Water for All // De L’eau Pour Tou-te-s

Background

The Water For All / De L’eau Pour Tou-te-s campaign was launched in the summer of 2023 by a coalition of humanitarian NGOs committed to improving the lives of refugees and displaced people in northern France.

Collective Aid, alongside partners Calais Appeal, Calais Food Collective, and Vents Contraires, and with support from Solidarites International, Coalition Eau and others, launched a petition to put pressure on the French government to improve access to water for refugees and displaced people.

The aim was to see all human rights respected and for the French government to provide improved and sufficient water access. At the time, refugees and displaced people had access to an average of just 4.9 litres per person per day in Calais, but the World Health Organisation’s recommended safe minimum is 150 litres per day. A survey we conducted in early 2023 found that approximately one in four people suffered from the skin infection scabies - a painful rash which causes intense itching.

Outcome

More than 3,000 people added their names to the petition urging the French government to accept the recommendations that were made during the 2023 UN Universal Periodic Review which recommended they improve water access for refugees, asylum seekers, and displaced people.

French political figures voiced their support for the campaign and French media reported on the confiscation of water distribution tanks in Calais.

In October 2023, France announced it would accept many of the recommendations made as part of the UN Universal Periodic Review earlier in the year, including:

• 185 - Take measures to improve water sanitation conditions and ensure continued and safe access to sanitary facilities for all

• 186 - Increase efforts to provide safe drinking water, sanitation services and emergency shelter for migrants

• 187 - Ensure water and sanitation are available, accessible, affordable and of adequate quality for all persons across the territory of the French Republic

• 329 - Strengthen policies to effectively protect the human rights of migrants, refugees and asylum seekers, particularly unaccompanied migrant minors and adolescents

• 330 - Ensure its policy on migrants and refugees, especially of women and children, are in line with the international norms to ensure their fundamental rights

• 333 - Ensure the protection of migrants and refugees’ rights, and promote social inclusion

• 334 - Continue to take steps in the promotion and protection of rights of migrants, asylum seekers and refugees

• 338 - Increase the implementation of concrete measures to guarantee the protection of the rights of migrants, refugees, asylum seekers and stateless persons, particularly women and children

• 342 - Guarantee access to drinking water for all the populations of the overseas departments and regions, migrants and asylum seekers in the north of France

• 348 - Redouble efforts to guarantee the safety, living conditions and rights of migrants, refugees and asylum seekers, especially children

• 352 - Take measures to improve the living conditions of migrants and asylum-seekers

• 354 - Ensure the right of all immigrants and asylum-seekers to have access to legal aid as well as essential services necessary for their subsistence and protect them from any attacks they may be subjected to

• 355 - Continue efforts to guarantee the rights of immigrants and asylum seekers and improve the services provided to them

You can read more about how France denies refugees access to water by visiting our blog:

• Zéro point de fixation: How denying water to refugees is a French government policy

• Policing Water: France’s dangerous deterrence methods harm refugees