At trial for lead poisoning at the Palace of Versailles, defendants shift responsibilities

"Everyone is passing the buck," accused the public prosecutor on Tuesday, February 11, on the second day of the trial of six people and four companies, tried in Versailles (Yvelines) for not having protected workers against lead contamination on the construction site of the royal opera house at the Château de Versailles in 2009.

In court, the defendants prosecuted before the criminal court for unintentional injury and endangering others, including the former president of the Confederation of Small and Medium Enterprises (CPME) François Asselin, all sought to minimise their responsibilities in this case.

The project owner and the project manager stated that they had mentioned the presence of lead in the documents relating to the preparation of the site, and it was up to the companies working there to take this into account and implement adequate protective measures.

Frédéric Didier, the chief architect of historic monuments in charge of designing and organizing the construction site, explained that he had received the general coordination plan, a document that defines the measures to be implemented to prevent risks on a construction site, in which the presence of lead was mentioned.

This plan "did what was necessary to be able to inform" of the presence of lead "the parties called upon to intervene" in Versailles, he specified.

No one could be unaware that there was lead in this historic monument because "lead paints were used until the beginning of the 20th century", but the premises concerned had not been renovated since 1870, according to him.

And if this information has not been transmitted, it is the responsibility of the coordinator responsible for security on the site, affirmed the representative of the project owner, the operator of heritage and real estate projects for culture (OPPIC).

But the company working on the site, Asselin, headed by François Asselin, repeated that it had not been sufficiently and precisely informed of the presence of lead.

According to her, the documents provided did not allow for a proper assessment of the risks.

"There was negligence across the entire chain of competence, including us," Mr Asselin conceded, however, under heavy questioning.

The carpenters who testified on Monday all said they had not been provided with any equipment to protect themselves against inhaling lead-laden dust.

No one had informed them of the presence of lead or trained them in how to manage the risk, they said.