Yahoo News Brexit weekly briefing: the French political establishment splinters
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The big picture
Not much going on this week? Only the splintering of the French political establishment, radical implications for the Brexit negotiations and the start of campaigning for a shock UK general election.
The independent centrist Emmanuel Macron is now favourite to win the French presidential election against the far-right Front National’s Marine Le Pen.
But, like the map of Britain after Brexit, the French election showed a country divided, but not just between the two frontrunners.
Polls leading up to election night pointed to the possibility of a place in the final round for centre-right mainstream François Fillon, of Les Républicains, once favourite to win but dogged by political scandal, and the veteran leftwing radical Jean-Luc Mélenchon, whose sudden surge in popularity took everyone by surprise – apart from those who had watched the 2015 Labour leadership election.
Macron’s social liberalism and business-friendly values meant his projected victory over Le Pen was welcomed across the political spectrum in the UK, from former chancellor George Osborne, who called him “my friend”, to Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron and Labour’s former business secretary, Chuka Umunna.
However, the lukewarm reactions of some Eurosceptic UK newspapers betrayed some nerves as the UK begins to contemplate a Macron presidency.
Ministers will guess he is likely to drive a hard bargain at the negotiating table and has floated tearing up Le Touquet agreement, which sees UK customs and border officials based across the Channel.
He has said:
I don’t want a tailor-made approach where the British have the best of two worlds. That will be too big an incentive for others to leave and kill the European idea, which is based on shared responsibilities.
The view from Europe
European politicians breathed a sigh of relief this week that Macron looks set to beat his far-right rival, according to polling that puts him up to 25 percentage points ahead.
The European commission president broke protocol to wish Macron well in the second round of the French presidential election. He was also congratulated by Jean-Claude Juncker, president of the European commission.
“When the choice is set along these lines, for Jean-Claude Juncker, who has spent 35 years of his life defending Europe’s values and the need for cooperation, the choice is pretty obvious,” said his spokesman, Margaritis Schinas.
The EU’s chief Brexit negotiator, Michel Barnier, described Macron as a “patriot and European” who he felt confident would beat Le Pen. “France must remain European,” he said.
Delight was palpable too from the German government. The German foreign minister, Sigmar Gabriel, said: “I am certain that Emmanuel Macron will be the next president of France. Great for Europe.”
Angela Merkel’s spokesman, Steffen Seibert, wished Macron “all the best” in the runoff against Le Pen. “Good that Emmanuel Macron was successful with its course for a strong EU + social market economy,” he tweeted.
Le Pen’s response to her uphill battle was a radical one – temporarily quitting her post as leader of the Front National on Monday, in an attempt to widen her appeal ahead of next month’s presidential election runoff.
Tonight, I am no longer the president of the Front National. I am the presidential candidate.
Meanwhile, back in Westminster
Parliament is technically still in session but parties are in full general election gear.
Voters are being urged to unseat prominent Brexit-supporting MPs such as Iain Duncan Smith, Theresa Villiers and Kate Hoey by Open Britain, the successor organisation to Britain’s pro-EU remain campaign.
The group has drawn up an “attack list” of 20 seats, held mostly by Conservative MPs, where constituents voted to stay in the EU but their representatives are Brexit supporters.
Campaigner Gina Miller and former prime minister Tony Blair have also called for Labour to vote tactically in the election to send a pro-remain message. In an op-ed for the Guardian, Blair wrote:
Ignoring the Brexit issue or trying to downplay it as one issue out of many just won’t work … we have to expose the fact that the mandate the Tories are asking for is not an open negotiation in the interests of the country but for a Brexit at any cost driven by the ideology of the right of the Tory party.
Many of the attack seats are in London or the south-east, including Chingford and Woodford Green, which is held by the former cabinet minister Duncan Smith, with a majority of 8,386 over Labour.
Nigel Farage confirmed he will not make his eighth bid for parliament as Ukip leader Paul Nuttall struggled to make the case for the party’s relevance, launching a blitz of anti-Muslim policies including a ban on the face veil at an event on Monday.
The Ukip leader has not even confirmed whether he himself will seek election, after his high-profile byelection defeat in Stoke Central a few weeks ago, although he has given a hint he may not stand.
On Tuesday, Labour’s shadow Brexit secretary Keir Starmer will set out the party’s vision for Brexit, pledging to scrap the Brexit white paper and replace it with new negotiating priorities with the emphasis on keeping the benefits of the single market and customs union.
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Natalie Nougayrède writes in the Guardian that voters should not assume a Le Pen defeat is a done deal. Leftwingers and ultra-conservatives could yet hand the French presidency to the Front National candidate – by refusing to back Macron.
At such a defining moment in French and European politics, surely there can be nothing more important than making sure a key democracy resists the sirens of the Front National, which would restore values from of the darkest eras of French history.
Anti-establishment sentiment can be understandable, but if it’s indifferent to the outcome it produces, then that’s chaos and nihilism – not renewal.
In the New Statesman, Stephen Bush says much is being made of the success of Macron’s new party En Marche! as a sign of how the political system can be remade, but the result may be something far less radical.
If En Marche!, Macron’s new party, can go from no seats at all to the largest group but are short of a majority their natural allies in getting through Macron’s programme will be from the remains of the Socialists.
Far from irrevocably changing the pattern of French politics, Macron’s remarkable success may simply mark a period of transition in the life of the French Left.
Tweet of the week
Ed Miliband gets sassy:
Do not panic too much about this tweet. I guess @EmmunelMacron has many friends. I also met him once... https://t.co/OzLb0q4r4m
— Ed Miliband (@Ed_Miliband) April 23, 2017
