If I had given a Euro for every poor sod who begged for help in the Metro this morning, I would be out there with them. I was in tears for the souls who have all fallen through the rather wide cracks in the French social system, no one looking after them… The only one who had any purses opened was claiming to be a retired Frenchman whose pension was not enough for him to live. Everyone else (too thin, too smelly, maybe drinks, maybe takes drugs?) left empty handed.
We, as immigrants, have experienced refusal of our social rights under the French system many times, notably when the Pole d’Emploi refused to pay my husband the chomage to which he was perfectly entitled after 20 years of working and never once taking a penny from the State, just needing a bit of help to get back on his feet. He needed 2 years of psychiatric help to get over his breakdown caused by this experience, did he get it in France, no…
Even with the legal text of his rights laid before them, the fonctionnaires just said “non…non…non”. Until after 21 months of fighting, my husband was ready to commit an act like the poor sod who around the same time doused himself in petrol in a Pole d’Emploi office and set himself alight. The reaction from the French authoritities reported by the Press “we need better security to protect Pole d’Emploi workers”. Egalité at work!! Sure…
I have had equally good and bad expériences of the healthcare system, also during my pregnancy. Dreadful treatment and left to fend for myself for 7 months until I was finally treated by a (half) decent hospital as an emergency walk in. Operated on unecesarily due to incompetence and “experts” charging exorbitant fees for a 5 minute consultation only to tell me nothing was wrong with me because he didn’t find anything (quickly proven wrong).
The French people I know in Paris and locally in our rural area unanimously complain about the poor quality of teaching and lack of choice with regards to food in school (forcing too much meat and dairy upon children to satisfy the agricultural lobbyists). One vegan girl I know was told she WOULD DIE because of her food choices. They look to us to give free English lessons, admitting that the teachers of this subject barely speak the language.
Virtually 100% of my colleagues in a reasonably “mundane” activity come from white, rich, privileged families and have NO CLUE about the struggles of the majority of people living normal lives.
Far from perfect, I have seen no Liberté, Egalité and certainly no Fraternité since I have been here. The lack of charity here compared to the UK shocks me to the core.
So before I’m asked why I still choose to live here… better work / life balance comes very high up the list. I simply can earn less, pay more (yes almost everything is more expensive) but still spend a bit more time with my family than I could in London.
Oh, and as for the autoroutes, tolls paid for largely by tourists and foreigners to private companies pay for those rather good roads, not the local who largely shun them for free, local road alternatives. Our local roads here are like a bone-shaking, patchwork quilts. It took 30 years to approve and build a very sensible bypass of our historic village which had 500 lorries a day rumbling underneath our narrow 11th century stone archway…
I’m sorry if this hurts a few people’s sensibilities and shatters a few illusions but this is the experience of just one couple, fairly able to look after themselves and pull themselves out of it all in the end - imagine what it’s like for people who REALLY need social help and can’t access it, like those poor sods on the Metro this morning.