Education: La France insoumise presents an “emergency plan” for schools

Make school “really” free, increase salaries and recruit teachers, invest in adaptation to global warming... Paul Vannier, LFI deputy, presented on Tuesday the four main axes of the “emergency plan” for education from the parliamentary group to the National Assembly. “National Education is at a tipping point, it threatens to collapse,” warned the Val-d’Oise MP on Tuesday, the start of the school year, insisting on the need to act “now.”

“We must recruit teachers and oppose job cuts,” he declared in order to “put an end to the scandal of more than 15 million hours of lessons not replaced each year due to lack of teachers.” For this, Jean-Luc Mélenchon's party is proposing the establishment of a “multi-year recruitment plan” and the creation of an additional session of the competition “from this winter”, as well as the tenure of “tens of thousands” of contract workers.

On the question of salaries, France Insoumise undertakes to increase them “immediately” by 20% in the first year of the five-year term, in the event of victory in the presidential election in April and May. “Today, a teacher begins his career at 1.04 minimum wage, compared to 2.2 in the 1980s,” denounced Paul Vannier, affirming that it is “impossible” to recruit sufficient numbers and quality teachers “under these conditions.”

These measures would be financed by tax reforms

Furthermore, LFI is pleading for a “free plan” for the canteen, after-school activities, outings, school supplies and textbooks, while the “average cost of a child's education for a family” amounts to “488 euros” this year. This “total free” would represent a cost of 10 billion euros per year. The left party also intends to welcome disabled students “with dignity”, while “50,000 of them did not have support” last year. This implies an increase in the remuneration of those accompanying students with disabilities (AESH).