Marine Le Pen interview: It’s time to think the unthinkable
The Front National leader appeals to many as ‘an anchor of stability’ amid the turbulence of her rivals’ campaigns
If Marine Le Pen wins France’s presidential elections in May, all talk of punishing Britain for the outrage of Brexit will become irrelevant. French diplomacy will pirouette overnight under a National Front (FN) leader. The Élysée Palace will seek an
entente cordiale with the British, offering a bilateral alliance on new foundations. It will then be the European Union that faces an existential choice: whether to reinvent itself as a loose federation of nation states, or succumb to galloping disintegration.
“What is the point in punishing a country? It is senseless, unless you think the EU is a prison, and you are condemned if you escape. I want to rebuild our damaged relations with the United Kingdom,” Ms Le Pen told The Daily Telegraph.
“A people decides its own destiny. You cannot force a country to do something that is against its own interests, or against the democratic process,” she said.
It is a far cry from the language of President François Hollande, who told Europe that Britain must “pay a price” to deter any other country from toying with temptation.
Whether she has a chance of winning is hotly disputed, but it is no longer unthinkable. Bookmakers have lifted the odds to 3/1, an “alarming” development says economic forecaster Oxford Economics.
“France is the political heart of Europe, and the moment we leave the euro the whole project collapses,” said Ms Le Pen. She leans across the table in her tiny office in the European Parliament with a glint of mischief.
Pollsters note her imperturbable serenity as the pillars of the French political system crumble around her, and the coronation of ex-premier François Fillon goes horribly awry. “She has established herself as an anchor of stability on the political landscape,” says Frédéric Dabi from polling group Ifop.
The latest L’Express poll found that she trails Mr Fillon by just 44 to 56 in a run-off election. The taboo of voting for the Front National is not what it was, and Britain’s referendum shock has played into her hands. “Brexit has been a powerful weapon for us. In the past, our adversaries have always been able to say that there is ‘no alternative’ but now we have had Brexit, and then Trump, and Austria,” she said.
“A whole psychological framework is breaking down. I think 2017 is going to be the year of the grand return of the nation state, the control of borders and currencies,” she said.
Her rising star unsettles the 250,000 Britons who live and work in France, or are retired in the Périgord or “Kensing-Tarn”. “They can be reassured because none of my policies are anti-English. Nothing will change for them,” she insisted. “All existing contracts will be upheld. I am totally opposed to any form of retroactivity because it is against the rule of law. All we are talking about is what happens in the future,” she said.
Yet nobody knows quite what she intends with her “national priority” plan for French workers, and her surtax on the hiring of foreign staff. New legal residents will have to wait two years before they can access the “full plenitude” of healthcare and state services, though there could be a reciprocal deal with the UK on medical insurance.
“What we’re concerned about is massive immigration of unskilled workers, mostly from the Maghreb and Africa, which pulls down salaries in France,” she said. The contours of this “France First” policy are left vague. Critics will draw their own conclusions.
Ms Le Pen’s position on Europe differs from the clean break of the Brexiteers. The edges have been softened for appearances as her party sniffs real power.
In theory, France could remain in the EU if others agree to the FN’s exorbitant terms: a managed break-up of the euro; control of post-Schengen national borders; the right to impose trade barriers; and the primacy of French law. If they refuse, she will call a referendum on EU membership and the French franc.
She hopes that Italy, Spain, Greece, and others will join in a collective revolt against the German-led euro system once given a lead. “They may rally around France and agree to dismantle this structure together in an orderly way before it collapses in chaos,” she said.
“The euro is a potent tool used by Germany to engage in permanent monetary dumping. It suits the Germans just fine but we unfortunate travelling companions cannot be subjected to this misery for ever to promote their happiness.”
She has made up her mind on the pivotal issue of coinage. “We can do nothing under the current structure in Europe, and the euro is the keystone. Not a single one of our measures will ever see the light of day,” she said.
“The euro is not a currency. It is a political weapon to force countries to implement the policies decided by the EU and keep them on a leash. Look at what happened to the Greeks when they said no to austerity, as they were right to do: liquidity for the banks was cut off,” she said.
Mrs Le Pen admits that her antieuro stand may cost votes. In 2012, say her strategists, it knocked her out in the first round.
The party is split. Her critics say the fight against Europe frightens the mainstream voters that she is trying to woo away from the Republicans. Others say it diverts attention from the FN’s law-and-order message and more visceral matters: the defence of France’s secular society, as they put it, or the crusade against Islam as France’s 4.7 million Muslims see it.
“It may hurt me, but what other solution is there? Am I supposed to lie and pretend that it is possible to pursue our patriotic policies while we are still in the euro?” she said.
French views on Europe fluctuate but are slowly hardening over time. A survey last June found that 61 per cent of French voters had an “unfavourable” opinion of the EU – compared with 48 per cent in the UK – and a clear majority wanted core powers repatriated from Brussels.
An intractable economic slump has been eating away at the legitimacy of France’s pro-EU elites. It roughly tracks the deindustrialisation of the country and the loss of competitiveness against Germany under monetary union.
Headline unemployment is still 10 per cent a full eight years after the global banking crash. The malaise has combined with the migrant crisis and a wave of Isil attacks, culminating in the murder of an 86-year old Catholic priest while saying Mass in the sleepy Norman town of Saint-Etienne-duRouvray. The kindling wood hardly needs more than a spark at this point.
Ms Le Pen has disguised her Frexit plans by talking of two parallel currencies in “cohabitation”: the franc for all internal use and debt contracts; the euro for external use. Stripped of camouflage, it is the end of the euro. The rating agencies have already warned of default if the FN carries out its threat to switch €1.7 trillion of French public debt into francs.
“The rating agencies serve the purposes of powerful vested interests. We will tell our creditors that it is in their long-term advantage to ensure the economic vitality of France,” said Ms Le Pen.
Whether she can overcome the toxic legacy of the Front National is an open question. She has carried out a purge, known as dédiabolisation, or taking the devil out of the party. Her own father, Jean-Marie Le Pen, has been driven from the movement that he once incarnated.
The anti-Semites and Vichy sympathisers have disappeared or been pushed to the margins, though French Jews remain wary and the Israeli government refuses to have any contact with the party.
The rebranding has paid off – up to a point – though some say she has “watered the wine” too. For now, however, Ms Le Pen is in the political sweet spot.
The centre-Right is stuck with a “Mr Clean” who turns out not to be clean, caught playing the expenses game to the tune of €1.5 million. The Left is split. The Socialists have chosen a “Corbynesque” utopian unable to stop the leakage of their working-class base to the FN.
“For the first time in more than 30 years, there is a party that taps into all the core values of the working class: cultural, economic, and social protectionism,” says the think tank Terra Nova.
Ms Le Pen is relishing a duel with the perfect adversary: Emmanuel Macron, a pro-European globalist, and the untested boy-wonder of French politics. The former economy minister talks well but he has no party machine, and has not yet fleshed out his policies. “The choice in modern politics is no longer between Left and Right. It lies elsewhere, and with Macron things are clear. It is a battle between patriots and unbridled globalism,” she said.
“What we are defending is our cultural inheritance: our history, our secularism, our rural way of life. It is to defend ‘ une certaine idée de la France’,” she said.
The allusion to Charles de Gaulle is intentional. Whether the French are ready for Ms Le Pen’s pungent brew has become a massively important question.
‘I think 2017 is going to be the year of the return of the nation state, the control of borders and currencies’ ‘The choice is no longer between Left and Right. It is a battle between patriots and unbridled globalism’