Invited Sunday on franceinfo, the member of the organizing committee of the Games and former Secretary General of the CGT, warns about the lack of security personnel.
Published on 21/01/2024 22:13
Bernard Thibault, January 12, 2012. (FRED DUFOUR / AFP)
“It will be missing several thousand” private security agents for the Paris Olympic and Paralympic Games, alerts Bernard Thibault, a member of the organizing committee of the Games, on Sunday, January 21 on franceinfo, six months before the start of the international sports event. “We will not have the necessary private security staff for the organization of the Games as they have been established,” affirms the former Secretary General of the CGT.
Private security is a “particularly precarious professional sector” because “it is very poorly paid” and “working hours are very restricted,” explains Bernard Thibault. The union representative claims to have “advocated for leveraging the Games to improve the social status of this sector,” but “it was not done.”
“A risky meeting”
“We will call on people who will be trained at a minimum just to perform security tasks,” laments Bernard Thibault who is also co-president of the Follow-up Committee on the Social Charter adopted for the Paris Olympics. “It is still delicate to present this meeting as a risky meeting and to have a part of the system that relies on people who will be trained quickly only for this meeting, who will not be professionals.”
Private security contracts must be signed by mid-February, said the interministerial delegate for the Olympic Games, Wednesday, during a hearing in the Senate. “This does not mean that the agents will be there,” he clarified. According to Michel Cadot, there is a global need for “18,000 agents on average per day” and “24,000 at the peak.”
