Gavin Mortimer

The left in France believe that Donald Trump’s mid-term mauling is an omen. The Greens, Socialists and the far-left La France insoumise are convinced that the age of ‘populism’ is over. Trump is finished and so too, they cheer, is Marine Le Pen’s dream of becoming president of the Republic next year. In a tweet this week Marine Tondelier, the leader of the Greens, declared that Le Pen’s National Rally ‘is as fascist as Donald Trump’ and as ‘incapable of solving our problems’. His presidency should act as a warning to any voter in France foolish enough to think Le Pen is the solution to the country’s myriad woes. Not so fast.

It was a peaceful weekend in France apparently. One broadcaster described the latest protests as ‘calm’ and Le Monde said they unfolded ‘without serious incident’. Tell that to the 53 police officers who were injured in clashes with demonstrators, 1,513 of whom were arrested as trouble broke out across the country. Laurent Nunez, the Interior Minister, said that in several towns and cities the police had been subjected  to an ‘extremely high level of violence’. This Saturday is Halloween and social media is full of threats and taunts about bringing terror to the Parisian bourgeoisie In Grenoble, for example, hundreds of far-left extremists were beaten back by police who resorted to tear gas and baton charges.

Marine Le Pen is the political winner from the anarchy that erupted in France at the weekend. A poll conducted in the 48 hours after the nationwide riots found that the leader of the National Rally is the only figure whose approval rating has increased. Le Pen is now up to 38 per cent, a popularity not seen since Francois Mitterrand enjoyed widespread support in the 1980s. According to Frédéric Dabi, one of France’s leading political scientists, Le Pen is regarded as ‘the representative of the party of order, the party of those who can no longer tolerate the chaos’. Her nearest rival is Jean-Luc Melenchon, the leader of the far-left La France insoumise, the party that much of the country holds responsible for stoking disorder in recent weeks.

This is not going to be an easy week for the French police. More than 200,000 people are expected on the streets today in ‘Act 5’ of the high school protest, and on Saturday the Gilets Jaunes will join a demonstration about the cost of living crisis. The extreme-left and their anarchist allies are set on disorder There will be violence. There was on Monday, which was supposed to be a relatively quiet day in preparation for today. It was anything but. In a school in Aubagne, in the south of the country, a 14-year-old boy opened fire with a hunting rifle, wounding two teachers and terrifying his classmates. Police are still working to establish a motive. Elsewhere in France, eight teachers were assaulted by protestors.

On 21 September, pupils at the Lycée Saint-Exupéry in Créteil, south-east of Paris, staged a protest. They had a list of grievances. Classes were overcrowded and there was a shortage of teachers. They were also dismayed at the decaying state of some of the school buildings and the automated university admissions platform they feel deprives them of autonomy. Pupils filmed the protest and uploaded the footage onto social media. It went viral. Across France, children in other secondary schools joined the protest. They aired the same complaints as their peers in Créteil – and more. Some pupils described seeing rats in classrooms, others of enduring leaking ceilings and mouldy walls. For many, memories of the summer heatwave were still painfully fresh.

The government of France held a crisis meeting yesterday afternoon as a school protest movement intensified in violence. On Wednesday, 625 people were arrested and 83 gendarmes and police officers were injured as youths protested outside hundreds of schools nationwide. Yesterday, a school in Nantes was severely damaged after being firebombed and a fire engine was destroyed in Marseille. In the city of Reims there were fierce clashes between protestors and police, and only the use of tear gas dispersed the demonstrators. In some cities, such as Rennes, it was reported that university students were protesting alongside the high school pupils. The government claimed yesterday that the movement has been hijacked ‘by LFI and its far-left proxies’.

So the ‘one in, one out’ deal is dead. Quelle surprise – as the French might say. Since the initiative was launched on 2 August last year, approximately 1,500 people have been returned to France and a similar number sent in the other direction. In the same period, more than 40,000 migrants have crossed the Channel illegally in boats of varying size. According to reports, Britain was keen to continue the arrangement whereby the Home Office returns one illegal immigrant in exchange for accepting a legitimate asylum seeker. France was not and the deal officially expires today. Paris wants what is described as an ‘EU-wide returns scheme’ rather than one arranged with Britain.

Marine Le Pen has promised to ban women wearing Muslim headscarves if she becomes president next year. The leader of the National Rally declared on X: ‘I will submit to the French people, by referendum, a bill to combat Islamist ideologies with numerous powerful measures, including the banning of the Islamist headscarf in public spaces’. Le Pen may be out of step with the rest of the political class but she is speaking for a majority of the people France has led the way among European countries on the issue of conservative Islamic dress. In 2004, for example, a law was passed prohibiting the wearing of conspicuous religious symbols in schools. It applied to Christians, Jews and Muslims, but France was accused of using the bill to persecute Islam.

The fight for France is underway. The 2027 presidential campaign began last night as the leading candidates clashed in a live debate on the centre court of Roland Garros. Yesterday's confrontation came on the same day a poll confirmed that Marine Le Pen is streets ahead of her rivals in the court of public opinion. The leader of the National Rally boasts an approval rating of 33 per cent, more than twice that of the left’s Jean-Luc Melenchon. He is on 16 per cent with the centrist former prime minister Edouard Philippe 2 per cent behind. Fourth, on 11 per cent, is Raphael Glucksmann, the leader of the centre-left Place Publique.

France’s under-15s can carry on using social media after a parliamentary ban was struck down by the Republic’s constitutional council on Friday. The ruling is a humiliating blow for Emmanuel Macron, who had championed the legislation from the beginning. It had won the backing of both parliament and the Senate last month but the Council had other ideas. In rejecting the Bill, France’s highest constitutional authority judged that it ‘places a disproportionate restriction on freedom of expression and communication’. Macron heard the news as he enjoyed the surf at his seaside retreat on the Riveria, a break that has already provoked the ire of many. Should the president be gallivanting on a jet-ski when so much of the country is ravaged by destructive wildfires?