Prime Minister Jean Castex announced the reopening of these establishments from February 16.
The owners of discotheques were pushing a big “phew” of relief Thursday evening, after the announcement by the Prime Minister of a reopening of their establishments in mid-February: impatiently awaited, it should not be accompanied by a negative test imposed on customers in addition to the health pass… unless the health situation deteriorates.
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Closed since December 10 because deemed conducive to contamination by Covid-19 – as elsewhere in Europe for months – the nightclubs will reopen on February 16 and consuming standing in bars will again be authorized, announced Jean Castex on the eve of the decision of the Constitutional Council on the bill making the health pass a vaccination pass. “The profession is super relieved”, reacts to AFP Thierry Fontaine, president of the night branch of the main hotel and catering union, Umih. “Finally measures that hold water: there is consistency, we finally feel respected, listened to”, he continues.
This decision was eagerly awaited: these establishments, among the most affected by the pandemic, will thus have kept their doors closed for ten weeks, after an initial period of 16 months of forced inactivity from the start of the health crisis until July 2021. “We are not going to shun the pleasure of finally reopening … but what a waste: closing ourselves did not prevent having a number of contaminations never seen before. We were ultra-stigmatized as an ultra-dangerous place, but closing us down was trying to stop a tsunami with a sandbag.”, believes Mathieu Lebrun, manager of the Le Milton nightclub in Baudre (Manche), which employs 12 people.
Aid “not at the rendezvous”
According to him, aid “in proportion to the difficulties” promised by the government, are not there: the device “fixed costs” with 100% coverage of operating losses in December and January, “pays some bills” but will be insufficient in particular for nightclubs in ski resorts, which sometimes make half of their annual turnover in December, against 20% on average, he says.
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For the time being, only 80 aid application files have been submitted, out of 1,534 nightclubs in France (some only opening in the summer), Bercy told professionals. Discotheques also benefit from partial unemployment without remaining dependents and from assistance with the payment of social security contributions announced on Tuesday. “There are so many little lines (in the aid request forms, editor’s note) that very few of us are entitled to them”, told AFP Carl Hautbois, boss of Gossip in Vitré (Ille-et-Vilaine) which has 36 employees, a company “very healthy before the Covid” but to the treasury now exhausted.
No test requested
The professionals were especially delighted, on Thursday, to learn that a negative test of less than 24 hours will not be requested from their customers in addition to the vaccination pass, as in Germany: they saw it as a real sword of Damocles, for a sector which made a billion euros in turnover in 2019 and has 22,000 employees – plus 23,000 security guards. “The law allows us to do so”, said the Minister of Health Olivier Véran, “but we don’t have the ambition to do it, at least not as it is.” Nevertheless “if ever the decision were to change, once again, be careful (…) you never know what could happen, but that is the intention at the moment”, he said.
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Indeed, the bill strengthening the tools for managing the health crisis, adopted on Sunday in Parliament, provides that in certain circumstances to be defined by decree, it may be required on behalf of “the interest of public health” the combined presentation of proof of vaccination status and a negative test, to access certain establishments. “In Switzerland, it was a disaster for our colleagues”, reports Carl Hautbois. As for whether or not wearing a mask is compulsory inside nightclubs, the minister said it would depend on the epidemic situation.
According to Sacem, which collects copyright for the music broadcast by these establishments, 82 nightclubs had filed for bankruptcy and 131 had been placed in compulsory liquidation in March 2021 – latest figures available.