VIDEO. Death of Claude Allègre: “We need to trim the fat from the mammoth”, when the former Minister of National Education made teachers jump

Quand Claude Allègre voulait “dégraisser le mamouth”. MAXPPP – Christophe FORTIN

Claude Allègre, who died on Saturday, January 4, was known for his many shocking statements at the time when he was Lionel Jospin's Minister of National Education.

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“We need to trim the fat from the mammoth”. Many people remember the short statement uttered by Claude Allègre in June 1997, barely three weeks after his appointment to the Ministry of National Education.

An outing assumed by this close friend of Lionel Jospin – who has paternal ties in Prades-le-Lez and maternal ties in Ceilhes, between Hérault and Aveyron – and which is the starting point of a long conflict with the teachers, embellished with other shock phrases.

A resignation in 2000

“Teachers have four months of vacation and, in addition, they take their training leave on schooling” he also said, also more or less comparing National Education “the army red”.

Not to mention the contested figures, considered far too high, that he had put forward to stigmatize… the rate of absenteeism among teachers.

Enough to lead to numerous demonstrations that led to the resignation of Claude Allègre in March 2000. His record includes his reform of teaching staff management and the reduction of overtime pay for professors.

Claude Allègre also gave his name to a law on innovation and research, which allows academics to file patents and create start-ups.