This is a new and unconventional way of issuing a warning that several rural mayors have decided to use, in the face of the difficulties in accessing care that are hitting their territories hard. In Brittany, since June, fifty-five councillors of Côtes-d’Armor have issued an order aimed at responding to the “disturbance of public order” caused by “a health care offer that is clearly insufficient to guarantee equal access to health care [leurs] managed ».
The State is called upon to implement a “Emergency plan for access to health” and of “Proceed with the provision of staff and resources in the department’s public hospitals”under penalty of a fine of 1,000 euros per day. At the end of August, the left-wing mayor of Digne-les-Bains followed suit by signing a similar decree, as did around thirty mayors in his department of Alpes-de-Haute-Provence.
The legal process appears to have little chance of success, but the approach is also intended to be political. “We regularly mobilise for our hospital services in Carhaix. [Finistère]in Lannion [Côtes-d’Armor]in Guingamp [Côtes-d’Armor]But it doesn’t lead to anything, there is never any dialogue with the regional health agency, the ministry, the State… we wanted to change our method of action”explains Gaël Roblin, elected (left-wing independentist) to the municipal council of Guingamp, at the origin of the approach. “It has been a year and a half since the Guingamp maternity ward closed. says Vincent le Meaux, one of the signatory mayors and president of the Guingamp-Paimpol agglomeration. It is unfortunate that we have to go to court, but ultimately we want to get answers, mediation. »
Very specific requests
However, the State did not follow up: in the context of the legality check, the prefect of Côtes-d’Armor referred the orders to the administrative court, requesting their annulment. At a first hearing in Rennes (Ille-et-Vilaine), on Tuesday 3 September, to which fifteen mayors were summoned, the public rapporteur leaned towards the prefect. According to his comments, reported by Agence France-Presse: the orders would be “illegal”having been the mayors “beyond their police power”A meeting of ten Breton councillors will be held next week, with a first decision expected in mid-September.
In these normative texts the same argument is developed: access to care is a “essential condition” Respect for dignity and the absence of corrective measures to guarantee it “seriously harms human dignity and constitutes a breach of public order”. The mayor holding “the administrative police authority”may therefore issue such an order to put an end to this problem.
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