Despite the unfavorable opinion of the Council of State, the government wants the obligation to show a health pass to enter certain shopping centers to be maintained.

The magistrates nevertheless considered that it was "a disproportionate attack on freedoms".

For them, access to basic necessities must be guaranteed. 

The government wants to maintain the obligation to present a health pass in certain shopping centers, while taking into account the opinion of the Council of State which judges that access to essential goods must be guaranteed, the door announced on Monday. - speech of the government Gabriel Attal.

"A disproportionate attack on freedoms"

The executive had proposed Sunday to limit the obligation to present a health pass to shopping centers of more than 20,000 m2, from the beginning of August.

But in its opinion issued on Monday and consulted by AFP, the Council of State stressed that the presentation of a health pass in these structures was "likely to particularly concern the acquisition of essential goods, in particular food" .

However, the court sees in it "a disproportionate infringement of freedoms", in particular for people who cannot be vaccinated for medical reasons and who will therefore have to be "tested very regularly" to access these centers.

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- The Council of State validates the extension of the health pass but has some reservations

At the end of the Council of Ministers Monday evening, Gabriel Attal announced that it had been "decided to adapt the wording of this measure in the bill" of the government which extends the obligation of the health pass.

"Concretely, the article in the bill provides for the extension of the sanitary pass for shopping centers whose surface area exceeds a threshold which will be defined by decree", indicated Gabriel Attal, specifying that "the working path" concerned centers of more than 20,000 m2.

"We hope the rules will be more or less clear"

Thus, in practice, if at "the scale of a territory, there are shops which are not in the shopping center but which would allow the purchase of basic necessities, food or pharmaceuticals, then the health pass can be applied in the shopping center of this basin of life, "he said. But when "we can only guarantee access to basic necessities in a large shopping center, there will be no use of the health pass in this shopping center," added Gabriel Attal. Regarding the more precise assessment of what a "catchment area" is, "we will do it in conjunction with prefects and local elected officials," said Gabriel Attal.

Jacques Creyssel, director general of the Federation of Commerce and Distribution, interviewed by AFP, estimated that "this mechanism is complex, with an analysis by areas of life which we do not really see how it will be" . "We hope that the rules will be more or less clear. The problem is that the Council of State does not retain only this subject: he said that it is not necessary in terms of health, damage to the "Equality, distortion of competition. This complex system shopping center by shopping center, store by store, does not seem to me to meet these objectives and is extremely complicated," he said.