Sarko fever? Not in St. Pompon, says Martin Vander Weyer in yesterday's Spectator.You can’t go much deeper into la France profonde than St Pompon, the village in a cleft of the hills between the Dordogne and the Lot to which I escape as often as I can. It’s a placid, unchanging, self-contained sort of place, a world of its own. I’d like to report that it was gripped by election fever this weekend – but if I did I’d be making it up.
Interesting that Mr Vander Weyer should make this comment. Here I am in La France Profonde -- admittedly not quite as profonde as St Pompon -- but within a hand's reach of it, and I found just the opposite.
No -- people were not out in the streets in their hordes with red roses or blue balloons, but they were all glued to their television sets at home in groups of family and friends and fellow supporters of either one or the other candidate.
-- And the debating -- the endless, ceaseless, continuous (consult Thesaurus for any more adjectives in the same vein and insert) debating that preceded the election by months, continued, and no doubt will continue for another few months and on the night was creating a distinct hummmmmmmmmm throughout the Dordogne valley. I always wondered about the French' love for the debate. Someone mentioned recently that the reason there is so much debate on French television -- for the bulk of the French television programmes is made up of debates -- or at least -- people sitting around and talking -- was that it is such a cheap way to make television programmes. It is a bit of a chicken and egg situation -- did their love for debating come first and then the realisation that it was cheap television production, or did the television production budget result in them finding out how much they loved sitting around and debating?............
But back to the elections.........I had commented before on attending political rallies in the area in the run-up to the elections. I was fascinated - and thrilled to be living in an area where the choice of the country's new president was weighing so heavily on everyone's mind. I am impressed that people take their leadership so seriously. In a world where elections and choice of government is more important than it has probably ever been in the history of mankind, this is sadly very seldom the case. We live in a world of apathy about our leadership. Oh yes! We like to complain -- and often vociferously -- after the horse has bolted, so to speak. But more often than not the biggest and loudest complainants are those who just could not be bothered to go cast their vote, because "What is my vote going to change? The stupid fool will get in anyway!"
Coming from a country where the majority never had the vote until recently, and a continent where western democracy is not the norm, the ability to participate in the political process and have my voice heard when it comes to choosing our leaders, is no doubt something I appreciate far more than most of my fellow Westeners. I do not take the privilege to elect my government for granted -- ever! And yes -- it is a privilege, not a right, and if everyone remembered that, they would not take it for granted either.
So -- when I found the interest everyone showed here in La France Profonde before and during and now, after the elections, I was, as I said, thrilled.
I despair when I talk to people who do not take an active interest in their
government -- local or national. Even when people take to the streets and riot and show that they care that way -- even that is better than apathy! However, here I am surrounded by people who take an active interest. So much so that now that the elections are over, the debate is starting all over again. On television, on radio and in every home and little coffee bar and bistro, people are talking about the results of the elections, who voted for whom, what Sarkozy had promised and what he is likely to do and not do, what he will do first and what he will leave till later, where he will go, who he will choose as his prime minister and in his government, what the background and the talents and the faults are of each of the possible members of his government, whether his wife, Cecilia Sarkozy will support him, what her dress sense is, what she should do with her hair, how Sarkozy will stand up to Bush and will he keep his promise to urge the USA to adhere to strict measurements to combat global warming, ---- the list goes on. A post-mortem like I have never seen before! A veritable fest of chewing the cud! And the relish and pleasure they are getting out of this, is as a direct result of the fact that they had actually cast their vote and participated in the political machine that is grinding away and know that their voice and their vote had made a difference. What a wonderful knowledge that is! Vander Weyer continues in his article : "Fortunately, however, the local Sud Ouest newspaper prints the results not just district by district, but commune by commune, so I now have a better idea which way the political breeze was really blowing down this narrow wooded valley 350 miles south of Paris. St Pompon mustered a turnout of almost 90 per cent, and voted 148 for Sarko against 141 for Ségo. That was against the run of play in our district, Domme, whose 5,000-odd voters inclined 52 to 48 for the socialist candidate – having given 8 per cent to Le Pen in the first round. To the extent that these detailed results offer any pattern, it is that the communes in which agriculture predominates were generally the strongest for Ségo, while those more dependent on commerce and tourism (led by the lovely hilltop bastide of Domme itself) tended towards Sarko. St Pompon, whose micro-economy is a mixture of the two, was bang in the middle."
As another very astute article by Simon Heffer points out: "...the majority of French are bought off with a lavish welfare state and jobs on the public payroll, financed by a minority who pay high taxes for the privilege of living in France. Business has had enough of bankrolling bureaucracy and funding feather-bedding." Choosing Sarkozy meant that France has chosen to finally move out of the 1940s, rather than to stay there to the point of utter economic destruction. The three great economic difficulties facing France are chomage, or unemployment, the absence of croissance, or growth and the weakness of pouvoir d'achat, or purchasing power.
Wages for most workers, especially in France's vast rural communities are low. "The bargain prices British tourists feel they have spotted when they buy food and wine, or pay for a meal in a restaurant, are quite often out of the reach of the average French family. The income tax threshold is high, and therefore only 48 per cent of those in work pay any.
By contrast, there are huge imposts on employing someone - and, once employed, staff are almost impossible to sack - which is part of the reason it is so hard for young people to get work, and why there is such high unemployment. It is also why so many dynamic young French people now choose to come to live and work in London, now the seventh biggest French city in the world."
" In some parts of France the signs of decay are becoming ever more obvious: shops boarded up in villages in the Dordogne, property not selling except perhaps to foreigners, and resentment about freeloaders, especially if they are perceived to be immigrants. France has numerous successful multinationals, and every French town has scores of one-man bands (notably retailers), but there is less and less in between.
The other factor that makes it so hard for energetic and enterprising French people to prosper is that they are usually prevented by law from working more than 35 hours a week. This law, brought in under the socialist government of Lionel Jospin, is now widely condemned, even by some supporters of Miss Royal, for the effect it has had on suppressing growth, living standards, wealth creation and productivity.
That Mr Sarkozy has said that he will not only scrap it, but will make the earnings for work done in excess of the 35 hours free of taxes both for the employee and the employer, is indicative of the hand grenade he intends to throw into the dormant French economy.
Vander Weyer concludes with this remark, which I have observed as well: "If there is any conclusion to be reached at all from this exercise it is, I suspect, that what rural France really wants is a mixture of socialist subsidy and welfare with rightist social and immigration policies; but most of all what it wants is to be left in peace and privacy, not to be told what to do, and not to be asked too many questions."
........ not to be told what to do and not to be asked too many questions, no, but do give your opinion and start a discussion going, though --- they do love that with a passion -- and no time like elections time for those kind of passionate discussing and debating!
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