Loose ends

Hangovers were pushed to the back on News Year's Day with a visit to Les Halles, where la cuñada and I feasted on oysters, prawns and Chablis while the others watched. The afternoon was spent recovering, with leftover duck on the menu for dinner. Sunday was an even lazier day, apart from our guests rousing themselves early to do the croissant run and purchase tartiflette provisions for dinner. A day of snoozing and DVD watching.

Monday la bienheureuse was technically back at work, though at home, her boss having granted permission for home working for the final two weeks before confinement. While la belle-mère busied herself with some sewing, our other guests decided they ought to do some more sightseeing. I acted as demanding guide on a wide-ranging round tour - Bellecour, Vieux Lyon, Places Celestins & Jacobins, le mur des lyonnais and a gruelling ascent to the Croix Rousse. Then a steep descent to the banks of the Rhône where little legs decided they were too tired for a further detour via the park.

La bienheureuse and I had another antenatal session in the early evening, so once breathing and pushing were mastered we met the others for a farewell dinner at Les Oliviers. Thanks to our generous guests for a lovely meal and visit.

This morning I was up early to go and consult a man about a rear end checkup and home in time to see off our visitors as they headed towards the station via a cheese and meat lunch in Les Halles. Quiet re-descends, leaving us to contemplate a busy few days and a busy year.

In the wider world, a few stories were in the process of winding up towards the end of the old year. Bettencourt mere et fille called a truce in their inheritance war, though the richest woman in France is still facing investigation over tax evasion. Meanwhile, recriminations over the way the country grinds to a halt in bad weather continue (sound familiar?), and the investigation into the Karachi affair rumbles on.

French lessons

Red letter day in the lyonnais calendrier today - le beaujolais nouveau est arrivé.  Similar party mood amongst the French at Wembley last night, where les bleus gave England the blues. Much satisfaction this side of La Manche, and no little consternation about the lack of aggression displayed by the Premier League cloggers. Four fouls in 90 minutes, surely that's not the English way? Coach Blanc's decision to give in and play two creative midfielders paid off handsomely. Now let's see if he's brave enough to stick with the same tactics in a competitive match…

On Tuesday, Monsieur le Président gave one of his marathon interviews on the three main national TV channels. Ninety minutes of lecturing to the public, most of whom seem to have remained unconvinced that he's learnt any lessons from the recent discontent. The TV appearance was ostensibly to explain the government reshuffle over the weekend, which finally put an end to any pretence of a broad centre-right consensus. Out went representatives of the more moderate, minor parties (Borloo, Morin), and those from further left (Kouchner, Amara), in came a clutch of Sarkozy loyalists. Also shown the door was Eric Woerth, victim of the discontent over the pension reforms he guided through parliament, but more particularly of the Bettencourt affair. And further corruption suspicions over the sale of a hippodrome.

There is more trouble looming for Sarko too. A former defence minister, in office at the time of a controversial deal to sell submarines to Pakistan, has admitted that backhanders and bribes were paid to ease the deal through. It seems to be widely believed that a small proportion of the money ended up in the campaign fund of Eduoard Balladour during the presidential campaign in 1995. Said campaign fund was managed by one Nicolas Sarkozy. Relatives of people killed in the 2002 Karachi bus attack are demanding that Sarkozy answer questions, in the belief that the attack was a reprisal for the ending of the kickbacks by Jacques Chirac, elected in the '95 election.

Custard pie

The maire de Lyon, Gérard Collomb, was pied yesterday. A nebulous group calling itself "Al Qaïtarte" (presumably a play on words linking tarte and a certain notorious terrorist group) claimed responsibility and condemned the "policies more than right-wing of a man who claims to be left-wing." The entarteurs also count the president of the Rhône-Alpes region and the artist Ben among their victims, claim the "greatest pieing ever in Lyon", that of the MoDem mayoral candidate, but regret failing several times to entarte the former minster and UMP mayoral candidate Dominic Perben. Ho hum. I suppose it's more fun than attending a city council meeting.

On the wider political stage the government is still struggling against the adverse headlines created by the new "security policy", with several government ministers breaking ranks to admit to unease about the expulsion of Roma and the proposed stripping of citizenship. And waves continue to be made by the Bettencourt affair. Sarko and Fillon are still backing Eric Woerth after he was forced to admit that he had indeed written a letter recommending Patrice de Maistre for a Legion d'Honneur. He claims that ministers and MPs routinely put forward people for honours, which may be true, but not all of them would dare to recommend the man they've persuaded to give their wife a highly paid job…

Interestingly, there's a view that the government are happy to take the flak about the security policy, safe in the knowledge that it's deflecting attention from other problems and that the majority of the French population support the Roma pogrom. One problem comes up on Tuesday, when a journée d'action to protest against retirement reforms has been called by some of the main unions. The union hand is strengthened by the fact that it's a distracted Minister of Labour, one Eric Woerth, who is handling the reform bill in parliament. The main strikes are likely to be on the railways, so perhaps I shouldn't be too nervous about the fact that we're flying to the UK that day…

Woerthy causes

The flow of accusations against Eric Woerth continues undammed. Yesterday Liberation published a letter allegedly sent by Woerth while he was Budget Minister, which purportedly showed he had intervened to get a 27 million Euro tax rebate paid to the estate of the late sculptor César. Allegedly at the behest of the executor of César's will, who by pure coincidence is a major donator to the ruling party, UMP. Which, by the way, had one Eric Woerth as treasurer at the time. Of course Woerth has said it was the tax office who decided on the rebate, and the executor in question, Alain-Dominique Perrin, has denounced the letter as fake. This morning Liberation is standing by its story, the most extraordinary part of which I find to be that a sculptor I've never heard of can be worth so much money that he has to pay enough tax to even consider a 27 million Euro rebate. Though I've since learned that I'm very familiar with one of his works - le Patineur, next to the opera house in Lyon. Hmm…

Meanwhile the World Cup debacle is reaching its final phase. Bad boy Anelka has been giving his version, chiming in with the general player chorus - it was all Domenech's fault. This morning the new coach, Laurent Blanc, announced the squad for Les Bleus' first game since the World Cup, a friendly against Norway. He'd already decided not to pick any of the 23 grèvistes for this game, so the next French football team to take the field will have a decidedly unfamiliar look.

A wee spot of bother

The Bettencourt affair was pushed briefly off the front pages yesterday by the mise en examen of two international footballers for sex with an under-age prostitute. The summer of Les Bleus grows ever stormier.
 
It wasn't long, however, before the Bettencourt story was back, rolling along with no sign of grinding to a halt. Government minister Eric Woerth's wife was questioned recently by the procureur investigating illegal political funding and nepotism, and the labour minister himself is due to follow her into the hot seat, as soon as he's finished presenting the government's plans for reform of pensions and retirement to parliament. A busy man, Mr Woerth. Not surprisingly opposition MPs have been asking how he can devote himself fully to his job while defending himself against the Bettencourt bribery allegations. One of his alleged crimes was to ask Liliane Bettencourt's financial manager to give his wife a job, and the task of defending himself against the claim wasn't made any easier when said financial manager told the procureur that Woerth had asked him to 'advise his wife on her career'. Quelle difference?

On a more successful sporting note (what is politics if not sport?), this year's Tour de France is being heralded as one of the best in recent years. There certainly has been a fair amount of excitement, with plenty of twists and turns, but I suspect the French view is tinted a somewhat pinker shade of rose by the success of French riders. Six stage wins so far, the most in any Tour for nearly fifteen years. To top it all, three of them came in successive Pyrenean stages earlier this week. The final mountain stage is taking place today as I write, the final climb up the mythic Col du Tourmalet in damp cloudy weather (much like Lyon today - a break in the hot spell at last) certain to decide the overall winner of the Tour. Somehow, I think a fourth successive French win is unlikely…

Lyon is the subject of a bit of piss-taking in the national news today. Municipal police in the Parc de la Tête d'Or cautioned a man yesterday for allowing his three-year daughter to urinate in public. Authorities say it was on the pavement in front of a restaurant, with public toilets only a short walk away. He says he was on crutches, his daughter was desperate, he couldn't get her to the loo on time, and it was under a tree nowhere near the restaurant. Ho hum. He faces a fine of as much as 450 euros if he can't convince magistrates…

Tears and greasy palms

The Sarkozy regime continues to battle allegations of illegal political 'donations'. Yesterday government spokesmen claimed Monsieur le Président had been cleared when the former Bettencourt accountant backtracked on earlier claims that Sarko was among the right wing politicians who regularly received cash from the major shareholder in L'Oréal. However, closer examination of the 'retraction' reveals that she says she told the media site, which broke the story, that Sarkozy only 'may' have been among the beneficiaries of the Bettencourt largesse, rather than claiming she definitely saw him, as was originally reported. She also holds to the claim that the Bettencourt financial manager told her he was giving 150000 euros in cash to the Sarkozy presidential campaign in 2007. A bank official at the branch 50000 euros were allegedly withdrawn from has now categorically denied speaking to the accountant, who claims she told her the money was to fund the Sarko campaign. Is that the sound of UMP thumbscrews being applied?

Elsewhere in the media, the left-wing magazine Marianne claims to have seen the famous account books kept by the accountant, and reports that they show cash withdrawals totalling 380000 euros in the first 3 months of 2007 (compared to about 60000 in the equivalent period the previous year, when there was no presidential election campaign). The Bettencourt lawyers say the cash withdrawals were all to cover the personal expenses of André Bettencourt, but Marianne says that only about 180000 worth of spending is accounted for in the books. All rather surreal. How can anyone need sixty thousand euros worth of petty cash per month, let alone a hundred grand plus, and haven't billionaires heard of credit cards?

Meanwhile the Tour de France reaches the end of a rather eventful first week, characterised by sundry crashes, hot weather, government politicians making a point of comparing the approachability of the cyclists comported to French international footballers, and a lot of fuss surrounding the poor form and behaviour of the British 'bad boy' of sprinting. When Mark Cavendish finally won his first stage of this year's tour yesterday, he promptly burst into floods of tears in the middle of a live interview on French television, and it took a full minute before he managed to recover sufficient composure to continue. Which appears to have rather endeared him to the French media, who love a good bit of high sporting emotion.

And in local news, it's hot in Lyon today. Very hot. And tomorrow, and…

Scorching summer

Saturday evening finally brought relief from temperatures in the upper thirties. Overnight thunderstorms cooled things down and Sunday's maximum was a mere 30C. A brief respite it seems, as the forecast is for 35C+ again on Thursday and Friday and Meteo France are predicting a spell of weather similar to the long hot summer of 2003. As you might guess it was a weekend when we did as little as possible. Too hot Saturday to venture out for more than a short walk to the shops, but Sunday we managed a stroll and lunch along the river. It was strangely quiet, with most of the waterside restaurants closed. Perhaps not so strange, with it being the first weekend of the French school holidays. Seems most of the city, all of our building neighbours included, headed straight for the seaside.

The heat in the political arena continues to rise. Revelations in the Bettencourt affair continue to make daily headlines, and today a former accountant for the richest woman in France dropped a fresh bombshell. After being interviewed by police investigating the Bettencourt tax irregularities she talked to the media website which has broken most of the story. Among other things, she alleged that Sarkozy was one of the numerous right wing politicians who regularly visited the Bettencourt home and walked away clutching a brown envelope stuffed with cash. More specifically she also claimed Eric Woerth (in his capacity as treasurer of Sarko's UMP party) was given 150 thousand euros in cash to help fund Sarkozy's presidential election campaign. Naturally Monsieur le Président and his budget minister have denounced the allegations as 'calumnies'.

In other French corruption news, six policemen from in and around Marseille have been arrested following an investigation into inside tip-offs to Marseille crime godfathers.

Hot and bothered

As France's favourite weather girl told us on TV last night, a canicule is defined as three or more successive days when the thermometer climbs above a certain limit during the day and doesn't drop below another at night (34C and 20C for Lyon), and as such, strictly speaking, we aren't yet enduring a heatwave. Well, wall to wall sunshine and temperatures hovering around and above 30C since Saturday is plenty hot enough for me. A thermometer outside the bedroom window showed 29C at 10.30pm last night, was back up at 28C by 10am this morning and is now showing 36C in the shade. And no end in sight. Summer took its time arriving, but now it's here with a vengeance.

Elsewhere, the heat is still on the Fédération Française de Football. The president finally bowed to the inevitable last weekend and announced his resignation, and a meeting of the ruling body has been going on today. The resignation of Escalettes was accepted, but the election of his successor has been delayed until the next meeting in three weeks because of a failure between the amateurs and professionals to agree on a compromise. They did however make one definite decision, confirming the appointment of Laurent Blanc as the next French coach.

Another public figure sweating under the spotlight is the labour minister Eric Woerth, linked with a tax scandal involving the richest woman in France, L'Oréal heiress Liliane Bettencourt, who recently promised to 'regularise' her tax affairs after being accused of tax evasion via Swiss bank accounts. The questions arise because Woerth was budget minister until March this year, and thus in charge of fiscal administration at the same time as his wife was working as tax advisor for the company which manages some of Bettencourt's financial interests. She has since resigned but the opposition and media remain on the attack. Clandestine recordings of conversations involving a Bettencourt advisor have surfaced, in which Woerth's name is mentioned several times a payment of 7500 euros towards Woerth's election campaign is sanctioned. Which is apparently entirely legitimate, but that won't stop more questions being asked. For the moment the Sarkozy camp is backing their man…