French presidential election 2017 - The "Big Five" and a perplexed electorate

The French presidential election is turning out to be one of the most confusing and unpredictable of recent times.

And it’s really not surprising that,  according to many of the (innumerable) polls, there are a sizeable number of French who are still unsure as to how they will vote - at least in the first round April 23.

Of course, many of the leading candidates have their hard core supporters - but none of them is guaranteed a place in the second-round head-to-head.

What follows is not a (huge sigh of relief) poll and, admittedly, far from being scientific. It’s a recap of the five main contenders (in reality there are only three) to be this country’s next president. The comments are based on observations - something more than just a chat to the taxi driver on the way from the airport after being parachuted in to a country - from someone who lives among the French and hears their fears, confusion as to what might or might not happen in this year’s presidential elections.

The "Big Five" French presidential hopefuls: Marine Le Pen, François Fillon, Emmanuel Macron, Benoît Hamon and Jean-Luc Mélenchon (collage of YouTube screenshots)

Perhaps the best-placed (again according to those omnipresent polls) to make it through the May 7 run-off is the far-right Front National’s (FN) Marine Le Pen.

Along with her faithful lieutenants (such as Florian Philippot), Le Pen has made a pretty good job of what the media calls “dédiabolisation” or “de-demonising” the party in terms of its image: giving it a veneer  of respectability, positioning itself as an anti-system alternative to “politics as usual” and broadening its electoral appeal.

In essence though, for all its nationalist and populist bluster about how it would do things differently if in power, the party would still be at the mercy of a political and institutional system (and all its inherent flaws and self—serving perks).  The FN also remains fiercely anti-immigration (a sugar-coated way of saying xenophobic and anti-Islam) implausible on economic policy and typically protectionist - although given recent global events such as Brexit and The Donald’s election in the United States, that might well be seen as an attribute.

The party is also a peculiarly “family business”.  Le Pen’s father, Jean-Marie, was its founder, her partner, Louis Aliot, is one of its vice presidents and her niece, Marion Maréchal-Le Pen, one of its two members in the National Assembly.

The right wing (although the party still insists on portraying itself as representing the Right/Centre-right) Les Républicains’ François Fillon was for many months the political pundits favourite to face Le Pen in the second round.

His overwhelming victory in the party’s November 2016’s primary provided him with a virtual “boulevard” to the Elysée: well that was the proverbial common wisdom. He would make it through to the second round and, even though he might have a hard time convincing those who had voted for leftwing parties in the first round, there was no way they would allow a Le Pen victory. In much the same way as Jacques Chirac had sealed success against Jean-Marie Le Pen in 2002, so Fillon would be assured of doing (but less emphatically) in 2017.

But then it all well pear-shaped. The man who had always taken the moral high ground and presented himself as almost “whiter than white” found himself embroiled in “the Penelope gate” fiasco, suspicions that his Welsh-born wife and two of his children had earned hundreds of thousands of euros for “fake jobs” as his parliamentary assistants.

“If a presidential candidate is indicted - no matter for what reason - he (or she) cannot possibly maintain the trust of the electorate and must withdraw from the race” of his earlier campaigning became “I have become the victim of a media witch hunt and “I’m going to see this out to the very end”. A neat reversal of what he had said just months earlier. So much for consistency and integrity in French politics.

And then there’s Emmanuel Macron. His very strengths could also prove to be his weakness. He’s young (38) - perhaps too young for many to have that much needed gravitas of a Statesman. He not politically bound, even though he served as advisor and economics minister under the current president François Hollande, a man he is accused as having “stabbed in the back”. He has never stood for elected office before and his programme - yes he has one at last - for the longest time seemed vague: exciting but confusing - that mix of Centrist ideas that lack ideology (and dogma) and try to appeal to everyone and anyone (apart from the extremes).

Criticised by the Right as representing “Hollande redux” - and few French want a repeat performance of the last five years - and by the Left as not being Socialist enough, Macron has nevertheless managed to garner support from across the political spectrum with his movement “En marche” (On the move) - yes only the most confident (or arrogant) of people could give his political movement his own initials.

The media darling and golden boy of French politics has surprised many. His movement has gathered momentum but he lacks the structure of a political machine behind him. Sure, he could beat Le Pen if he makes it through the second round, but the transitory nature of his support - that so-called Centre - could also be his undoing.

So, what is the Socialist party up to? Well, it’s not so much fighting a presidential race as defining its own future as a party. In its primary it chose Benoît Hamon as the candidate. For many he’s “too Socialist”, too Utopian, offering the French what they want (to hear): no belt-tightening economic reforms (but no real guaranteed progress either). In fact more of the same as the country entrenches itself deeper in the beliefs of the past.

And Hamon is not drawing in the big crowds as he had hoped. The former rebel of yesteryear who resigned as Hollande’s education minister after just a few months in the job (what staying power) now finds himself confronted with his own rebels - hard-hitting party bigwigs who feel he is leading the lot of them into political oblivion and are (more than) tempted to throw their weight behind Macron. Result? Hamon has had to blow hot and cold on some of his core ideas such as universal suffrage.

Finally among those that really matter (and apologies for any other candidates who might obtain the necessary signatures to enable them to stand) there’s Jean-Luc Mélenchon.

If only this former Socialist party member could pull his act together and get over himself to join forces with Hamon, the Left might actually have some say in determining the outcome of the 2017 presidential elections.

But no, the angry old bloke of French politics (who has admittedly calmed down a fair deal since his campaign managers discovered social media) has an ideological path that doesn’t sit well with many inside the Socialist party. Oh yes - and an ego.

You see, and this is actually unusual in French politics - or any politics come to that, Mélanchon actually has (don’t say this too loud) principles. Employment rights, welfare programmes and a real redistribution of wealth to tackle existing socioeconomic inequalities actually mean something to him. And oh yes, he’s very anti-EU.

No wonder the French are perplexed. There’s no clear “leader” to guide the country over the next five years. Le Pen might well score highly in the first round but there’s still (hopefully) - at least on the Left - enough French who would do the “right thing” and vote tactically to keep her from winning the run-off.

Should she face Macron, it would be easier for those - Left and Right of the political spectrum - to swallow their pride and help the young pretender into office…no matter what their qualms might be about his leadership qualities.

But Fillon versus Le Pen casts quite a different picture. Distasteful Right against even more distasteful Far Right…and some might just be tempted to let the latter win simply by abstaining.

And that most unlikely combination of Macron against Fillon…heck, that’s just introducing another unfathomable element into the equation.

Dominique de Villepin's Rolling Stone is a Beatle

Former French prime minister, Dominique de Villepin, confuses The Beatles with The Rolling Stones during a prime time television show.

Dominique de Villepin (photo from Wikipedia, copyright David Mendiboure - Service photo de Matignon)

Dominique de Villepin is due to launch his own political movement on June 19.

It's the next stage of his possible bid to become the next French president when elections take place in 2012.



As France 24 reported earlier this year, the new "independent political movement" is viewed by many as a challenge to his "bitter rival" the current French president, Nicolas Sarkozy.

With the launch fast approaching, Villepin has been multiplying his public appearances and of course has been making full use of the country's media to get his message across.

Last weekend for example, he appeared on Dimanche +, the Sunday afternoon political magazine on Canal +, during which he criticised Sarkozy's foreign policy, saying France's voice wasn't being heard loud enough in the Middle East or Afghanistan,

But just a few days prior to that while on "La boïte à questions" portion of the daily evening news and talk show, Le Grand Journal, on the same channel, Villepin made an error which has more than amused some commentators.

"La boïte à questions" is a short segment of the show during which guests are invited into a room in which they face a screen displaying questions sent in by viewers.

It's a light-hearted affair, obviously meant to be entertaining, but it can at times be quite revealing.

Such was the case with Villepin.

His question and answer session started off well enough.

"Can you say in English, 'I might be a candidate (for the presidency) in 2012'," he was asked.

The former diplomat, one-time foreign minister, and prime minister from 2005-2007 responded with aplomb, albeit it heavily accented.

The next question was one designed to test Villepin's street credibility when he was asked "to show that you're more 'with it' than Benoît Hamon (the 42-year-old spokesman for the Socialist party) can you tell us who Lady Gaga is?

"She's a charming singer, a little eccentric," he replied without flinching.

But it was when the 56-year-old was asked a question about a musical group with which his age would presumably make him more familiar that he came somewhat unstuck.

"If you had been a member of the Rolling Stones, which one would you like to have been?" flashed up on the screen.

"It would have been difficult to have been Mick Jagger," began Villepin in response.

"So probably Ringo Star."

It was a blunder which, as far as the well-known French radio and television presenter Laurent Ruquier was concerned, didn't bode well for the former prime minister.

"It's not by confusing the two (groups) that Dominique de Villepin will appear more intelligent," commented Ruquier during his daily radio programme on Monday.

"Of course it's a mistake that anyone could make as not everyone is familiar with the Beatles" he continued.

"But to try to give the impression that you know something, when you don't, that's not particularly admirable."

French national identity - the grand debate

Politicians and the media in France have been literally falling over themselves in response to an interview given by the immigration minister, Eric Besson, last weekend in which he said he wanted to launch a major discussion over "national values and identity".

To start from the beginning of November it will be, in the words of the minister, a debate to determine how best “to reaffirm the values of identity and the pride of being French.”

Not surprisingly perhaps reactions came thick and fast with the media quickly jumping on the story.

Radio and television stations asked audiences what they thought about the idea and newspaper websites invited comments.

Reactions from politicians ranged from support from members of the governing centre-right Union pour un Mouvement Populaire (Union for a Popular Movement, UMP) party to scepticism or outright condemnation from opposition parties.

Frédéric Lefebvre, the UMP spokesman welcomed the idea saying that it wasn't "the return of a debate on national identity that should be surprising, but the blurring of that identity."

The leader of the centre Mouvement démocrate (Democratic Movement MoDem) party, François Bayrou, though was more guarded, insisting that defining or determining "national identity is not for politicians."

"It's like history," he said. "It's not up to politicians to try to monopolise the subject."

For Vincent Peillon, a European parliamentarian for the Socialist party, the call for opening a debate on national identity was symptomatic of a certain "sickness" in France and would have an negative effect on how the country was viewed by others throughout the world.

"France has never talked about national identity," he said. "And it's dangerous to open the debate like this."

Benoît Hamon, the spokesman for the Socialist party, was harsher in his reaction accusing Besson of pandering to the far-right Front national (FN) ahead of next year's regional elections in making illegal immigration a central issue before the vote in March.

"Eric Besson is applying the ideas of the FN," he said.

"He's cynically carrying out parts of its (FN's) programme," he continued.

"It's all part of government policy of keeping illegal immigrants in a state of extreme hardship to dissuade them from coming. "

And from the FN itself came the call from Marine Le Pen for a "Grenelle on national identity" to be held, similar to the one there had been for the environment as her party had "a lot of things to say on the subject."

Maybe the most measured response though came from a member of the UMP itself, in the shape of the former prime minister and current mayor of Bordeaux, Alain Juppé.

Writing on his blog, Juppé cited the discourse "Qu'est-ce qu'une nation?" ("What is a Nation?") given by the French philosopher and historian, Ernest Renan, back in 1882.

"The definitions of the nation are numerous," writes Juppé. "It seems to me that the explanation given by Ernest Renan, remains unsurpassable," he continues before quoting from Renan's speech.

"In defining what the nation is, Renan said 'the essential element of a nation is that all of its individuals must have many things in common and they must also have forgotten many things,''" quotes Juppé.

"Renan also said a nation is 'a sense of solidarity, one that supposes a past but is summarised in the present by a tangible fact: the consent, the clearly expressed desire to continue living together,'" continues Juppé.

"Everything has been said," concludes Juppé.

"What's the point of starting the debate all over again?"

French Socialists get their maths wrong in leadership battle

The leadership battle for France's Socialist party should be decided tonight, and it'll see two women vying for the job - Ségolène Royal and Martine Aubry.

In Thursday's vote among the party's 233,000 card carrying members, none of the three candidates achieved the magical 50 per cent needed to claim victory.

The result of Thursday's vote: Royal - 43.1 per cent, Aubry - 34.5 per cent, and Benoît Hamon 22.83 per cent.

So as many predicted Royal and Aubry will go head to head in a re-vote today.

But hang about. Isn't there something just a tad strange in those figures? Anyone who has been following the Socialist party soap opera will surely be asking themselves what on earth is Royal still doing in the race?

Ah well it's all about the fact that complicated politics and simple maths don't always go together.

Let me (try to) explain and recap simultaneously.

In what has by any standards been one of the most protracted processes for choosing a new leader, party members will once again vote on whose vision of the future of the party they support.

Crudely put, a move to the centre - as proposed by Royal, or more traditionally left as Aubry wants.

A couple of weeks ago the party took its first step in supposedly determining its future direction when members voted on the so-called "motions" or programmes.

It wasn't a vote on the leadership per se, but on the alternative programmes - although both were and of course still are inextricably linked.

You might remember that Royal surprised most political pundits when her programme came top. It garnered 29 per cent of the vote followed by Aubry's and that of the mayor of Paris Bertrand Delanoë - both gained 25 per cent, and in fourth place Benoît Hamon's with 18 per cent.

So four programmes with a chance of winning overall approval and paving the way for a new leader to be "crowned".

That was the expectation going into the party's conference last weekend in Rheims, especially as everyone agreed that what the Socialists needed most was "unity" and that could best be achieved by rallying behind one programme and therefore one candidate.

Aubry and Hamon looked to be on the verge of reaching an agreement. They didn't. Aubry and Delanoë also tried to iron out their differences, but with the same non-result.

None of the others really wanted to "be friends" with Royal, although she apparently tried hard enough, sending them personalised letters and encouraging them to "come aboard".

They didn't. The only surprise being perhaps that after a weekend of "burning the midnight oil" Delanoë withdrew from the leadership battle (by not entering it), but refused to endorse any of the others.

So the party came away from the conference with the choice of three candidates, and it was up to party members to choose between them.

The very next day there was a coup de théâtre as Delanoë changed his mind - not about standing, but about who he would endorse - Aubry. And he urged his supporters to vote for her "massively".

So the maths looked quite simple. Aubry's 25 per cent, plus Delanoë's 25 per cent with hopefully some others joining the non-declared TSS ("Tout-sauf-Ségolène" or "Anything but Ségolène") campaign and bingo. Surely a shoo-in for Aubry.

"Outrageous" claimed Royal over the coming days. Underhand tactics she implied, and although she never actually said it overtly, once again evidence of another cleverly played TSS campaign.

Hamon meanwhile took the moral high ground and criticised everyone, saying he wasn't going to be part of it, and therefore he was the natural choice of leader (all right so a tiny bit of paraphrasing going on here in the interests of making a long story less long).

But in spite of seemingly simple sums, as Thursday's results show, it didn't quite turn out the way Aubry, Delanoë and the rest had hoped

The next twist of course is that Hamon has now turned around and urged his supporters to vote "massively" for.......wait for it......Aubry.

So once again the maths would appear to indicate that it's game, set and match for Aubry. After all 34.5 plus 22.83 would give her more than the 50 per cent needed for victory.

But remember her opponent is Ségolène Royal - discounted by most from the start, and apparently the person everyone in the party wants to beat, but has so far been unable to.

When she ran for the party's nomination to be the presidential candidate last year, she was up against the might and power of its old guard "elephants". But her appeal to the grass roots eventually saw her nomination reluctantly "endorsed" by all her opponents.

So who would bet against her defying the pundits (and the maths) once again?

One thing's for certain, it'll be a woman leading the party - the first time one has been elected to that position here in France.

Whatever the result though, what it probably won't do is stop the internal bickering as whichever woman wins, there will still remain a sizeable chunk of the party disillusioned with the outcome.

French Socialist party at "sixes and sevens"

Or perhaps the headline should read "at twos and threes" because after the weekend's conference which was supposed to propose just one candidate as a new leader for the French Socialist party, that's exactly how many contenders are still left in the race.

Realistically when the party's 233,000 card carrying members vote on Thursday, the two women seeking the job, Ségolène Royal and Martine Aubry, should fill the top two slots. Both have very different concepts of the future of the party.

But a third candidate, Benoît Hamon is still in the running, and even though he's unlikely to cause an upset, his presence will probably force a second round run-off.

The biggest surprise of the conference was the decision by the mayor of Paris, and long-time front runner for the post, Bertrand Delanoë not to continue his campaign for the top job, while at the same time refusing to endorse any of the other three.

Although he's perhaps more akin to Aubry's line of thinking in his vision for the future of the party, his move is being interpreted by some as "hedging his bets" by not appearing to upset either of the putative candidates for the leadership.

The story so far

In essence the vote should be about the future direction of the party. In simple terms, does it move to the left as Aubry wants or towards the centre ground as Royal's approach would favour.

After the first round a couple of weeks ago when members voted for their preferred party programme, in what is a typically protracted process that would also see the election of a replacement for the outgoing chairman, François Hollande, no one candidate achieved an outright majority.

Everyone expected plenty of horse-trading and jockeying going into the conference, in the hope that one clear candidate would emerge.

There was plenty of midnight (and beyond) oil burnt, but no agreement reached.

The events of the weekend will hardly be a surprise for anyone who has followed French politics for the past decade, and in particular the ever-declining fortunes of the Socialist party, which even its leadership admits has been riven by internal dissent for several years.

The losers

A quick scoot through the French media reveals that nobody is really sure where the party now is headed.

What they all seem agreed upon - regardless of political persuasion - is that the conference failed miserably in its attempt to find a leader, rally behind a common cause, or achieve the much sought-after unity.

The left-of-centre daily Libération headlined its analysis of the conference as "All that for that" - reflecting on the fact that the party had ended its three-day gab fest embroiled in much the same infighting and disunity as it had begun it.

For the centre-right daily, Le Figaro, Delanoë was clearly the biggest individual loser, and perhaps surprisingly Le Monde - arguably this country's most esteemed newspaper and slightly to the left of centre - was in agreement.

It suggested that in proving himself unable to reach an agreement - especially with Aubry, from whom he is not that far removed politically-speaking - Delanoë suffered a massive setback to any presidential ambitions he might have nurtured for 2012.

And that's an important point to remember, because as well as determining the future direction of the party, the leadership vote is also about who will lead it into the next presidential election in 2012.

For the centre-right weekly L'Express, Royal still remains the favourite in Thursday's vote after the other three failed in their efforts to reach agreement among themselves, in spite of late-into-the-night attempts.

While the centre-left weekly, Nouvel Observateur, basically uses the words of the interior minister and member of the governing centre-right Union pour un Mouvement Populaire (Union for a Popular Movement, UMP), Michèle Alliot-Marie, expressed on national radio to sum up what many thought.

"It'll be very difficult for the party to find a leader," she said.

"The problem now is to know whether the Socialist party is capable of finding an identity, because the question we can all ask is how many different parties there actually are within the Socialist party."

The winners

So if everyone seems to agree that the Socialist party hasn't gained from the weekend's stalemate, who has benefited?

Well first up of course is François Bayrou, the leader of the centre party MoDem.

Most political commentators agree that in future elections he could attract a chunk of the electorate unwilling to vote for the UMP but disullusioned with the battles within the Socialist party, and its seeming inability to form an effective opposition.

Another eventual winner could be the charismatic and popular leader of the far-left-wing Ligue communiste révolutionnaire (LCR), Olivier Besancenot.

If the Socialist party were to implode, he could be the rallying figure for a broader opposition further to the left that would include disheartened members of the Socialist party, the Communists and even the Greens.

Of course that's all speculation for the moment, but certainly not outside the realms of possibility.

The biggest immediate winner though on the political front to all intents and purposes is none other than the French president himself, Nicolas Sarkozy.

At a time when the country is undergoing institutional reforms, facing economic and social challenges and a host of other issues, the opposition - in the form of the Socialist party - is without a voice or an effective leadership.

It's all a long way away from the party's heyday in the 1980s and 1990s, when François Mitterrand was president, and many are predicting that unless it can get back "on track", the party founded (in its present form) in 1969 might be no longer.

What next?

For the immediate future, with three candidates still left in the race, it's unlikely that one of them will emerge with a clear majority after one round of voting on Thursday, which means that party members will probably have to vote a second time in a run-off between the top two.

There's not time to hold rallies up and down the country, so the chances are that all three will be battling for as much media airtime as possible over the next couple of days in an effort to appeal to party members.

What happens to Delanoë's supporters will perhaps be crucial. The most obvious beneficiary should be Aubry, but as the two camps were unable to reach an agreement prior to the weekend, there's no guarantee they'll be any more successful in doing so before Thursday.

Some of his supporters simply cannot stand Royal, but others don't want to alienate her, and besides nobody openly wants to be seen indulging in a TSS ("Tout-sauf-Ségolène" or "Anything but Ségolène") campaign, just in case come the end of the week, she's the one holding the reins of power.

The story continues.

There'll be an update when the result is out.

Royal keeps everyone guessing in the battle to lead France's Socialist party

It's surely not as immediately gripping as the recent US election and Barack Obama's history-making win, but once again there's a twist in political events here in France as Séglolène Royal takes perhaps another (distant) step towards becoming the first female elected head of State of a G8 country.

On Sunday the French Socialists are expected to endorse both a political programme and a new leader when party activists gather in the northern city of Rheims, and Royal has not counted herself out of the running.

The formal vote among the party's 233,000 card-carrying members will not take place until next Thursday (November 20) but the weekend's conference should settle the ongoing battle by picking just one candidate for the post.

On Wednesday evening Royal appeared live on French television during the TF1's prime time news broadcast and said that she "would like" to be the Socialist party's next leader.

It wasn't exactly Royal excitedly throwing her hat into the ring and declaring her intention to run in the race to elect a new leader (or chairman/woman) but it was the next best thing.

And her appearance has kept everyone guessing about the likely outcome, whether she'll be able to reach an agreement with other pretenders to the post to back her, or the possible appearance of a compromise candidate behind whom the party can rally as it tries yet again to overcome internal bickering and refocus on being in its own words "an effective opposition".

Tuning in last night viewers were probably expecting Royal to give a clear "yes" or "no" as to whether she would be standing in this weekend's election. She didn't - but she also didn't rule anything out.

"Party members have already voted and given a legitimacy to the programme I put forward," she said.

"And I'll say quite frankly that 'yes' I would like to be the leader. But plenty of people have said that I'm not a woman of who fits comfortably into the party apparatus, and that's true in the sense that I prefer direct contact with the people than being ruled by the party machine," she admitted.

"The thing I would like to do is have the party move forward with the team I've assembled, but above all I would like be able to unite the party," Royal continued.

"I've met Bertrand (Delanoë) and Martine (Aubry) and others to listen to what they have to say, because the party members haven't voted to count anyone out of the running but for us to put our collective talents together to unite the party."

You might remember that Royal was the party's candidate in last year's presidential election.

In losing to Nicolas Sarkozy she garnered almost 47 per cent or over 16 million votes, overcoming deep divisions within the party, which re-emerged after the campaign as the internal bickering and "blame" for yet another electoral loss dominated.

After her defeat, Royal took time to lick her wounds, metaphorically speaking, rebuild her base of support and then launched upon a campaign for the leadership of the party - when her former partner of more than 20 years, François Hollande, announced that he would be standing down.

But her chances of making headway seemed doomed when her main rival for the post and current mayor of Paris, Bertrand Delanoë, won the backing of many of the party's powerful old guard (or so-called elephants) when he declared that he was up for the job.

His supporters included Hollande and a former Socialist prime minister and presidential candidate, Lionel Jospin.

Another potential contender - Dominique Strauss-Kahn had been shipped off by Sarkozy to become head of the International Monetary Fund, and while Royal's popularity "waned", Martine Aubry, daughter of the former president of the European Commission Jacques Delors, and architect of the 35-hour working week here in France, emerged as the most likely challenger to Delanoë.

Are you still following?

By the summer of this year surveys showed that what had orignally appeared a two horse race between Delanoë and Royal had in fact become a likely win for Delanoë, with even Aubry outdistancing Royal in the polls.

The most likely outcome as far as most political commentators were concerned was Delanoë as the party's next leader, and so it seemed going into last week when party activists chose whose "vision" for the future they liked most.

It was the first step in the process that should end with the endorsement of a programme and a new leader on Sunday, and the formal vote next Thursday.

To everyone's surprise, Royal's programme came in first - a narrow win, but a win nonetheless - and it put her very much back in the driving seat.

Would she now, as she had previously promised to do if her proposals won the day, seek to become the party's next leader and, as she had always maintained, use the position as a platform for that presiential bid in 2012?

Apparently she would stand according to the much respected national daily Le Monde, at the beginning of this week.

Royal remained silent, and even when she appeared on television last night the odds were fairly stacked in favour of here making that announcement.

Once again though she seems to have learnt from past mistakes and is playing the game to her advantage. Royal knows she holds the balance of power - so-to-speak. None of the programmes of the four main contenders (there is also Benoît Hamon) has enough support to be the outright winner, and needs the backing of one of the other camps.

Of course a compromise candidate whose programme is a combination of two or more existing ones might still appear behind whom the party faithful could rally and there's likely to be even more behind the scenes last-minute haggling.

All right so the next presidential election here isn't due until 2012 (should be a busy year with presidential elections scheduled in both France and the US, and the Olympics hitting London) and Royal narrowly missed out on making history last year when she lost to Sarkozy.

But it's certainly not beyond the realms of possibility that she could still become the first elected female head of state of a G8 country, and perhaps for that alone it's worth the "heads up" - to use the appropriate Internet vernacular.

There'll be an update for anyone out there who's still interested and still awake after wading through this as to whether on Sunday, the conference actually endorses one candidate and one programme.