RSA reform: individualized target and more reactive sanction

The stated goal of the government is to encourage RSA recipients to return to work. For this, Minister of Labor Olivier Dussaud pointed to a weakening of the system: 15-20 hours of mandatory integration activities per week for recipients will not be included in the bill, but will be objectively “suitable” for everyone. Human.

The activity, which will be “neither free work nor mandatory volunteerism,” will be defined in a “mutual commitment contract” between the beneficiary and his adviser, a contract “that has existed since the inception of RMI in 1988,” he said. outside.

“What fish accompany”

“Part-time assistant, we are not going to ask her for an additional 20 hours of integration (…). A disabled beneficiary who spends time diagnosing her health problems to find out what positions she can hold returns to work, this happens within 15-20 hours,” he gave as an example during a press conference.

The main task of the government is to solve the problem of lack of support. Because “of the 1.950 million RSA beneficiaries, 350,000 have no social or socio-professional accompaniment,” he insisted. And “seven years after their first enrollment, 42% of RSA recipients are still there, it’s a collective failure.”

“What fails is the accompaniment. We do not renounce our duty of solidarity when we paid someone 607 euros,” he reasoned.

The RSA reform, which has begun testing in 18 departments, is part of the France Travail bill, which will be presented to the Council of Ministers in June, and will reorganize the public employment service. To strengthen this support, there will be “additional funds”, Olivier Dussopt assured, recalling that the High Commissioner for Employment, Thibaut Guillui, has estimated “between 2 and 2.5 billion euros in total until 2027” for the reform of France Travail.

But it will also come at the expense of a redeployment of Pôle emploi, “whose workforce has increased from 47,000 to 51,000 full-time equivalents (FTE) from 2017 to 2022, while the unemployment rate is now lower than pre-crisis levels,” said He. .

In an interview with France Info on Monday, Olivier Dussaud clarified the nature of the new “second tier” sanctions that RSA beneficiaries could incur if they did not comply with the contract of employment. Therefore, there will be a suspension, that is, a “one step lower” sanction, but considered more reactive than radiation. It “will always be decided by the president of the department council” and “may last a day, a week…”