The sector is experiencing a severe recruitment crisis. After the unemployed and students, the organizers of the Olympic Games are turning to retirees in the hope of recruiting 15,000 people before July 26.
They had already appealed to the unemployed and students. Apparently, this is far from enough. The National Old Age Insurance Fund (Cnav) and France Travail (formerly Pôle emploi) launched an information campaign this week among retirees to encourage them to become private security agents during the Paris Games. The needs are estimated at 17,000 agents, a figure which could rise to 22,000 depending on the day. But the job doesn’t attract crowds, to say the least.
Since 2022, campaigns have been launched at a regular pace to try to attract all types of candidates. The result is special event training, of 106 hours over 3 weeks, mainly intended for the palpation and filtration of spectators entering a competition site. This special training convinced… 1,488 people according to figures dating from mid-January, specifies Cédric Paulin, secretary general of the Group of Security Companies (GES), which issues certifications for this training.
Where did the idea of attracting seniors into security come from? “The objective is to inform certain retirees of the opportunity to benefit, if they wish, from funding for training to carry out event security missions during the Games,” explains the interministerial delegation to the Olympic and Paralympic Games ( Dijop) “Retirement insurance is a support to inform retirees interested in the training offer on the impacts of returning to work,” specifies the CNAV.
According to the latest figures communicated by the Ile-de-France prefecture, 9,500 people have been hired specifically with the Olympics in mind since the launch of the campaigns, with the aim of reaching the 15,000 mark in June. In mid-January, the interministerial delegate to the Olympic Games, Michel Cadot, indicated that the private security contracts would be signed “mid-February” but, he clarified: “this does not mean that the agents will be there. YOU”. We have had more optimism.
