Odds and sods (of good Pyrenean earth)
More statistics for those who believe in them: a poll published this morning shows that only 45% of those asked want to work longer to earn more. That flies in the face of Sarkozy’s premise that millions of working people are desperate to increase their income by working a few more hours per week, and so back his plan to loosen up France’s working laws. 53% want to have their current working week sanctified by law.
A development to my blog about the devious practices to which candidates, or their supporters, will resort in order to get the necessary 500 signatures from rural mayors, there’s a story in today’s Le Monde that one rural mayor sent back a cheque for 1,000€ sent to him by the Front National. A spokesman at the Front admitted his party sent cheques to rural mayors, not in return for a signature, no, no, no, but because the Front National understands that rural communes are short of cash for little extras - heating bills for the elderly, for example. A kind thought. Anyway, this particular mayor thought it was a bribe and sent it back. Now added suspicion and calumny will fall on all those mayors (their names will be published on the 20th of this month) who have endorsed the Front. Jean-Marie Le Pen claims to be short of about 100 signatures, with 2 weeks to go.
And another piece of daft polling. Great excitement this morning because a BVA poll showed that if François Bayrou makes it into the second round, he will win the election, whether his rival is Nicolas Sarkozy or Ségolène Royal. The polls say he would beat Sarko by 54% and Royal by 55%. The problem is the same poll says that he won’t make it into the second round - he’ll only get 17% in the first round, well below Royal at 25% and Sarkozy at 31%.
The more I look at the photos of François Bayrou which are flooding the net, the more he looks like what he is - an affable, intelligent farmer. He doesn’t have that crisp slickness of Chirac in the old days or of Sarkozy and Royal today, a quality many find attractive and for some reason equate with efficiency and international know-how. Bayrou’s more the Gordon Brown of the election: it would be interesting to run a proper comparison on the two men. Bayrou is said to be difficult to get on with, certainly several MP’s close to him have left him after stormy disagreements, though he has many firm colleagues, particularly among his advisors like Charles de Courson. Neither man has an immediate telegenic charm, though nowadays that lack may be more appreciated than being at ease with the media. Their policies may be close too, an indefinite mix of vaguely free-market economics and social conscience. Bayrou has bravely overcome a serious stutter, and the effort makes him appear a little slower with words, but that may be seen as greater sincerity? He also fits the tradition that every president of the 5th Republic has had roots in the coutryside. Up until now that has been very important, since many French families only moved out of rural France in the last 40 years and still have close attachments there. Indeed for the parliamentary elections many city-dwellers vote in the country commune of their parents or grandparents because they feel their choice carries greater weight there. Both Royal and Sarkozy have made country folk guffaw by the way they hold a baby pig (important) or pick their way gingerly through cow shit. In many ways the current race is between the French who have moved to the slick city and those who have not: speedy Sarkozy and the slower, thoughtful Bayrou. Tortoise and hare?
March 3rd, 2007 at 4:33 pm
After a debate we organised between young activists of the respective political parties campaigning for the French elections, I got chatting to a Sarkozy supporter about the exhaustion and excitement of being an activist during the elections and we were both puzzled by the lack of UDF activists on the streets. Given their victimist campaign about being excluded from the media, you’d think that’s where they’d concentrate their efforts. While Segolene and the PS transformed the way they campaign and didn’t play the traditional “election game” with the photo-opps in the village, the soundbite for the news - rather organising participative debates across the country (some places I’m sure probably are too small to be on most parties’ radars! and where you could count the number of socialist supporters on one hand) and being criticised for it. We were also puzzled by why Bayrou seems so popular in the opinion polls and now in the media. One poll even goes to suggest he would beat either Royal or Sarkozy in the second round.
It seems this extreme centrism he proposes is not what Sarkozy proposes nor what Royal proposes. Given they propose completely opposing reforms and solutions to transforming France, then what policies could he propose which wouldn’t copy one or the other?
Bayrou the tortoise indeed knows good old France - Sarkozy and Royal are either mad or liars to propose to reform this country. As the “affable, intelligent farmer”, he knows that it’s not as good as it used to be, the postcard France - you know the “a year in Provence” image. He knows that the problem with Sarkozy and Royal and their respective parties, is that they disagree with each other. Why don’t they like Bayrou just not propose anything and just smile at the camera and see who gets the more votes.
Bayrou the tortoise has like the fable, always got there in the end. Campaign against the right during the elections in 2002, get ministerial posts for yourself and your colleagues in a right wing government, vote for most of the government laws that Sarkozy passes until you see the elections coming up, vote against them once on privatisation of the motorways and then claim you’re against them, despite the fact all of the council the UDF controls…it does in coalition with the UMP and never with the left. Tempt the centre-left by saying you’ve already got someone on the centre-left within the PS to be your next prime minister and all those on the centre-left of the PS publicly state they would never enter government with you, as do the UMP.
As for its proposals, while Segolene introduced her presidential pact on the problem with the national debt and detailed how this would be resolved, Bayrou defends he hasn’t got a magic wand to solve the problems for France, its more “backwards not forwards” or for the more cynical a sweet package of Sarkozy’s proposals wrapped up in motherhood and apple pie.
Can’t argue with that, but how are you going to do it? Since we still haven’t heard any real proposals from Bayrou in France then if someone in the UK has then I will eagerly translate them into French so my compatriots can finally work out what Bayrou wants to do with this country..
Sorry, I forgot Bayrou’s only proposal…to form a government of national unity. Like in Italy (government lasted nine months)…with the right added into the mix, or like in Germany…which is a federal state and where neither of the two ruling parties have as little as 20 MPs like the UDF does (after the 20002 elections, 80% of the UDF MPs joined the Sarkozy led UMP).