Paris (AFP)

The Defender of Rights, Claire Hédon, “deeply” regrets in an opinion published on Tuesday the choice of an accelerated procedure for the vote of the health bill, given “the extent of the infringements of fundamental rights and freedoms” by the text.

The bill which allows in particular the extension of the health pass and the compulsory vaccination of caregivers was adopted Monday in the Council of Ministers.

It begins its way to Parliament on Tuesday before a possible adoption at the end of the week.

"While recognizing the importance of vaccination in the fight against the pandemic, the Defender of Rights questions both the method and the proportionality of most of the provisions and restrictions present in the text", we read in this article. notice.

It calls for "a fundamental public democratic debate" and "strongly regrets the choice of an accelerated procedure given the extent of the infringements of fundamental rights and freedoms provided for by this bill as well as the novel nature of certain provisions that it comprises".

Claire Hédon puts forward "ten points of alert".

It "insists on the need for a regular reassessment of the system with regard to the health situation so that the restrictions only last for the time strictly necessary for the management of the crisis".

She wonders in particular "on the choice to grant to public and private companies a form of police power, ensuring themselves the controls of the possession of a + health pass + for people wishing to access their service".

"This control should be the responsibility of the public authorities," she said.

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Restrictions on access to public transport and to goods and services are "likely to undermine the freedom to come and go and to hamper the daily life of many people, even though a large part of the young and / or or precarious has not yet had access to vaccination ".

People in a situation of poverty "could be doubly victims", worries the Defender of the rights.

"The map of the weakest vaccinations overlaps that of poverty, the digital divide, access to public services," she underlines.

"The new measures thus carry the risk of being both harder for precarious populations and of generating or increasing new inequalities".

Another point of alert: the extension of isolation measures.

"It is to be feared that these provisions, combined with the possibility of making the tests payable, have the effect of discouraging being tested and hampering the policy of massive screening, thus promoting the circulation of the virus", worries the Defender of rights.

© 2021 AFP