"At Silence des Justes, we prefer to choose real life"

Interview with Stéphane Benhamou, Founder and Director General of the Silence Des Justes association.

Interview with Stéphane Benhamou, Founder and Director General.

What do you take away from 2022?

I take away two words: training and inclusion. We have made enormous progress on these subjects, particularly in the educational and professional fields. Significant progress has also been made regarding the early diagnosis of children under the age of 3.

What progress has the association made in the field of inclusive schooling?

In 2021, we had put in place arrangements to prepare children with autism, upstream, to integrate school. This year, the doctors and psychologists of Silence des Justes have raised awareness of and trained head teachers, teachers and neurotypical children on autism. Inclusive schooling is still strongly criticised in France. We are often told that children with autism cannot integrate because they are violent or because their presence will disturb the class. However, this does not happen when the children are prepared. We have noticed: even in the youngest ones, when they are even a little informed about autism, they act to make space for their classmate with ASD. They help them, accompany them and it works. With several establishments, we have set up multidisciplinary teams that have developed adapted support pathways. These work in most cases and with different profiles of children with ASD. It is a small victory which will be even greater when the necessary investments follow. I am thinking in particular of the recruitment of specialised staff such as psychologists and psychomotor therapists. Schools must integrate medico-educational arrangements to welcome children with autism.

What about professional inclusion?

We have had internships that turned into work contracts this year. The association has also recruited specialised and technical educators in the fields of gardening, cooking, baking, plumbing, etc. Adolescents and adults with autism must be able to discover trades and to make training and employment choices according to their tastes. Silence des Justes is also developing a partnership with Cap Emploi Ile de France to lead to the creation of help desks adapted to people with ASD.

Did current events impact the activities of Silence in 2022?

Indeed, starting with a major event: the presidential election. Citizen and democratic life is a right for people with autism. We trained young adults in the electoral process. They followed the campaign with their educators. Then, the mayor of the 19th arrondissement of Paris, Mr Dagnaud, welcomed them to explain the rules of voting and the way to put a ballot in the ballot box. Thus, for the first time, they voted on the day itself, expressing a real choice and without a panic attack in the polling booth. The Football World Cup was another highlight. We left for ten days to Qatar with ten children from Silence des Justes and thirty pupils from a Year 6 class. They attended three matches of the French team. Many people questioned us on the justification of this trip. However, sport excites all children, with or without autism. We experienced great moments of socialisation, discovery and cultural openness. They came back deeply fulfilled. This represents a significant investment, however, imagine the money needed when medical arrangements have to be put in place because the children are doing badly. At Silence des Justes, we always prefer to choose real life. Unfortunately, we were also impacted by a dramatic current event: the invasion of Ukraine. This led us to organise the welcoming of a little girl traumatised by the events in her country.

The experimentation of the Silence des Justes structure authorised by the Regional Health Agency ended this year, what assessment do you draw from it?

It concluded with the creation of a medico-educational Institute of 32 places and a specialised Reception Home of 34 places. At the same time, the medicalised emergency units for children, adolescents and adults were maintained. This experimentation made it possible to give an administrative and legal framework to the association, to secure and sustain places. Families and siblings will be able to evolve without disruption of their pathway. The assessment is therefore excellent. It is also a recognition of the reception and innovation capacities of our structure. 2022 was marked by salary revaluations confirmed by the SÉGUR measures: a recognition of the work of your teams? These revaluations were necessary, all the more so after the Covid period, during which our teams were extremely solicited and mobilised. It is a form of recognition that nevertheless remains insufficient. At Silence des Justes, we have the chance to have little turnover and we are aware that we must defend the sustainability of jobs, professionalisation and, of course, the salaries of our employees.

How are your users evolving by age group?

I encountered autism 30 years ago by welcoming a teenager with ASD into a summer camp of neurotypical children. This stay was a second chance for him. Today, early diagnosis and care make it possible to halt the development of ASD earlier. The situation of children is therefore reassuring. But, of course, after the diagnosis, there is a need for places, care and inclusive arrangements. As for adolescents and adults, our professionalisation pathways are starting to reach tangible objectives. We offer them a real platform for discovering trades. Their internships in companies are multiplying. We are making progress on the development of their autonomy. Silence des Justes is now working on the ageing of its users. Projects are being studied for the support of people over 60. We will discuss this again next year.

Is the association still as much in demand for emergencies?

Yes, it still is, almost daily, with many complex situations and emergencies in child and adult psychiatry. This year, the new development is that these emergencies came from all over France: Marseille, Nantes, Brest, Lyon... The numbers in our medicalised emergency units have increased by 30%. We are constantly solicited by judges, by departments and their child welfare services, by the Interministerial Delegation on Autism... Responding to these emergencies is essential for the association. It is in our DNA and our most elementary responsibility.

The activity of the association has increased by 226% since 2019, how do you face this phenomenon while maintaining the quality of support?

Silence des Justes has two strong points: its responsiveness and its creativity. When there is no more space, we open a new apartment. When a child arrives in an emergency, we immediately offer them reassuring activities supervised by caring people. With the Covid crisis and the 300 additional placements that the National Public Health Council asked us to carry out, we acquired an almost immediate recruitment and training capacity. In addition, we benefit from a medical structure that works hand in hand with the educational teams to support users and emergencies 24 hours a day. We have also obtained accreditation to issue the National Certificate of Intervention in Autism and have opened a training centre. To meet the new needs, the association set up a house near Cabourg in August 2022. It welcomes emergencies and families who take part in learning weekends, or who recharge during short respite stays accompanied by our teams. We organise activities in harmony with nature and in collaboration with professionals from coastal protection. This type of micro-structure is perfect for sustaining support and fostering the good development of people with autism.

Silence des Justes has two strong points: its responsiveness and its creativity

Where do the projects launched in 2022 stand?

The respite stays for families and the training centre on ASD have been created. Our projects of opening a unit for children under 3 and a training workshop in the catering trades, La Table des Justes, will soon be completed. The association wanted to modernise its fleet of vehicles this year but we lacked donors. Nevertheless, Silence des Justes made an investment of €150,000 to acquire five electric vehicles. This ecological transition is vital.

What are your objectives in 2023?

We are going to further professionalise the teams. Silence des Justes must continue to progress in the knowledge of autism in order to strengthen its educational strategies, its inclusive arrangements, its partnerships with the world of schools and businesses. The association will continue to create places and microstructures to respond to emergencies, to develop learning weekends and family respite stays. Intensifying our efforts towards families and siblings is essential. 2023 will also be the year of our international development: we are at the initiative of and we co-organise, with our partner Axa, the first Autism Fair in Africa, in Cameroon. Autism is a global problem. We must share our knowledge. For this reason, Silence des Justes already works with universities and research centres in the Comoros and in Israel. The association is also launching a magazine: L'Autisme & nous, an independent media outlet aimed at raising awareness among everyone about the needs of people with autism and the benefits of inclusion. Implementing everything that can impact society in favour of autism is also our responsibility.

What are the needs of Silence des Justes to respond to all these objectives?

The association obviously has very significant financial needs that the State does not cover and that we are obliged to seek from donors and patrons. We will increase our actions in this area. I expect, moreover, a lot from the work of the Court of Auditors which must examine, in 2023, where the money allocated to autism in France goes. Fortunately, at Silence des Justes, we have the particularity of imagining projects before the arrival of budgets. We are positive and never short of ideas.