Proof that relations are currently tense between agents, unions and the hierarchy in the city of Noyon, the last meeting of the territorial social committee on January 16 was postponed until Thursday the 23rd in the morning. The cause: no quorum. Of the 10 staff representatives, three were needed for this CST to be held. There were none. “It’s like the municipal council for elected officials,” summarizes an agent, “the representatives protest there, but everything is already tied up.” Thursday, January 30 in the morning, the representatives should travel: we will talk about the transformation of the end-of-year bonus for agents of the two communities, city and Pays Noyonnais.
The end-of-year bonus for agents will therefore disappear as we announced at the end of last year. A bonus which must be replaced by the CIA, an annual compensation supplement. A transition from one system to another which presents several gray areas. And denounced as a “new savings measure at the expense of agents”, and “a way of bringing them a little more into line”, underlines an agent.
A request from the Public Treasury?
In a letter addressed to agents, the general director of services, Choukri Mastouri, affirms that “this new (bonus) format will make it possible to comply with the regulations recalled by (the) public accountant and to maintain these advantages”. A way of saying that the communities therefore had no choice. A way of also insinuating that without this, the bonus could disappear.
According to the city therefore, for the first time in years, the Public Treasury asked the city to abandon its old regime. Problem: this bonus is completely legal. Patrick Deguise, former mayor who set it up, recalls: “At the time, the legislator wanted to bring order to certain practices, but while allowing the old format to be kept. In Noyon, we chose to continue with the old system.”
According to our information, however, during a general meeting to present the change in bonus which brought together 300 agents at Inovia on January 13, the general director of services justified wanting to abandon the old system due to “the loss of a old deliberation. An agent is surprised: “These documents have been presented several times by our representatives to the city during discussions on bonuses in recent years,” says an agent. Former mayor Patrick Deguise: “The Treasury regularly requests these documents. If they don’t exist, they don’t pay. However, they have been paying since 1996. I have these documents if they want them,” he says.
Technically, the city could even have kept the old system, AND created an additional bonus system with the CIA. But now is not the time for new spending.
Maintaining the level of premiums?
In his letter to agents, the DGS explains that the new system will “maintain” bonuses. What he does not say, however, is that it will be mathematically impossible for a certain number of agents to benefit from the same level of remuneration.
These amounts are in fact capped as recalled by the former mayor of Noyon Deguise on his Facebook page. At around 1,200 euros gross, for a category C civil servant, the lowest salaries, and the category most represented in the two communities. “Which means that for an agent who received 1,600 euros gross, we will necessarily have a minimum loss of 400 euros,” explains the former mayor.
In the end: “It’s a way of once again making savings at the expense of agents,” notes one of them, “while we have already seen our advancements frozen, and we have been forced to do less overtime: a further reduction in our purchasing power due to the hole in the coffers. As with the reduction in subsidies to associations, Sandrine Dauchelle’s poor financial management must be paid for by someone: “Not by her in any case, nor for her DGS and her HR Director”, quips Patrick Deguise.
Fairer treatment?
This is one of the justifications put forward by the DGS to agents: the change in bonus system would make it possible to “implement a fair remuneration policy”. In a context of strong social tension in the two communities, the agents denounce on the contrary a “reward system at the head of the customer”.
“We want to make sure that no heads stick out. If you open it too much, if you don’t fall in line, at the end of the year, there will be nothing left of your bonus,” estimates one of them. Another agent assures that the transformation of the bonus would have the effect of “destroying team cohesion”. He takes an example: “It would be possible, in a team of five, to distribute a different bonus to each of the agents and above all to make it known.”
Fight coming to the community of communes
The implementation of the system change will have to go through a vote, following the consultations. In the town of Noyon, mayor Sandrine Dauchelle will have no trouble getting the measure adopted by a council that is still mostly loyal. In the Pays Noyonnais, on the other hand, rural mayors who regularly denounce the “mistreatment of agents” should oppose it. Consequence: in the event of rejection to the CCPN, the Country agents will be on the old system, the city agents, on the new one, and the shared agents (both City and Country), also on the old system. “Whatever happens, we would therefore have agents with different bonus levels, sometimes for the same work.”
But there is another scenario. Presented by Choukri Mastouri before the general assembly of agents on January 13: “He explained that if the mayors refused to vote for the new system, they would have no other choice than to make the old bonus disappear, without the replace with the CIA,” assures a source. Patrick Deguise had the same echoes from this meeting. “If this is the case, it is a scandal and it would be illegal. This would be the same scenario as for the dismissal of the former director of technical services Henri Lamur: we had refused his change of contract, so they fired him completely illegally, claiming not to have a choice, which was false,” he sums up.
If we were to reach such extremes, the city could be, once again, taken before the administrative court.
“In any case, that’s a lot of tricks,” summarizes an agent who did not escape the fact that in one of his letters, the Director General of Services promised to want to establish “a climate of trust and transparency”.
Wishes under tension on January 30?
On Thursday, January 30 afternoon, Sandrine Dauchelle and her teams will present their wishes to the agents in Inovia. The same morning, an exceptional meeting with staff representatives will be entirely dedicated to the bonus. Will the discussion on the bonus be part of the ceremony like that on subsidies to associations did for the wishes of the Noyonnais? Not sure: “There is such a climate of fear that everyone should turn their tongue in their mouth before speaking,” notes an agent. With the 2025 end-of-year bonus already in mind?
We were unable to contact the general director of services, Chokri Mastouri. Nor the mayor of Noyon, Sandrine Dauchelle.
