Question 13369 — work accidents and occupational diseases

Summary

Ms. Marie Mesmeur alerts the Minister of National Education to the increase in workplace accidents affecting minor students during their observation courses, initiation courses, application courses and apprenticeship contracts. In 2025, five adolescents aged 15 to 17 lost their lives during professional training periods. These tragedies have plunged families into unbearable grief and raise questions the collective responsibility of public authorities in supervising these systems. Among these fatal accidents, a 16-year-old high school student died in July in Maine-et-Loire after being struck by the shovel of an agricultural machine during a farming internship. In April, a 15-year-old apprentice was crushed by construction equipment in the Var. In June, a second-year student on internship in a store lost his life following a falling pallets in the English Channel. Some families particularly deplore the lack of feedback from national education following the tragic death of their child. These tragedies are all the more worrying as periods of immersion in companies concern an ever-increasing number of students and fall directly under the responsibility of national education, via the framework of the internship agreement. From middle school, Fourth and third grades include a mandatory observation course, while certain high school technology courses include several weeks of training in a professional environment. Every year, tens of thousands of minors discover the world of work in this context. However, statistics show that workplace accidents occur more frequently during the first year on the job: 59 % of workplace accidents affecting those under 25 occur during this period, compared to 22% (Source: Ministry of Labor) for older employees. This increased vulnerability of young workers requires increased vigilance. At the same time, the abolition in 2018 of the apprenticeship inspection, previously empowered within national education to control the reception and working conditions of apprentices, has transferred these missions to the labor inspectorate, whose staff numbers have decreased and whose resources are now limited. Many unions are thus warning of a weakening of effective control of the working conditions of young people in training but also of the lack of supervision and training on the risks of work accidents. The MP also warns of the fact that internships tend to reproduce inequalities of access between students to internship opportunities, these depending largely on the professional networks of their parents. Many feedback also mentions tasks entrusted to trainees which are more akin to free labor than a real educational approach. Faced with these findings, the Member wishes to know the precise figures, for the last five years, of work accidents and accidents fatalities involving minor students and apprentices placed under the responsibility of national education as part of internships or work-study training. The MP wonders about the measures envisaged to strengthen the preparation of students for professional risks before their immersion in a company, in order to prevent serious and fatal accidents affecting minors in training and to guarantee that their discovery of the professional world no longer comes at the cost of their lives. Finally, she asks him if the Government plans to reestablish a specific control and support system dedicated to young people in professional training in order to ensure their effective safety.

Machine translation from French. The official text remains authoritative.

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