The Conditions of Support Work and Failure to Obtain Papers: Companions Denounce Slavery at Emmaüs

The companions denounce the conditions of their “support work” and the failure to obtain papers after more than three years spent as volunteers within the structure.

Emmaüs has been one of the associations validated by the prefecture to be able to offer regularization files since 2008. A commission in the prefecture which met when it was created “once or twice a month, and which now only meets once a quarter” to decide on these cases, explains Pierre Duponchel, president of Emmaüs Saint-André, in a press release.

“The initial deal is that the companions who work for Emmaïs are fed, housed, whitewashed in exchange for which the undocumented migrants obtain regularization after three years. If there is no more regularization, it becomes slavery”said Saïd Bouamama of the Committee of Sans-Papiers du Nord, in the columns of La Voix du Nord, yesterday, July 4.

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Said Bouamama, CSP 59 • ©France Télévisions

Or, “admittedly, several people accommodated are convinced, despite our recurring explanations, that after three years, they will be automatically regularized, but this has never been promised as the regularization circuits are so complicated and because everything is in any case the sole responsibility of the prefect”recalls Pierre Duponchel.

On site, the companions explain that they work forty hours a week, for 3 to 5 years, for compensation of around one hundred euros. Housed and fed, they denounce the conditions of this “support work” (since they have the status of volunteers) and the failure to obtain papers.

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Ibrahima Yattara, Guinean refugee • ©France Télévisions

Also via press release, the board of directors of the Halte Saint-Jean renews its support for the management targeted by the demonstrators and assumes “fully its action” for nearly thirty years by welcoming and supporting people in precarious situations and regrets finding himself “soiled by some low-level press on the grounds that she was recently searched as part of a preliminary investigation initiated by the Lille prosecutor (1)“.

Furthermore, concerning the investigation by the Lille public prosecutor’s office, the board of directors explains that “lhe 2018 immigration law offers any person in an irregular situation the possibility of easily and quickly obtaining a temporary residence permit with authorization to work if the person concerned files a complaint as a victim of human trafficking. The mere fact of filing a complaint or testifying opens the door to access this document which is so difficult to obtain through the usual administrative meanders”.