2023-07-12 20:45:20
On Thursday, 100% of the field officers of the municipal police of Vénissieux, near Lyon, launched a renewable strike. Officials are asking the mayor (PCF), Michèle Picard, to equip all of its staff (34 agents) with category B weapons, which corresponds to revolvers or long guns. According to the FO union, this request is “vital” after the events that occurred in this town of nearly 70,000 inhabitants after the death of Nahel. For the chosen one, it’s “no”. And this, since the first demands of the unions, as she repeated nearby Progress.
This social movement is an opportunity for 20 Minutes to make a small tour of France of the municipal police (not all, since 4,523 municipalities have such a service) and their armament. According to the Interior Ministry figures published at the end of 2021, 58% of the 24,221 municipal agents are already equipped with firearms. As a reminder, they can be following “a reasoned request from the mayor […] subject to the existence of a valid coordination agreement”, indicates the government website. Their missions remain the same, that is to say, “to ensure good order, security, safety, health and public peace”.
Major cities with armed police
The majority of municipal police therefore have officers equipped, particularly in the south-east of France where nearly 85% of the workforce in Bouches-du-Rhône, Var and Alpes-Maritimes are equipped, according to The Gazette of the Communeswhere city councilors often sit on the right of the political spectrum.
On the other side of France, in Toulouse, it was Jean-Luc Moudenc (ex-LR) who decided to arm his police officers, from 2006, during his first term. Initially, they were only at night, then all the time since 2014, two years after the killings of Mohammed Merah.
As the arming of the police is not reserved for right-wing municipalities, certain “left-wing” town halls have also implemented this measure. In Lyon, the former mayor (ex-PS) Gérard Collomb, long opposed to this idea, then took the plunge after the Paris attacks in November 2015.
Completely opposed mayors
While some have given in, others are resisting. This is the case in Nantes. The municipal police do not have a gun but are equipped with telescopic batons or pedestrian cameras. “Would a lethal weapon better protect [les agents] ? The answer is no”, replied last year the assistant (PS) for security, Pascal Bolo, when the question was at the heart of a municipal council at the request of unions and elected opposition officials. For years, the position of the socialist town hall has not changed on this subject.
Same thing in the North. Martine Aubry, mayor of Lille since 2001, had reaffirmed “her absolute refusal” to equip her police with lethal weapons in 2020. But the principles can evolve. The elected official had always refused video surveillance… before getting started in her last election.
Another socialist reversed her decisions. Initially opposed to the project, Anne Hidalgo finally provided the capital with a municipal police force in 2021. The current staff of 154 officers is equipped with a defense baton, a tear gas canister, a pair of handcuffs and a bulletproof vest. But no gun. “We consider that the missions of our Parisian municipal police officers do not justify equipping them with lethal weapons”, assured Nicolas Nordman, security assistant at the town hall of Paris, in November 2020.
Constantly recurring arms debates
In general, the debate comes up regularly after important news items or on the occasion of new elections. In Rennes, the FO union has been calling for several years for the arming of agents to deal with the “climate of growing insecurity”. But the municipality always refused. Territorial officials are, however, equipped with a defense stick and a tear gas canister. And since the fall of 2021, the mayor (PS) Nathalie Appéré has agreed to provide each crew with an electric pulse gun.
In Bordeaux either, the municipal police are not armed. Despite a recurring request from the opposition, the mayor EELV Pierre Hurmic prefers to focus on prevention and social support, upstream of repression. In 2020, newly elected, he reaffirmed his position after a series of stabbings: “Our municipal police are the first on the ground, they do their job but they will not do everything and they will not be armed” . The municipality wishes above all to increase the number of staff and the means to improve security.
But to increase the workforce, it would still be necessary to have candidates. Of the 8,000 recruitment needs recorded, almost half are still unfilled, according to the national center for the territorial public service. And according to the unions interviewed by 20 Minutes at the end of February, the number one criterion for the lack of attractiveness of the profession would be armaments. Cities refusing to equip their agents with firearms would find it more difficult to seduce…
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