Rassemblement National (National Rally) was the Front National of Jean-Marie Le Pen's creation until four years ago. As France's main far-right movement marks, as quietly as it can, today's 50th anniversary of its birth, there are shudders of disgust or at least distance among France's new intake of 89 MPs, forming the biggest single opposition party.
'I would not have joined the FN in 1972,' Alexandre Loubet, an MP from Moselle tells Le Figaro. 'I come from Debout La République [another populist, rightwing party, but without FN's toxic image] and consider myself a social Gaullist,' says Anne-Sophie Frigout, from Marne. Philippe Lottiaux, down here in the Var, assures me the RN of Le Pen's estranged daughter, Marine, is neither extreme nor right.
I respectfully disagree.
As Emmanuel Macron pointed out in this year's presidential election campaign, her crackpot idea of banning Muslim headwear would have criminalised, among so many others, Latifa Ibn Ziaten, a relentless campaigner against extremism whose son, a Muslim soldier, was one of the seven victims of Mohamed Merah, a terrorist killer, 10 years ago. That alone tells us a lot.
As my consoeur at the London-based website French Morning put it today, Emmanuel Macron did not expect to be drawn into the Tory and therefore No 10 succession contest. Liz Truss's crass comment in Norwich ensured that he was.
His rapier-like riposte, so much more elegant than her Little Englander spot of frogbashing, came during a three-day official visit to Algeria, which I explained for The National. See - or even hear - the item at this link or read it below, where it is reproduced with the editor's customary consent ...
When a president takes a sizeable delegation on a visit to a country with a shared and troubled history, it is fair to assume the agenda is unusually long or complex.
If the entourage numbers more than 90, assumption turns to certainty.
So it was for France’s Emmanuel Macron when he crossed the Mediterranean to Algeria last Thursday. Accompanying him were senior ministers, business chiefs and religious leaders among others.
'Spot-on', my fellow-Remoaners say; 'pompous, condescending' is the harsher Brexiter verdict.
I aim for greater objectivity when writing for The National and other publications. But if it is a piece for Comment pages, I am naturally allowed to express or imply an opinion... like here
Lured by Beatlemania and tantalising images of Swinging London, young French people looking for new experiences began flocking to the UK in the 1960s.
Many of those travelling to the capital wanted to stay. Needing help with accommodation, jobs or study opportunities, they headed for the bustling West End and the Charles Peguy centre.
Now, after six decades of assisting French people trying to find their feet in a new country, the centre has closed. It is another casualty of Brexit.
While the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic has also played a small part, the causes for closure lie principally with the hard Brexit Britain chose as its departure route from the EU.
A mischievous caricature of Leave supporters shows obsessively flag-waving Little Englanders thriving on conflict with foreigners, especially the French.
While this is an exaggeration, it is unlikely that the staunchest “go it alone without Europe” advocates will shed tears over the centre’s demise.
In place of the entente cordiale, the famous accord signed in 1904 with the aim of fostering smoother Anglo-French relations, there is now mutual distrust.
Francoise Hardy did rather a lot for the entente cordiale in the 1960s. She hated 'Tous les Garcons ..." but was quite pleased with this
Prime Minister Boris Johnson may be on his way out of 10 Downing Street but his government has picked fight after fight with France, the triggers ranging from fishing rights and immigration to the horrendous delays seen at Dover as holidaymakers try to cross the English Channel to Calais. Ministers claim, often without justification, that it’s all the fault of France or the EU. In the golf club analogy that is commonly used, Paris and Brussels say Britain acts as if it thinks cancelling membership should not stop it playing whenever it wishes.
Brexit’s opponents insist that for all the promises of “sunlit uplands” for a Global Britain freed from EU shackles, there is little sign of benefit and ample evidence of loss.
Persistent claims that leaving the EU facilitated the UK National Health Service’s successful coronavirus vaccination programme are in dispute.
Membership of the EU encouraged but did not oblige a collective response to the virus. In any case, neighbouring countries quickly caught up after a sluggish start.
The Anglo-EU row over the so-called Northern Ireland protocol, designed to protect Ireland from a hard border that would almost certainly threaten a fragile peace, has already led to the withdrawal of European funding for UK scientific research.
The UK has admitted its actions would involve a “specific and limited” breach of international law, reneging on a deal freely signed with the EU and acclaimed by Mr Johnson. While Brussels fumes, Britain accuses the EU of intransigence for failing to agree on a protocol rewritten to suit London (and the minority among Northern Ireland voters who backed Leave).
“Blame Brexit” has become a cliche of everyday life. UK exporters and importers deplore the added bureaucracy, delays and costs of continuing to trade with a massive neighbouring bloc. Aviation, agriculture and hospitality say ending freedom of movement has caused severe labour shortages. Whitehall either minimises the disruption or denies responsibility.
Britain has dropped out of the Erasmus programme that enabled a two-way traffic of students funded for academic exchanges. The replacement Turing scheme is one-way and excludes potentially crippling tuition fees.
Some Brexiters now say they always knew it would take time, perhaps decades, for gains to appear. Sovereignty, they say, was the paramount issue. Whether such a nuanced justification was properly explained to, or understood by, the narrow majority that voted Leave in the 2016 referendum is open to doubt.
All of which leaves the Charles Peguy centre as just another example of the collateral damage caused by a bitter political and cultural divorce.
Peguy was a young French poet and writer, killed in battle in the First World War. One of his works, The Portico of the Mystery of the Second Virtue was a favourite poem of Charles de Gaulle, who was to become the enduring symbol of French resistance in the Second World War and subsequently the country’s president.
Since opening in 1964, the centre named after him has advised tens of thousands of French visitors, mostly young, to London.
My wife and her best friend from school in provincial France, having worked as au pairs in northern England but wishing to settle for a while in London, went there for help in locating affordable accommodation. “All the French students coming to Britain knew of the Charles Peguy centre and we all gravitated towards it,” my wife recalls.
But the centre is now counted among what French Morning News London, an online source of news and information for French expatriates, calls the “heavy consequences” of Brexit.
“Covid stopped people travelling but now that’s more or less back to normal,” says Thibault Dufresne, director of the Centre for International Exchanges in France, which had run the London centre since the 1980s. “But sadly the impact of Brexit that has forced closure.
“London, the UK, used to be very attractive to young French people who wanted to gain experience of work and learn the language.
“With an identity card and the UK being next door, it was so easy. You could find a job in 24 hours and quickly move on to something better. Now that they need sponsorships and visas, it has become almost impossible for most.
“We held back on a decision for a couple for years hoping there might be some easing of restrictions, maybe to allow young people to come for six months or a year. But it hasn’t happened.
“It’s been a great adventure since 1964. The centre was the place to go for French speakers in London and we’re very sad that it has come to end.”
The beneficiary of Britain’s flagging appeal to Europe’s youth is Ireland, still in the EU, still participating in Erasmus and still offering freedom of movement. It is difficult to escape the thought that London – the city that Mr Johnson as its mayor acclaimed as a model of cosmopolitan harmony – has lost part of its soul.
Last week, I said a hung parliament was the likeliest outcome of the French legislative elections. I was also resigned to the far right doing well in my part of France, the Var. In both cases I was proved right.
What do the results - frankly a catastrophe for Emmanuel Macron and his unpopular centrist project - say about France? I can stomach the success of the leftwing/Green alliance Nupes (while not seeing it as having much of a future) rather more easily than the disconcerting level of support for Marine Le Pen.
I realise that decent, if deluded, people voted for her party in the same way that decent, if deluded, people voted for Trump and Brexit. Yet it fills me with dismay that I live among, rub shoulders with, until recently played badminton with inhabitants of the classic Le Pen territory of uncomplicated racism and xenophobia.
Here's my analysis for The National, a piece that necessarily aimed to rise above personal opinion ...
After the seismic electoral event that removed legislative authority from French President Emmanuel Macron, far-right leader Marine Le Pen had every right to appear before adoring supporters beaming with jubilation and pride.
Her National Rally movement (RN) dramatically increased its share of parliamentary seats from eight to 89.
It was an achievement greater than even she had expected. And it effectively dismantled the “republican front” in which voters of opposing political persuasions have traditionally buried differences to deny power to her party.
A pleasant afternoon to the village of Bormes-les-Mimosas, for a medieval fair, produced an unexpected if brief encounter (described here) with Eric Zemmour, whose studied xenophobia excites some in France while appalling others.
That was a week before those in France who care enough to vote began choosing members of parliament. Despite the fawning of starstruck visitors who also spotted him, Zemmour failed at the first hurdle just as he had done in the presidential elections.
No room for civilised gloating; there's good reason to fear his voters will switch to another far-right candidate .... my piece for The National
I took another look at the French presidential elections and analysed what it may all mean for next month's follow-up polling for the Assemblée National, France's parliament. My thanks to the editor of The National for permitting my article's reproduction here ...
The re-election of French President Emmanuel Macron on April 24 may have seemed straightforward enough to anyone following events from outside the country. But that victory, with 58 per cent of the vote, was far from emphatic enough to heal divisions in a torn and troubled country.
The harsh reality that must be pondered as France approaches another election, to decide who runs parliament, is that the result concealed a hidden majority: people unimpressed by Mr Macron’s centrist presidency.
While 18.7 million people voted for him, almost 27 million did not. They were split more or less equally between those who preferred the far-right candidate, Marine Le Pen, and those who abstained or deposited blank or spoiled papers.
Emmanuel Macron once again beat off the threat of rising extremism and defeated Marine Le Pen, by a margin that exceeded the best opinion polls had predicted. France remains divided, a worrying number of its citizens believing the far right has some kind of coherent answer and in some cases believing in the face of all evidence that it is not far right at all. This is my analysis
In Emmanuel Macron’s moment of triumph, there were broad smiles, embraces and clenched fists as the newly re-elected French president moved through a crowd of excited supporters beneath the Eiffel Tower in Paris.
But challenging times lie ahead as he attempts to heal the deep wounds and divisions of a fractured, restless country.
In the end, Mr Macron won his second five-year term with a more comfortable majority than polls had predicted, 17 points ahead of his far-right rival, Marine Le Pen.
But less than two months remain before France votes again, to decide the make-up of parliament.
After sweeping to power in 2017, also at Ms Le Pen’s expense but more emphatically than on Sunday, the fresh appeal of a modern, enterprising president gave Mr Macron's centrist La Republique En Marche party (LREM) a landslide victory in the legislative elections.
In June, the LREM faces a stiffer test, the outcome made even less certain by Sunday’s high abstentions — 28 per cent, a reflection of widespread disenchantment with politicians. An unwillingness to choose “between the plague and cholera” became the mantra of countless non-voters.
Emmanuel Macron defeated his far-right rival Marine Le Pen with a 17 point margin of victory. EPA.
Ms Le Pen’s National Rally seems too poorly organised across the country to have a serious chance of forming a majority in the Assemblee Nationale in June.
But the far-left France Unbowed leader Jean-Luc Melenchon, who narrowly failed to reach the run-off in the presidential contest, is urging a coalition of left-wing and Green parties. He hopes to become a powerful opposition prime minister, making government a nightmare of “cohabitation” for what is already termed “Macron Season Two”.
In itself, Mr Macron’s win was impressive after five years of perpetual crisis, with the disruptive anti-government Gilets Jaunes (yellow vests) revolt followed by the pandemic and now the rocketing cost of living. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine brought him a “war bounce”, as he emerged as a key figure in Europe’s response, but this proved short-lived.
National Rally party candidate Marine Le Pen was defeated after centre ground voters formed a united front to keep the extreme right out of office. EPA.
His substantial lead over Ms Le Pen had much less to do with approval of his own record than the French electorate’s habit of forming a united front against the extreme right.
Even that “republican barrage” now looks less solid. In her three presidential campaigns, Ms Le Pen has boosted her share of the vote from 18 per cent in 2012 to 41 per cent on Sunday.
Her party blamed pro-Macron media propaganda for denying her what mainstream western opinion would have seen as an alarming outcome. “Even a TV weather girl told us we had to vote Macron,” said a senior National Rally strategist.
Mr Macron’s daunting task, as he acknowledged in his victory speech on Sunday night, is to persuade hostile voters and non-voters he can unite a country split — after the collapse of conventional left and right parties — into three major blocs: the centre and opposing extremes.
He must first choose a reshuffled cabinet and, in particular, a new prime minister should the LREM form the next government alone or in coalition.
He praises the “extraordinary” efforts of Jean Castex, a decent, competent but dour prime minister. But Mr Castex will announce his resignation within a week, to be replaced by a man or woman charged with making ecological change central to his or her duties.
Supporters of Emmanuel Macron celebrate after he won the French presidential election, at the Champ de Mars, in Paris. AFP
Beyond her harsh programme of populist nationalism, including a ban on headscarves, sweeping immigration curbs and protectionist measures undermining the EU, Ms Le Pen had hoped to win over voters with promised tax cuts and retirement from the age of 60.
Mr Macron denounced her populism and mocked the budgetary “incoherence” of her cost-of-living pledges. He only slightly modified his pension reform plans so that under his presidency, the age of retirement will rise steadily from 62 to 64 by 2027-28, not reaching 65 before 2031.
As Mr Macron made his way to the stage at the Champs-de-Mar, flanked by wife, Brigitte, and children of campaign workers, the rousing melody of the EU anthem, Beethoven’s Ode to Joy, sent defiant messages of European solidarity to Eurosceptics in Hungary and Poland, as well as to Ms Le Pen’s supporters and, possibly, a troublesome neighbour — Boris Johnson and his Brexit government in the UK.
But the true measure of success or failure in the coming five years will be how well he lives up to his commitment to respect those who voted for the far right, or not at all, and prove himself “a president for all”.
My final eve-of-poll thoughts on the French presidentials - plus, as a bonus, the wonderful Christelle Chollet's brilliant parody of election promises. It's in french but there subtitles, also in French but not too hard to follow ...
French bureaucracy is rightly renowned, though feared is perhaps a better word, the world over. I've experienced worse - the loss or, more likely, theft of my wife's passport when we lived in the UAE springs to mind - but it can formidable enough to challenge the will to live.
I wanted to vote, having acquired dual nationality (UK/French) last year. And at the Gendarmerie Nationale on the rue Bonaparte in La Londe-les-Maures, just along the Med coast from my own home in Le Lavandou, I successfully negotiated the last of various hoops, some created by my own misreading of the instructions, and instantly received the crucial e-mail authorising me to use a French citizen in London to vote on my behalf at the French Consulate, where I am registered as a voter.
As mentioned by me at Facebook, the much-anticipated French TV debate between Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen ahead of Sunday's presidential decider confirmed the defending Elysee incumbent as a man in complete control of his brief but given to condescension and arrogance. 'Madame Le Pen...', he kept repeating in an exasperated tone that belied his concluding expression of respect for his far-right rival. She did not win the debate but fared infinitely better than in the equivalent encounter just before the election that saw Macron cruise to power five years ago.
Le Pen insisted she did not wish to haul France out of the EU but sounded a lot like a Frexiter, the French version of the Brexiter she claims she no longer is. I could swear l've heard this before: 'Don't confuse Europe and the EU - I adore this continent' followed or preceded by assorted anti-Brussels whinges. Her defence of positions on Russia (not least the loan her party took from a Moscow bank), immigration, Islam, crime, tax concessions to improve the spending power of ordinary people was sometimes muddled and always unconvincing. That said, although she may not have secured many extra votes and will probably still lose, it wasn't a repeat of the 2017 car crash of a debate. Only 15m viewers bothered with it - half the record set for such debates.
I am grateful to the editor of The National for permitting me to reproduce my work here. I am also indebted to my confreres at Ouest France and AFP for this tale of proprietorial interference in journalistic integrity: staff at Marianne magazine are up in arms over a not very subtle change to the front cover dictated by the Czech major shareholder Daniel Kretinsky. They are right to be so; the original version was ethically sound, the cover as changed wasn't far from being a party political pamphlet ...
A likely cinema hit if the success of its two predecessors is a guide: Qu'est-ce qu'on a Tous Fait au Bon Dieu? What have we done to deserve this? or, to use the weak English translation Serial (Bad) Weddings came out in France a few days before the first round of the presidential elections. It is well acted, especially by Christian Clavier and Chantal Lauby as the narrow-minded Verneuils whose disappointment at their daughters' choice of men gives the film its theme.
It has nothing, strictly speaking, to do with the campaign but the script does mock, among other aspects of French society, the sort of attitudes that lead people to vote for xenophobes (as they did in large numbers in my own Mediterranean town). I made the mischievous connection in this comment piece for The National, reproduced with thanks to the editor for her consent ...
In cinemas across France, audiences laugh out loud at the third film in a hugely popular series depicting a bourgeois, provincial French couple's struggles to accept that their four daughters have avoided suitably solid Frenchmen in favour of Maghrebi, African, Jewish and Chinese husbands.
Against the backdrop of a presidential election in which race plays a key role and would be dominant but for the cost-of-living crisis, it feels impossible not to make the connection, however innocent the timing of the release.
Whether or not they all realise it, the filmgoers' amusement is necessarily laughter at precisely the attitudes that have helped propel Marine Le Pen from the marginalised political wilderness of the far right to the brink of presidency.
:quality(70)/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/thenational/YWIWINWK52IY7SGAYGZIVDM4D4.jpg)
:quality(70)/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/thenational/J3UBPYCY225P2LN4ZV7UUYPOAQ.jpg)
:quality(70)/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/thenational/PQ5NV5A4JJD75FOMKTO5OKYFU4.jpeg)
:quality(70)/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/thenational/SP2KLA5BLBC2RM246NH73QVLF4.jpeg)
:quality(70)/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/thenational/XKK2S2ZALZHOREQOOEQUWURK4M.jpeg)
:quality(70)/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/thenational/4UWWMAC7YVCAHFO23BPTWJW75M.jpeg)
:quality(70)/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/thenational/GXVGOTK3FVDT5BND3AXIVOC35A.jpeg)
:quality(70)/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/thenational/NZSAUUPWYVEGJMGOALPW7ACKHI.jpeg)
:quality(70)/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/thenational/LMVAKKM34IGQVDJZI7PO5QNQ4Q.jpg)
:quality(70)/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/thenational/FXJZSHDSUJEBZE7PQLCYUNAWVM.jpg)
:quality(70)/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/thenational/6QVJ2IKNCFH5LKKMZKY7WUFI4E.jpeg)
:quality(70)/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/thenational/445YBH2Y2FDLHG2QS3XS56D3OI.jpeg)
:quality(70)/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/thenational/23MDARFXSFCPLMLDVHXEFC3RFI.jpeg)
:quality(70)/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/thenational/H6QIT7MZEFCBBXOXYJ5LJE5BNA.jpg)
:quality(70)/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/thenational/PLZRYYUZ7REUDHFI373M3XTLMM.jpeg)
Recent Comments