France: Megret welcomes commission
01 May 1998
In France, former Prime Minister Eduard Balladur called in June for a commission to inquire into the issue of national preference, in which representatives of the Front National (FN) would be invited to participate. National preference amounts to discrimination between French nationals and others resident in France in the allocation of social security entitlements and in employment rights.
Balladur made his call for a commission on 14 June on the television debate Grand Jury-RTL-Le Monde. In the course of the debate, he sought to locate the notion of differentiated social rights in the European context. He went on to support his claim with the somewhat duplicitous proposition that, were a commission to come out against the concept of national preference, the FN would be disarmed of one element of its propaganda. His personal advocacy of differentiated social rights can, however, be traced back to 1986, when he called for the restriction of family allowance to French nationals.
Balladur's remarks have provoked mixed reactions on the right. Francois Bayrou, head of Force Democrate, strongly condemned the proposal for a commission, stating that it is always bad strategy to hold debates on the opposition's territory. Others, including RPR Secretary General Nicolas Sarkozy and former RPR minister Alain Peyrefitte believe that the debate should take place and that there should be no taboo attached to the concept of national preference. RPR spokesman Fillon also defended Balladur's remarks, saying that he was not attempting to form an alliance with the FN.
The debate may be seen as a manifestation of a growing tendency on the traditional right to use immigration related issues as the territory on which to differentiate itself from the centre left, and of a tendency to seek common ground with the increasingly "respectable" FN. The latter tendency is proving controversial in the aftermath of the regional elections, as the official line of the RPR, the UDF and of President Chirac is of resisting the overtures of the racist extremists.
For the FN, Bruno Megret said that Balladur's words were a sign of "great progress" and indicated that the FN's ideas were making "great advances". In the FN paper National Hebdo, he spoke in more up-beat terms about national preference, saying that its introduction would constitute a "national revolution". (This was exactly the terminology used by the Vichy regime to describe the totality of its discriminatory legislation during world war two).
Le Monde, 17.6.98; 19.6.98; 23.6.98; Observer, 21.6.98