Europe 1 with AFP 7:39 p.m., October 09, 2022

Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin once again supported the judicial police reform project.

If this reform is very controversial today, the minister presents it as courageous, essential and difficult.

He also notes that challenges should not exceed certain limits.

Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin defended Sunday in an interview with Le Parisien the very controversial reform of the judicial police, which he presents as "courageous, essential and difficult", two days after the indignation aroused by the dismissal of the boss of the southern area of ​​the PJ.

The reform "shakes up habits and it is normal that it arouses disputes" but "certain limits must not be crossed", adds the minister, denouncing the "shocking images" of the demonstration of the investigators in Marseille.

Many opponents of the project

Thursday, the Director General of the National Police (DGPN) Frédéric Veaux, who came to Marseille to present his reform, had to cross a "hedge of dishonor" formed by some 200 investigators opposed to the project.

The next day, Éric Arella, respected boss of the PJ in the south of France, was sacked.

"The general manager has the choice of his collaborators. The bond of trust between them was broken," said the minister in Le Parisien, without further comment on this eviction.

"It is obvious" that some demonstrators "could be liable for punishment", continues Gérald Darmanin, specifying however that he asked the Central Director of the Judicial Police, Jérome Bonet, "to have a sense of appeasement".

On the merits of the reform, the minister does not initiate change, but repeats that “no PJ policeman will do anything other than what he was doing today”.

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No staff cuts, assures Darmanin

The reform project plans to place all police services at the department level - intelligence, public security, border police (PAF) and judicial police (PJ) - under the authority of a single Departmental Director of Police national (DDPN), dependent on the prefect.

Opponents of the project denounce the risk of a "leveling down" of the PJ and a strengthening of the weight of the prefect in the investigations.

There will be "no abolition of staff, no abolition of central office, no abolition of service or local branch", adds Gérald Darmanin, ensuring that this decision is an "amendment to the DGPN project".

As he said on Friday before the union of internal security executives (SCSI), the minister explains that he "ordered an audit", to which the general inspection of justice must be associated and which "will be made in mid-December" .

“We will discuss from there with the trade unions to amend the reform according to the remarks for an implementation in 2023”, adds Gérald Darmanin, without giving a more precise date.