in Arques, a year after the floods, these victims who resold their house to the State

A year later, the stigma is still present. In November 2023, several towns in the Nord and Pas-de-Calais were flooded after historic floods, causing thousands of victims. At least 540,000 inhabitants were directly or indirectly impacted by the disaster. Among these victims: residents who have never been able to return to their homes which were too damaged by rising waters and located in areas at risk.

So, certain owners were able to benefit from what we call the Barnier fund (Michel Barnier, who has since become Prime Minister, is at the origin of the creation of this fund, editor's note), which allows them to resell their house at Condition before it was shaved. In the town of Arques, near Saint-Omer, several residents had to resort to this extreme solution.

“Luckily I sold”

While waiting to see her house razed, Hélène observes one last time the interior of the house drowned last year under nearly a meter of water. “There's not much left to do here…I still have a few things in the cupboards but that's ending. Besides, I haven't really been at home since I signed up last week to benefit from of the Barnier fund”, explains this mother at the microphone of Europe 1.

In Arques, all its houses are being bought by the State to be destroyed. Photo credit: Lionel Gougelot

This system allowed him to sell a condemned house to the State in a neighborhood that had become too exposed to flooding. “Fortunately I sold (to the State editor’s note) because I don’t know how I would have managed to finance the work with what the insurance gave me, I would perhaps have made a third of what needs to be done here, because it’s ridiculous what the insurance offered me as compensation,” she is alarmed.

A traumatic disaster

The house was sold at the estimated value before loss, i.e. 120,000 euros. A lesser evil for Hélène. But “with the amount that was allocated to me, today, I cannot find a house like I had with a garden of 400 square meters. So indeed, these are not the same conditions, now, it is still a chance to not have to spend my life paying for a house that is no longer worth anything,” she emphasizes.

There also remains the trauma of seeing a house destroyed in which this young divorced mother hoped to make a new start. It was finally the opportunity to 'sit down' with my teenage son, but it only lasted three months before taking on 80 cm of water in the house”, she regrets. A disaster which, still today, generates permanent stress for the young woman in the face of the risk of flooding.