Sunday December 10, 2023, during an interview given to La Tribune Sunday, Aurore Bergé, Minister responsible for Solidarity and Families, unveiled a measure which could soon apply to so-called parents “defaulters”. A term that seems rather vague at first glance, which the politician wanted to clarify. “I start from an observation: parents cannot be the forgotten ones of our public policies. We need them, we must work with them. And it is on them that I want to rely […]”, she explains in the preamble. Recalling the recent riots following the death of Nahel in June 2023, she wishes to address “these mothers going out into the street in the evening to pick up their children and put them back on the right path.” From this crisis, alarming figures emerged, according to which “30% of the rioters were minors and 60% of them grew up in so-called single-parent families“, notes Aurore Bergé again. Representing nearly 25% of households, this family model would be a catalyst for these management difficulties. “What does it mean to be parents? And where is the second parent, often the father? Fathers cannot be reduced to child support! Society has finally come to terms with the fact that women take on certain tasks with children alone. […] We don’t leave our children”, she denounces. An abandonment of parental responsibilities which therefore seems to be at the heart of the problem.
Parents considered “responsible” damages
It’s about parents”overwhelmed, disoriented”, who are confronted with new lifestyles, such as screen abuse, social networks and a sedentary lifestyle, and to which they must know how to respond. But it is a completely different issue, that of restoring parental authority in the event of a crime that the government wants to tackle. Avoiding a speech “infantilizing”, who doesn’t want to be “neither reactionary nor cheesy”the State wishes to sanction parents considered to be “defaulters”. Community service penalties or even fines could in fact apply to these parents, as long as the child is the author of damage. And when they do not accompany the child to his court hearings, they would be considered “responsible” for the damage. If this measure seems difficult to apply as the notion of failure is difficult to understand, “concrete proposals” will be revealed within six months. They will come from a scientific commission led in particular by the child psychiatrist Serge Hefez in the presence of numerous experts – doctors, magistrates, sociologists – and whose slogan will be “meet the challenges of parenthood today.