The number of hours worked by each agent cannot exceed 48 hours per week over a period of 3 months for interns or 4 months for qualified practitioners.
Public hospitals must carry out a count “reliable and objective“of the working time of their doctors and interns, in order to respect the legal ceiling of 48 hours per week, recalled the Council of State in a series of decisions rendered on Wednesday.
Read alsoAbsenteeism, vacant positions… A study highlights the difficulties of public hospitals
SEE ALSO – Demonstration of caregivers: “Interim aggravates tensions in the hospital”, explains Julien Da Sois
Seized by three unions of doctors and interns, the Council of State rejected their requests aimed at obliging the government to reinforce the rules in force. A sham setback, because these decisions are accompanied by a reminder of the law for all public health establishments. Indeed, the existing lawnecessarily implies“than hospitals”equip themselves with a reliable, objective and accessible system making it possible to count (…) the daily number of hours worked by each agent», which cannot exceed 48 hours per week over a period of 3 months for interns or 4 months for qualified practitioners.
Important case law for “respect for working time”
The means of precisely measuring this working time come under therules of procedureof each hospital, and not of the State, which also does not have to “impose a penalty“For employers at fault, as there are in the private sector, adds the Council of State. Contacted by AFP, the president of the National Intersyndicale des Interns (Isni), Gaëtan Casanova, however appeals to the government “to set the terms and conditions for setting up this hourly count“following this decision”historical“, at a time “for the rights of interns» et «for patients who will no longer be systematically cared for by exhausted caregivers».
Read alsoHospital: the interim, a “soft drug” accused of aggravating tensions
His counterpart from the Young Doctors union, Emmanuel Loeb, considers that the case law of the Council of State “will make it possible to seize the competent courts in the event of non-compliance with working hours“, whose responsibility also depends on”of the medical community, in particular department heads“. More mixed, the president of Action Praticiens Hôpital (APH), Jean-François Cibien, considers that the rejection of his request is “a failure“, which leaves no other possibility than “individual appealsfor the 135,000 doctors and hospital interns, at the risk of clogging up the administrative courts.
SEE ALSO – South Africa: a second chance hospital for pangolins