Salut!

Does French guilt stand between Le Pen and the Elysée?

My picture from a press conference in Toulon when MLP and I were both six years younger

Terrorism is not the only menace facing France. There is also the possibility of a far-right politician becoming the country's first female president. Or, having lived with the pain and guilt of collaboration with the Nazis and brutal attempts to resist Algerian independence, have the French learnt from a troubled past? This is my first serious look at the coming French elections* for The National, Abu Dhabi ...

In strange and confusing times, with disenchantment at successive governments aggravated by feelings of insecurity after terrorist attacks, looming elections threaten to produce a socially divisive outcome France may come to regret.

One essential question faces French voters: should they embrace the extraordinary political turmoil that has swept the West and elect Marine Le Pen, leader of the anti-immigration Front National, a party many see as racist, as their next president?

Clare Hollingworth, legendary journalist; Tony King, wise psephologist, even wiser judge of Parisian dining. RIP

Photo credit: University of Essex

Two important fixtures of what some of us call the old Daily Telegraph died this week. Clare Hollingworth was 105 and had been a wonderful reporter and writer who famously broke news of the outbreak of the Second World War, often described as the 'scoop of the century'. I knew her only a little, from reputation, occasional visits to the office where I worked and telephone calls. I knew Professor Anthony King rather better. He was a Canadian academic who made his home in Britain and covered shifts in political opinion while also being, without exception in my experience, charming company ...

It was during my stay in Paris as The Daily Telegraph's correspondent for France, and the male Canadian voice on the phone was unmistakeable.

Could we join him and his wife for dinner at a location he would not reveal in advance? Since Tony King was one of nicest people I had ever worked with, it was not so much a challenge as a guaranteed pleasure.

Professor Anthony King died yesterday, aged 82.

Michel Roux Jr and a Shard of class that blunts the jagged edge

What we've been wondering since last night, my wife Joelle and I, is how Michel Roux Jr got on with his chosen starter at the table next to ours, 32 floors up at the Shard next to London Bridge and by the window no less.

He went for the Cornish crab, described on the menu as "Donington celeriac, mayonnaise and crab butter toast". For himself. In our attempt to keep down what we knew would be a heavy bill, and because we were not that hungry at the only time we could book the Aqua Shard restaurant (6.30pm), we had decided to share the same starter.