While a camp for unaccompanied minors has been set up in Place de la Bastille for more than a month, elected environmentalists are demanding that an accommodation solution be offered to them. A wish to this effect will be submitted to the Council of Paris, which opens this Tuesday, July 5.

The elected environmentalists have decided to act. Since, according to them, “no housing solution or orientation is made available to these young people when their minority is not recognised”, they therefore demand that the City of Paris “make every effort […] to open new places dedicated to caring for these young people as soon as possible”.

shelter for the duration of the appeal

“Many young people have been dismissed, and are currently in appeal. Today they meet on this camp [de la place de la Bastille, ndlr]. We leave young people on the street while some are minors”, denounces Nour Durand Raucherelected ecologist in the 11th arrondissement, who maintained that a “shelter” be offered “during the appeal period”.

Because according to the elected official, if there are about sixty unaccompanied minors on this camp, they would actually be in total “up to 300 a year” to pass through Paris. Some spend according to him “a year on the street”, where the risk that they smoke “the way of alcohol or drugs” is very present.

A situation proven by the associations which help them in the field like Utopia 56, which testifies that around sixty young people on the street “do not benefit from any support or accommodation”. “Abandoning them in this situation is open to all excesses,” says the association.

For 30 days, around sixty isolated young people (sur)live on the rue place de la Bastille in Paris. The government’s only response to our emails was to seize the Council of State to ban our mobilization. He lost. #minorsonthestreet pic.twitter.com/6ZwQ7SVPzB

— Utopia 56 (@Utopia_56) June 26, 2022

Towards accommodation for these minors?

With the group of elected environmentalists, Nour Durand-Raucher – in favor of “the presumption of minority” – campaigns for the City of Paris to systematically consider these young people as minors, when there is doubt and when they file an appeal. In particular so that they are taken care of by the municipality, of which it is the competence.

They also hope for the opening of a dedicated reception area, avenue Emile Zola, in the 15th arrondissement of Paris. “Finally, we need places of reception for these minors, and it is a real subject that France is able to protect minors” estimates the elected official, who recalls that they come mainly from black Africa but also from Iraq or Afghanistan “depending on the period”.