France has been rocked by a deeply disturbing child safeguarding scandal, after dozens of state nursery and primary schools came under investigation over allegations of violence, sexual assault, and rape.

In total, Paris police are now examining more than 100 separate complaints of alleged mistreatment, physical abuse and rape of children, said to have taken place during lunch breaks, nap times and after-school care.

Authorities have said the scale of the investigation is unprecedented.

'We have investigations underway in 84 preschools, about 20 primary schools and about 10 daycare centres,' said Paris's top prosecutor, Laure Beccuau. 

Lawyers said the investigations included the alleged rape of children as young as three and four years old.

Across the country, parents' groups say they have spent years raising concerns that were not properly acted upon, claiming failures in recruitment checks and vetting procedures allowed individuals accused of abuse to remain in contact with children.

One lawyer described the situation in stark terms.

'It's a massive scandal,' said Florian Lastelle, a lawyer for three Paris families who have filed police complaints over the alleged abuse of their children. 

'The state school system is a source of pride in this country, but unfortunately in France today it's not possible to say that the public service guarantees children's safety.'

The allegations centre on school monitors - adults responsible for supervising children during lunch, break times, naps and after-school activities. 

In many cases, they spend more time with pupils than teaching staff. 

However, they are not directly employed by schools or the education ministry, instead being recruited through city halls or local authorities, often on hourly pay and, critics say, with limited training or formal qualifications.

In France, nursery school attendance is compulsory from age three, meaning school monitors are a daily presence in the lives of children aged roughly three to 11.

Parents have reported a wide range of alleged abuse by monitors across France, including children being screamed at, shoved, having their hair pulled, being denied food, forced to eat until they vomited, and, in the most serious cases, sexually assaulted or raped.

Lawyer Louis Cailliez, who represents two Paris families, filed police complaints in February over alleged rapes of nursery schoolchildren in 2025. 

In one case, a three-year-old girl is alleged to have been raped by a school monitor at a school in western Paris. 

In another case, a three-year-old boy is alleged to have been raped by the same monitor, who had reportedly been transferred to another school after earlier complaints of physical violence.

Cailliez described the emotional toll on families, saying: 'One morning, the three-year-old boy became so distressed in front of the school gates, refusing to go in, that he fell into a kind of trance and his mother was in tears. 

'The headteacher had to come out to force the child into school, and at the time neither the boy's mother nor the headteacher knew why.'

He added that the children were now suffering both physically and psychologically from the alleged abuse, and said: 'It is daily torture for the parents who want the investigation to move forward to establish the scale of the offences.'

Cailliez also described the system overseeing school monitors in France as a 'disaster' and 'a national catastrophe'.

The case is expected to intensify further as proceedings begin in Paris next week, where a school monitor is due to stand trial accused of sexually abusing five children aged between three and five at a nursery school in the capital.

A separate verdict is also expected next month in another case involving a 47-year-old school monitor accused of sexually abusing nine 10-year-old girls in the French capital. 

The new Socialist mayor of Paris has already launched a huge £17.3million to battle what he called 'major dysfunction' in the city's school monitor system. 

'If there was a collective mistake, it was to treat these incidents as isolated when in fact they point to a systemic risk, and perhaps even a systemic code of silence,' Emmanuel Grégoire told Le Monde last month.

Between January and April alone, Paris city hall suspended 78 school monitors, including 31 who were suspected of sexual abuse.

Grégoire, who disclosed that he was sexually abused as a child by a school monitor, has set up a citizens’ assembly to discuss the role of school monitors, which will report back in June.