The simple answer is we'd have to wait and see what happens. There's boring but necessary stuff like the FC-ASW missile that we're working on together which is replacing Exocet, so they'd be mad to tear that up.
As for migration agreements, we're already having difficulties with the French on the basis it's never entirely clear how far they're trying to stop migrants crossing the channel, with allegations of pushing boats into UK waters, etc. RN might refuse more cooperation, then again we pay them for some of the work they theoretically do so cancelling those agreements would be unpopular with the police who would lose the cash.
A RN government might also try to burnish its credentials by being seen to act responsibly with neighbours like the UK.
My worry is a massive crackdown in places like Calais etc, this will panic the migrants and refugees, forcing them to take more risks crossing the channel.
Expect a massive up tick in risky crossings and therefore more deaths of innocent people.
Why can't we just work together to sort this out? Proper camps for people to stay in while they apply for asylum in countries that can and will take them in. I have said this many times to many people, most refugees want to return home once they are able too. We need to apply pressure on countries with issues and work to solve the problems.
But of course nothing will happen as we are so nation centric that we only care about ourselves and damn anyone else.
>Proper camps for people to stay in while they apply for asylum in countries that can
Part of the current problem is that asylum seekers can only legally apply for asylum in the first EU country they arrive in. Post brexit, this means they can claim asylum here where they couldn't prior.
> I have said this many times to many people, most refugees want to return home once they are able too.
Utter bollocks. None of these people are ever going home and you're delusional to think that you'll ever be taken seriously spouting such obvious nonsense.
Certainly not while their countries are an active war zone.
While people are being bombed, massacred and victimised, there will be no chance of them returning. I have talked to a few refugees and all they want is to go home. Now I understand some will not, but the majority are just looking for safety until they can return.
Ah, now I understand you, reading your past posts, hard line Tory voter.
>Certainly not while their countries are an active war zone
Top Nationalities Crossing via Boat in 2024
1. Afghanistan = not an active war zone
2. Iran = not an active war zone
3. Turkey = not an active war zone
4. Eritrea = not an active war zone
5. Syria = active war zone
6. Iraq = not an active war zone
7. Vietnam = not an active war zone
8. Sudan = active war zone
9. Albania = not an active war zone
10. Egypt = not an active war zone.
So only 2/10 top Nationalities, who account about for about a 1/3 of total arrivals so far. Fleeing desperately clearly isn't the main motivator
wait till Sunday. second round of voting, such a good feature. Firat round whittles the candidates down, then back to the elctorate for the final pick. & pretty much all other parties will be standing down all but the most viable to defeat the RN candidate.
Question is, are the French really disciplined enough to vote tactically - is anyone - and will the voters of Macron's party deem it in their interest to tactically vote left?
Question is, are the French really disciplined enough to vote tactically?
Too f\*cking right we are. FN have got to the final pair in presidential elections several time and all the other parties have campaigned so that the best opposition to FN wins. It'll be pretty much the same this time, although the solid FN vote is larger now.
The only good thing we can hope is that people are quickly disillusioned by these rich, elitist arseholes, pretending to have solitions.
Let's see what improvements they make. France is our ally, and I still believe in their ability to ride this populist shit out when they don't manage to solve any problems.
It's utterly incredulous to me that people see Le Pen and the FN as the 'champions of the downtrodden and disenfranchised' when they're funded by Russian oligarchs, in the pocket of Putin and campaigning to cut taxes for the rich, destroy labor laws, take away equal rights and make hundreds of thousands unemployed from mass firings in the public sector -
Macron might be a neoliberal milksop with a penchant for far too many market-centric ideas, but there's not even a debate about who cares about France more.
> The only good thing we can hope is that people are quickly disillusioned by these rich, elitist arseholes, pretending to have solitions.
They have, that's why they've voted for the National Front. The question is what happens when they get disillusioned with them too?
It's not hard to see why fascism is on the rise in Europe. People are struggling economically, immigration (illegal and legally) is out of control and mainstream politicians have no response other than to wring their hands and accuse people of racism. Along comes a charismatic leader who says they'll sort it all out. They won't of course but people are desperate.
Well we have certain agreements with France on immigration, including shared resources and a bunch of money.
However whether France gives a shit is always the thing. There's videos of police just standing by laughing while boats go out, reports of the French boats just giving the dinghies a quick shove into the UK waters, etc. So you can see why people would think that.
Conversations about "fascism on the rise" in Europe miss a key point: unlike the previous rise of Fascism, there's **no big push for war.**
Whereas last time around, in the 1930s, building up a big army and writing that your intention was to create more living space was all the rage.
This time around, the far right has more a flavour of isolationism, anti-immigration, and not being involved in seemingly unwinnable conflicts, such as Ukraine/Gaza.
For people who've grown up amidst seemingly out-of-control immigration and utterly futile escapades in Afghanistan and Iraq, isolationism doesn't seem entirely outrageous.
That's not to say I support any of these parties. Yet I would be wary of likening these parties to the movement led by the man with the toothbrush mustache.
It's a very good point really, I was seeing a lot of the usual crowd on Twitter saying about how globalisation doesn't work, pushing for more isolation, focussing more on their own countries. Which you really can't blame them for, they're just seeing the immediate issues.
There's no scenario where RN are ever gonna be legislating on this
Theyre definitely not gonna get a majority and probably wont even be the biggest party now that the left and centre blocs have agreed to work together for the 2nd round
even if they miraculously did it 'll be cohab. with Macron leading to a lame duck parliament
If they cant get a majority for the assembly now theyre definitely not gonna win the presidential election in 2027, their peak opportunity was around 2017 and theyve blown it again since.
Keep in mind that this is a country where their recent "very strict" immigration bill is still softer than the changes that the rest of Europe made to immigration some decade ago. Power still rests with the centre left and will continue to.
Not true. They’re currently in front with 33% of votes and the only question is whether they will get an absolute majority. 2027 is in the bag for them so long as they don’t disappoint too much in the period up to the presidential.
I think a lot depends on the second round of voting and whether people turn out to ensure as few RN candidates get elected. Both when Jacques Chirac in 2002 and Emmanuel Macron in 2017 won, there were people who voted to keep the FN/RN out- if I recall correctly in 2002 some people showed their reluctance by wearing clothes pegs (to represent the choice as if a bad smell).
The mood in France seems quite different now. Back then the traditional left and right were holding up, and even in 2017 the left put in a decent effort. Now both are polling quite low and it’s between an unpopular Macron and a divisive Le Pen. I get the impression that more traditionally left/right voters are willing to give her a chance.
> If they cant get a majority for the assembly now theyre definitely not gonna win the presidential election in 2027, their peak opportunity was around 2017 and theyve blown it again since.
They did better in 2022 than in 2017 and by 2027 they have a ready candidate while all the other parties are busy infighting (Les Républicains) or in full panic mode (the left). Moreover, whatever the result of the 2nd round they have now shown that power is within reach (whereas the old *front républicain* was a very effective tactic in conveying the message “FN vote = wasted vote”). So 2027 is *very* worrying.
>Theyre definitely not gonna get a majority and probably wont even be the biggest party now that the left and centre blocs have agreed to work together for the 2nd round
Them getting an outright majority was always a stretch, most projections show them as the largest party with 200+ seats, not a majority but far and away the biggest.
And you are being very presumptuous regarding the second round. It is absolutely not a given that an NFP voter will vote Ensemble in the second round. If you follow French politics you will know that Macron is absolutely detested by a significant portion of the left. Indeed, most voters don't think on a left-right basis (the politicians who realise this are often the ones who do best). There's also a very good chance that that an NFP or Ensemble voter will just stay home and not vote while RN voters are much more galvanised.
Look at the difference between the 1st and 2nd round results in 2022 between Macron and Le Pen. The cordon sanitaire isn't nearly as strong as it once was.
Assuming RN win a majority (not at all guaranteed), Macron ought to still be in charge of foreign policy, so it wouldn't be a complete break. However their domestic politics would likely be more hardline anti immigration. I don't know how it would affect France's relations with the rest of the EU, but that could affect Britain's relations with the EU as well, considering France's prominence within the organisation.
I did wonder on their reaction to the EU, Twitter was awosh with the usual Americans trying the usual "globalism doesn't work, communism, blah blah".
Le Penn was quoted saying no to the "Frexit" stuff, but that was a couple of years back and things can change.
I feel like that this is an urgent question that needs asking of Keir Starmer between now and Thursday.
The reason is that if the French government decides not to cooperate, then it could drive a coach and horses through the "smash the gangs" rhetoric that we've been hearing so far.
It's certainly a good question to ask, if Le Pen's party do come into power, how would Labour work with them on UK/France matters.
Starmer has said that he'll resume processing asylum applications who have already arrived in the country illegally, so I suppose one worry may be that this will increase the desire to get here no matter how.
Though morally we really should be processing valid asylum claims, if a person is in serious danger in their country of origin, they should have a safe place. I do worry that we are a small country and already have a lot of housing issues, not like other countries don't have their own issues though.
Probably not good, especially in terms of Ukraine.
However, if you think the capitol riots were bad, wait it I’ll you see how anti democratic the French left are. Especially in the Paris suburbs
The simple answer is we'd have to wait and see what happens. There's boring but necessary stuff like the FC-ASW missile that we're working on together which is replacing Exocet, so they'd be mad to tear that up. As for migration agreements, we're already having difficulties with the French on the basis it's never entirely clear how far they're trying to stop migrants crossing the channel, with allegations of pushing boats into UK waters, etc. RN might refuse more cooperation, then again we pay them for some of the work they theoretically do so cancelling those agreements would be unpopular with the police who would lose the cash. A RN government might also try to burnish its credentials by being seen to act responsibly with neighbours like the UK.
My worry is a massive crackdown in places like Calais etc, this will panic the migrants and refugees, forcing them to take more risks crossing the channel. Expect a massive up tick in risky crossings and therefore more deaths of innocent people. Why can't we just work together to sort this out? Proper camps for people to stay in while they apply for asylum in countries that can and will take them in. I have said this many times to many people, most refugees want to return home once they are able too. We need to apply pressure on countries with issues and work to solve the problems. But of course nothing will happen as we are so nation centric that we only care about ourselves and damn anyone else.
>Proper camps for people to stay in while they apply for asylum in countries that can Part of the current problem is that asylum seekers can only legally apply for asylum in the first EU country they arrive in. Post brexit, this means they can claim asylum here where they couldn't prior.
> I have said this many times to many people, most refugees want to return home once they are able too. Utter bollocks. None of these people are ever going home and you're delusional to think that you'll ever be taken seriously spouting such obvious nonsense.
Certainly not while their countries are an active war zone. While people are being bombed, massacred and victimised, there will be no chance of them returning. I have talked to a few refugees and all they want is to go home. Now I understand some will not, but the majority are just looking for safety until they can return. Ah, now I understand you, reading your past posts, hard line Tory voter.
>Certainly not while their countries are an active war zone Top Nationalities Crossing via Boat in 2024 1. Afghanistan = not an active war zone 2. Iran = not an active war zone 3. Turkey = not an active war zone 4. Eritrea = not an active war zone 5. Syria = active war zone 6. Iraq = not an active war zone 7. Vietnam = not an active war zone 8. Sudan = active war zone 9. Albania = not an active war zone 10. Egypt = not an active war zone. So only 2/10 top Nationalities, who account about for about a 1/3 of total arrivals so far. Fleeing desperately clearly isn't the main motivator
wait till Sunday. second round of voting, such a good feature. Firat round whittles the candidates down, then back to the elctorate for the final pick. & pretty much all other parties will be standing down all but the most viable to defeat the RN candidate.
Question is, are the French really disciplined enough to vote tactically - is anyone - and will the voters of Macron's party deem it in their interest to tactically vote left?
A lot of voters just don't vote at all rather than vote tactically, as seen in 2022.
Question is, are the French really disciplined enough to vote tactically? Too f\*cking right we are. FN have got to the final pair in presidential elections several time and all the other parties have campaigned so that the best opposition to FN wins. It'll be pretty much the same this time, although the solid FN vote is larger now.
The only good thing we can hope is that people are quickly disillusioned by these rich, elitist arseholes, pretending to have solitions. Let's see what improvements they make. France is our ally, and I still believe in their ability to ride this populist shit out when they don't manage to solve any problems.
It's utterly incredulous to me that people see Le Pen and the FN as the 'champions of the downtrodden and disenfranchised' when they're funded by Russian oligarchs, in the pocket of Putin and campaigning to cut taxes for the rich, destroy labor laws, take away equal rights and make hundreds of thousands unemployed from mass firings in the public sector - Macron might be a neoliberal milksop with a penchant for far too many market-centric ideas, but there's not even a debate about who cares about France more.
Maybe we'll have to minimise it during the next election, but the fact is, people are fucking stupid.. And ignorant....and hateful......
> The only good thing we can hope is that people are quickly disillusioned by these rich, elitist arseholes, pretending to have solitions. They have, that's why they've voted for the National Front. The question is what happens when they get disillusioned with them too?
> that people are quickly disillusioned by these rich, elitist arseholes Most in France would say they got elected in 2017.
It's not hard to see why fascism is on the rise in Europe. People are struggling economically, immigration (illegal and legally) is out of control and mainstream politicians have no response other than to wring their hands and accuse people of racism. Along comes a charismatic leader who says they'll sort it all out. They won't of course but people are desperate.
You really think we currently work with France on immigration? We are polar opposites. Can’t see it will get better. Also can’t see it getting worse.
Well we have certain agreements with France on immigration, including shared resources and a bunch of money. However whether France gives a shit is always the thing. There's videos of police just standing by laughing while boats go out, reports of the French boats just giving the dinghies a quick shove into the UK waters, etc. So you can see why people would think that.
Theres a lot of collab on immigration between France & the UK
No, there is a lot of posing for the press. In action there is no collaboration between France and the U.K. quite the opposite.
Conversations about "fascism on the rise" in Europe miss a key point: unlike the previous rise of Fascism, there's **no big push for war.** Whereas last time around, in the 1930s, building up a big army and writing that your intention was to create more living space was all the rage. This time around, the far right has more a flavour of isolationism, anti-immigration, and not being involved in seemingly unwinnable conflicts, such as Ukraine/Gaza. For people who've grown up amidst seemingly out-of-control immigration and utterly futile escapades in Afghanistan and Iraq, isolationism doesn't seem entirely outrageous. That's not to say I support any of these parties. Yet I would be wary of likening these parties to the movement led by the man with the toothbrush mustache.
It's a very good point really, I was seeing a lot of the usual crowd on Twitter saying about how globalisation doesn't work, pushing for more isolation, focussing more on their own countries. Which you really can't blame them for, they're just seeing the immediate issues.
There's no scenario where RN are ever gonna be legislating on this Theyre definitely not gonna get a majority and probably wont even be the biggest party now that the left and centre blocs have agreed to work together for the 2nd round even if they miraculously did it 'll be cohab. with Macron leading to a lame duck parliament If they cant get a majority for the assembly now theyre definitely not gonna win the presidential election in 2027, their peak opportunity was around 2017 and theyve blown it again since. Keep in mind that this is a country where their recent "very strict" immigration bill is still softer than the changes that the rest of Europe made to immigration some decade ago. Power still rests with the centre left and will continue to.
Not true. They’re currently in front with 33% of votes and the only question is whether they will get an absolute majority. 2027 is in the bag for them so long as they don’t disappoint too much in the period up to the presidential.
I think a lot depends on the second round of voting and whether people turn out to ensure as few RN candidates get elected. Both when Jacques Chirac in 2002 and Emmanuel Macron in 2017 won, there were people who voted to keep the FN/RN out- if I recall correctly in 2002 some people showed their reluctance by wearing clothes pegs (to represent the choice as if a bad smell).
The mood in France seems quite different now. Back then the traditional left and right were holding up, and even in 2017 the left put in a decent effort. Now both are polling quite low and it’s between an unpopular Macron and a divisive Le Pen. I get the impression that more traditionally left/right voters are willing to give her a chance.
> If they cant get a majority for the assembly now theyre definitely not gonna win the presidential election in 2027, their peak opportunity was around 2017 and theyve blown it again since. They did better in 2022 than in 2017 and by 2027 they have a ready candidate while all the other parties are busy infighting (Les Républicains) or in full panic mode (the left). Moreover, whatever the result of the 2nd round they have now shown that power is within reach (whereas the old *front républicain* was a very effective tactic in conveying the message “FN vote = wasted vote”). So 2027 is *very* worrying.
Didn’t people say they are over every election but get stronger every time lol
>Theyre definitely not gonna get a majority and probably wont even be the biggest party now that the left and centre blocs have agreed to work together for the 2nd round Them getting an outright majority was always a stretch, most projections show them as the largest party with 200+ seats, not a majority but far and away the biggest. And you are being very presumptuous regarding the second round. It is absolutely not a given that an NFP voter will vote Ensemble in the second round. If you follow French politics you will know that Macron is absolutely detested by a significant portion of the left. Indeed, most voters don't think on a left-right basis (the politicians who realise this are often the ones who do best). There's also a very good chance that that an NFP or Ensemble voter will just stay home and not vote while RN voters are much more galvanised. Look at the difference between the 1st and 2nd round results in 2022 between Macron and Le Pen. The cordon sanitaire isn't nearly as strong as it once was.
Assuming RN win a majority (not at all guaranteed), Macron ought to still be in charge of foreign policy, so it wouldn't be a complete break. However their domestic politics would likely be more hardline anti immigration. I don't know how it would affect France's relations with the rest of the EU, but that could affect Britain's relations with the EU as well, considering France's prominence within the organisation.
*Frortie* sounds much less mellifluous than *Brexit* so I can’t see them going to that level of madness at least
Yet some local election posters here use the phrase « FREXIT >>
Where’s the *Institute French* when you need them?!?
I did wonder on their reaction to the EU, Twitter was awosh with the usual Americans trying the usual "globalism doesn't work, communism, blah blah". Le Penn was quoted saying no to the "Frexit" stuff, but that was a couple of years back and things can change.
I feel like that this is an urgent question that needs asking of Keir Starmer between now and Thursday. The reason is that if the French government decides not to cooperate, then it could drive a coach and horses through the "smash the gangs" rhetoric that we've been hearing so far.
It's certainly a good question to ask, if Le Pen's party do come into power, how would Labour work with them on UK/France matters. Starmer has said that he'll resume processing asylum applications who have already arrived in the country illegally, so I suppose one worry may be that this will increase the desire to get here no matter how. Though morally we really should be processing valid asylum claims, if a person is in serious danger in their country of origin, they should have a safe place. I do worry that we are a small country and already have a lot of housing issues, not like other countries don't have their own issues though.
Probably not good, especially in terms of Ukraine. However, if you think the capitol riots were bad, wait it I’ll you see how anti democratic the French left are. Especially in the Paris suburbs
It’s very funny how people think Europe is more liberal than us that’s all I’m saying