I am not in the secret of the investigation obviously, but if there had been obvious progress, we would be aware. As for Nicolas, the police in Marseille and Valence have done an extraordinary job, proving that they know his delinquency perfectly well.
In both cases, we must highlight the work of the national police or the gendarmerie, and encourage our law enforcement officers. We must give them back the means to act, whether human, material and above all moral. They must be able to carry out their work correctly without being prevented, suspected, accused and permanently hindered. And then, the Ministers of the Interior and Justice must work together to strengthen the criminal response. There is urgency.
What is your state of mind today?
A year ago, I insisted on talking about social facts and no longer news items. Now I see that we have made progress in this area. It would not occur to Bruno Retailleau to talk about a feeling of insecurity, as Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne did at the time. Now we need to put a battle plan in place.
What is the point of talking about social facts? What does this change?
If we talk about a news item, we seek to elucidate the matter and find a culprit, then we move on to something else. If we talk about social facts, we consider that behind a series of cases there is an underlying trend around a proportion of the population being hermetic to our values and common rules. This is the case for some in Romans, with the assassinations of Thomas, Zakaria and Nicolas in less than a year. But it is also a national subject. Faced with this phenomenon, the strategy to adopt is necessarily no longer the same.
However, I note that since Thomas' death, we have talked a lot about net operations in which I never believed, but the situation is still catastrophic.
Why was this a bad answer for you?
Moving the deal points by considering that all delinquency results from it is not a serious assessment of the situation. Delinquency phenomena are caused by a part of the population who refuses to apply our common rules. It's a minority, it's true, but a minority in number can be, in a given territory, a majority in terms of strength and impact.
How can we describe these territories, what is special about them?
We constantly use circumlocution so as not to describe them correctly. “Sensitive neighborhoods” for example. Sensitive to what? to whom? No one is able to answer. Or “priority districts of the city”. Priority of what? in relation to whom? in terms of interventions? which ones? And the ultimate deception is the “working class neighborhoods”. These neighborhoods were designed to accommodate populations of workers who left them a long time ago and who have never fallen into the excesses we are talking about. And even when they were immigrants from elsewhere: when immigration was European, some left the neighborhood by acquiring property, and many finally returned to their country.
But our “working class” neighborhoods have been replaced by community neighborhoods. And our response has always been the same: buy precarious peace through the distribution of subsidies. With the failure we see.
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How can we correctly describe these neighborhoods?
They were community because the vast majority of inhabitants came from immigration, and homogeneous groups were formed over time depending on regions and countries of origin, with the importation of alternative cultures and lifestyles. to those who unite the French. But the flow of immigration has never stopped, and the community phenomenon has itself been weakened: our neighborhoods are now ethnic. It's probably unpleasant to hear, but it's reality.
However, such belonging no longer implies reference points, community leaders and many young people are then open to the most attractive influence, in a France which has renounced the very idea of assimilation. I also have a very special thought for all those who have made this effort at assimilation and who see this situation as an immense injustice.
Doesn't that necessarily explain the violence either?
When you no longer have common points of reference, you no longer have a model to follow. So you are looking for one. The basic question is that of influence in these neighborhoods.
And what is your answer?
The reference is dictated by whoever has the leadership position. In the absence of parental, state or even community authority, there remains the power of money. And this brings us back to organized crime, and drug trafficking in particular. We cannot break this influence, which is obviously opposed to France, by moving deal points. Nor by excusing drug users, because Bruno Retailleau was right to point out that their products taste like blood. Clearing the way, really, would have required attacking that root.
“In the absence of authority, there remains the power of money”
Is drug trafficking crowding out the influence of Islamism?
No, this religious radicalism can be added and also fuel the desire to fight France. On this point, our error goes back a long way, when we refused to be clear and unanimous on the question of the veil. Beyond possibly individual choices, it has become a way of asserting oneself against the common model and you have to be blind not to see it.
How can we explain the at least partial disappearance, at the same time, of parental authority?
Fortunately, there are still families in which it is intact. But parental authority has been considerably weakened twice. First, by what we call city policy (another term that has no meaning), which claimed to occupy and take care of children instead of parents. Educators and “big brothers” were then influencers in these neighborhoods, little by little replaced by others, more powerful, who claimed control of the territory. In a second movement, the youngest became a particularly interesting “workforce” for them.
To which is added, in certain delinquent dynasties, the transmission of delinquency. I caused howls when I said it last year, but we all see that some minors arrested have parents known to the services, in prison, or with multiple convictions. Sometimes even drug addicts… so imagine the mental health of their children…
At the time, you were also threatened elsewhere. What about today?
I received four death threats, two people were arrested and received prison sentences. I believe they came out of it but I am not informed. For the rest, I have absolutely no problem with people who recognize France as their country, in these neighborhoods as elsewhere. I even receive a lot of thanks and encouragement to continue describing reality.
You must understand that behind my words, there are dead people.
I therefore reiterate: we must ask the question of parental responsibility. It would also be a way of recognizing the merit of those who take excellent care of their children, and in particular single mothers who are often described as overwhelmed. Some are absolutely not.
In your opinion, should we look at the aid granted in cases of child delinquency?
It's obvious. Some parents deserve to be hit in the wallet. But as mayors, we can't do much, most of this aid comes from the State: CAF, housing allowances or RSA mainly. What are the controls on this aid? There are none. We could, for example, look at proven cases of polygamy with what we call “decohabiting wives” and the aid that multiplies with it! Same thing with the allocation of housing. This is a file in which we should put a little humanity, that is to say human resources, to follow and appreciate the reality of the situations.
What is the problem on this point?
In general, housing is the property of the social landlord. However, leases do not provide for a review clause! Concretely, the allocation of social housing has no time limit.
If you behave badly or do not pay, there is a possibility of taking the case but the procedure is objectively discouraging, because it rarely succeeds. We must restore agility to communities and power to social landlords so that they can manage their assets.
Then it is totally crazy to realize that the evolution of income is never monitored even though these housing units are allocated with means criteria! Also crazy that assets held abroad are not included in the assessment of resources, even though they generate income! Everything needs to be reviewed, again.
