He arrived at the blockade around 2:30 p.m. with a procession of around twenty tractors to “put some pressure on” as one of the organizers explained. Kevin Brouillard is the head of a cereal farm near Etampes in Essonne.
His yellow vest makes him clearly visible. As if he needed it. Like the slogan that adorns his back: “drinking milk is good, not paying for it is stupid”, the farmer speaks loudly and in a direct tone. Facing the France insoumise deputy for Essonne, Antoine Léaument, he does not shy away and explains to him, eye to eye, the problems he encounters in the management of his farm: “We spend half of our time do administrative work to ultimately have more controls and pay more charges,” he explains in controlled anger. Always vindictive, he tells how much he has to pay to pay a net income of 1,700 euros to his worker when he can only pay himself 1,200 euros per month.
Crushed under the weight of paperwork
Cut off by a fellow farmer who calls him, Kévin runs towards the back of the procession to answer a few questions from a police officer about the organization. Always very direct, he does not hesitate to joke with the official even to the point of offering him a beer.
But when faced with our questions, he instantly regains his seriousness and verve. Even when he talks about the weight of paperwork since he took over the family farm after the death of his father a year ago.
Ready to go to Paris
As to whether he was ready to go to Paris, the answer is clearly yes: “I don’t know what will be decided this evening. If we stay to sleep or not, if we go to Paris tomorrow. I don’t know. But if we have to go Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and even more, we will go,” he says determinedly. Before going back to drink a beer with his friends under the barn which has just been installed in the middle of the highway.
If he throws out a phrase from time to time that makes the audience laugh, he assures that he is not there for that: “Really realize that there is not a farmer who takes pleasure in being there. It’s just that we no longer have a choice. »