Thread by @Valen10Francois

In a predictably 🇫🇷 twist, unions are blaming the Louvre fiasco on lack of staff

They claim that 100s of jobs were cut in the last 10/15 years. The French press took these number for granted

So I did what no one did and looked at the annual reports:

The unions are wrong

The unions are claiming that staff head count has gone down by 200.

In 2010 the Louvre's annual report claims 2100 employees.

By 2015 it has gone down somewhat at 2072

And in 2024? Would it be 1900?

Nope... it's even higher than in 2010 at 2242

Oh but perhaps the unions are talking about security agents.

In 2010 there's 1200 of them

In 2015 there's 1200 of them

In 2024 there's... 1200 of them

What about the Louvre's budget, has it gone down perhaps?

In 2015 its budget was 199 million

In 2025 it reaches 323 million, considerably outstripping inflation

There's one claim I haven't been able to assess, Unions claim that personnel is being used for "prestige" events like VIP visits and gala nights.

But the claim that (security) jobs have been destroyed simply doesn't add up

Also the "security agents" ran away when the heist happen.

That's because they're not trained to intervene and are here to protect the public.

So it's hard to blame them for what happened but hard to claim that another 200 would have changed much.

What is emerging is a culture of inefficiency. An upcoming leaked report from the Cour des Comptes blasts its leadership. A third of rooms don't have CCTV.

In some wings 75% of rooms don't have CCTV...

Only 138 cameras were set up in the last 5 years for 73000 SqM

The report also says that internal studies can take years if not decades.

An initiative on adapting the museum for potential fire outbreaks has been ongoing for 21 years...

The press also reports that the old security system on the left has been replaced by the one on the right in 2019

The former could back up into safes at the slightest alarm

I don't want to point fingers. I don't know what happened

But I wanted to talk about the reaction to the heiest

It's never an issue of personal responsibility, flawed processes or poor prioritisation

It's always a question of adding more (public) funding and hiring more staff

There's also a lesson about modern journalism

There's certainly nuances that aren't in the annual reports (more visitors add more strain)

But it took me 45 minutes to check the reports and write this thread and yet not a journalist has checked the claim of a drop in headcount

Here are the annual reports for 2010, 2015 and 2024

yumpu.com/fr/document/re…

mini-site.louvre.fr/trimestriel/20…

mini-site.louvre.fr/trimestriel/20…