Pap Ndiaye stands out from his predecessor, Jean-Michel Blanquer
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It has become the end of summer chestnut tree. Once again, the back-to-school allowance (ARS) is the subject of controversy on social networks and in the political sphere. The Minister of National Education, Pap Ndiaye, stepped up to the plate on Thursday August 18 to defend the payment of this means-tested benefit to families with at least one school-going child aged 6 to 18 years. “This aid is necessary and just for the back-to-school expenses of more than 3 million families. Casting suspicion on its use is unfounded and stigmatizing”wrote Pap Ndiaye on Twitter.
At each start of the school year, there is a little music on the use of the back-to-school allowance. This help is… https://t.co/rAifYwu9EK
Before him, other members of the government, including Olivier Véran, spokesperson, or Olivier Klein, the Minister Delegate for Cities and Housing, as well as left-wing personalities, took a stand in favor of this aid, while right-wing parliamentarians want to exercise more control over its use.
If these controversies are recurrent, the situation has changed within the government between the two five-year terms of Emmanuel Macron. With his statements, Pap Ndiaye takes the opposite view of his predecessor, Jean-Michel Blanquer. In 2021, the debates were inflamed after remarks by the former Minister of National Education. He had judged “interesting” the idea of the MoDem MP, Perrine Goulet, to pay the back-to-school allowance in the form of vouchers.
“We know well, if we look at things in the face, that sometimes there are larger purchases of flat screens in September than at other times”, he blurted out. Faced with the outcry, Emmanuel Macron then supported his minister: “We would be blind or naive to think that all of what each household receives in back-to-school allowance is donated to buy supplies or children’s books. » At the same time, the Head of State defended himself from any form of “stigma” towards families. “ We must not enter into a system of social control., he then pleaded.
“Vouchers” instead of a sum of money
The controversy started with a bill, tabled in early August by a dozen Les Républicains (LR) deputies, including their interim president Annie Genevard. For these parliamentarians, “real assignment” of the ARS “remains unknown to the public authorities insofar as it remains at the discretion of the families of the beneficiaries”. As a result, according to these deputies, “the absence of control over the expenses incurred allows the beneficiaries to use this aid for purposes other than that of the needs of their children for their schooling”. They advocate “more thorough control” of the payment of this allowance, with in particular the obligation to provide proof of schooling, and want to make compulsory the provision by the municipalities of a “kit of school supplies” and the allocation of “vouchers” instead of a sum of money.
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