“If I pay the bill, I don’t do anything else. I no longer buy a book for the CDI, nor the machine at 180,000 euros to open a new Bac pro. » Jean-Yves Soulier, the principal of the Deodat-de-Séverac multi-purpose high school from Toulouse, don’t lose your temper. The three-year contract with the electricity supplier Dalkia, a subsidiary of EDF, expired at the worst possible time, in the midst of an explosion in energy prices. The new contract which started in September almost quintuples the monthly bill: “We went from 16,000 euros per month to 72,000 euros! “explains the headteacher. He paid in September but decided to stop the charges. Especially since this new tariff must run over three years.
The Déodat-de-Séverac high school receives from the Occitanie region an annual operating grant of around 980,000 euros “With electricity bills at 72,000 euros per month, it would be totally absorbed, calculates Jean-Yves Soulier. It’s simply racketeering, speculation against the common good. »
“The war in Ukraine cannot explain everything”
His establishment, which nevertheless heats with gas, is far from being the only one to face this unprecedented inflation. “Other high schools have seen their bills double or triple, without there being the slightest overconsumption, and have stopped paying as well. I think it’s a good reflex while waiting for the supplier’s explanations, ”underlines Kamel Chibli (PS), vice-president of the regional council in charge of Education. The three-year contract with Dalkia indeed concerns a number of establishments and the community wants to know the “detailed” reason for this enormous inflation. “The war in Ukraine cannot explain everything,” assumes the elected official.
The Occitanie region, which voted an envelope of 220 million for the energy renovation of buildings before the Ukrainian crisis, has also just released 22 million euros urgently, solely to help pay electricity bills for high schools. “It’s already nearly a third of the annual operating grant for high schools,” says Kamel Chibli. The regions, which do not have their own taxation, will not be able to bear these costs alone and the absence of a social shield, ”warns the regional elected official.
Carole Delga (PS), president of Occitanie but also of the association regions of France, which brings them all together, “made a foot call” to the government to alert it to a problem which arises while winter hasn’t even started.