Paid leave: two extra days for employees soon? The idea will be studied

The idea of ​​offering two days of leave in addition to the five legal weeks will be put on the table.

It's a (very) ambitious proposal: adding two days of vacation to the Labor Code. While the trend is more toward increasing working hours (delaying retirement, tightening sick leave, tightening unemployment), the idea clashes with the current narrative and seems to run counter to current discourse. Yet, it could "put an end to an injustice."

In France, the law provides for a minimum of 25 days of paid leave per year, or five weeks, for all full-time employees. Additional leave is available for exceptional circumstances, such as maternity, paternity, or other family and personal events (moving, marriage, death, etc.). A new feature could be added to this set of measures: two additional days of paid leave for... natural disasters.

Every year, 6,000 municipalities are declared to be in a state of natural disaster. For affected households—especially flooding—they often face the loss of their homes, constant cleaning, administrative procedures, short nights, and all this while working. Or, alternatively, taking unpaid leave, subject to employer approval. To avoid losing pay, many must therefore use their vacation and reduced working hours.

This situation could soon come to an end, as a bill has been tabled in the Senate to add paid leave days. Senator Rémi Cardon (Socialist Party) proposes that the maximum duration be two days.

"The affected employees are losing vacation time or RTT because they are experiencing this natural disaster. The idea is to provide them with security," the elected official explained to France 3 Hauts-de-France . To justify his proposal, he pointed to the figure of 18 million French people living in areas at risk of flooding, as estimated by the Ministry of Ecological Transition.

His text must first be examined in committee in the Senate. Given the political balance (the Senate is right-wing), it still seems unlikely that his idea will be validated by the upper house and reach the National Assembly. In Spain, a similar four-day holiday was introduced into law after the deadly floods that hit Valencia and its surrounding region last fall.