Country Report: France, January 2023

For this first report of January 2023, I had to violate my own resolve and return to the theme that worries conservative Europe the most: insecurity in France. With the re-election of Emanuel Macron to the presidency of the French Republic, I had decided to cut myself off from this subject as much as possible, so much so that it provokes in me indignation, sadness and a feeling of total powerlessness. My compatriots, through their vote, have clearly indicated that the level of violence in France is acceptable. They have re-elected a president whose security record is catastrophic and who has found nothing better than to appoint, as Minister of Justice, a lawyer who has defended African dictators, the worst criminals and the brother (and accomplice) of the Islamist terrorist who has killed little French children because of their Jewish faith.  

Some figures: in 2019, in France, there were 28 times more rapes than in Poland (in relation to the respective populations of the two countries, which makes 16 times more rapes for France).  In 2019, France was the country with by far the most rapes in Europe. Over 10 years, the number of (reported) victims of assault and battery aged over 15 has risen from less than 55,000 to over 90,000. Apart from 2020, the year of Covid, homicides, attempted homicides, crimes and violence have been increasing in staggering proportions. If we take homicides and attempted homicides together, they have jumped by 90% over 20 years. Of course, linking this sad dynamic to the increase in immigration in France will probably impose on you the label of a liar at best, and of a racist at worst. But, let's face it, this is an improvement on a few months ago when you could be excluded from public debate "ad vitam aeternam". It is now possible to tackle this subject, though with a lot of caution. Indeed, President Macron himself, when questioned after the murder of little Lola, admitted on television that in Paris "at least half of the acts of delinquency come from foreigners". (Lola’s murderer was an Algerian national with illegal status who had been due to be deported several months earlier). Of course, this gave rise to a whole bunch of articles in the progressive media, casting doubt, with a lot of sophistry, on Mr. Macron's assertion. Accordingly,  this did not launch a real debate on immigration. On the contrary, in January we learnt that 2022 was a record year for immigration, with 320,000 first residence permits granted to people from outside the EU/Switzerland/UK. The equivalent of the city of Nice has come to France, with 1.6 million first permits issued since 2017. We also learnt that in 2020 unaccompanied migrant minors (whose actual age is a matter of debate) were responsible for 30% burglaries, 44% pickpocketing and 32% robberies/muggings in Paris, according to the justice system.

But all this is just statistics. In concrete terms, here are a few news items for the month of January that can be found on site https://www.fdesouche.com/ That site is much maligned by the mass media, which consider it to be extreme right-wing – just because it reproduces all the articles of these same media concerning "miscellaneous events".

"Antoine, 16 years old, lynched for his electric bike in the city centre by a dozen individuals, who called him a "dirty white man"". "Paris 18th: children escorted by the police to school because of the presence of drug dealers and crack users". "Paris: they steal the phone of a BAC policeman in the metro, then beat up another policeman, who was trying to stop them; 3 Algerian migrants arrested, including two illegals, all known to the police". "A 25-year-old Afghan illegal immigrant arrested for raping a 14-year-old boy on the public highway; he was already wanted for an attempted murder committed last February in Paris. "An undocumented man was arrested on suspicion of killing a mother and daughter with a knife in August 2021 in the Val-d'Oise. "An illegal Algerian migrant rapes a 19-year-old female passenger in a Lyon-Grenoble TER train". "I'm going to slit your throat, I'm worse than Daesh": a man threatens nursing staff and damages a hospital in Aix". "Montpellier: a young man of 21 lynched in the tramway, when he interfered between two women and a gang of young people who were bothering them; he suffers a head injury". "Bretteville: the president of a migrant aid association killed with an iron bar by a 23-year-old Afghan migrant". "Roanne: investigation against a father accused of beating up a Guinean migrant who arrived illegally in France in 2022, and sexually assaulted that father’s 6-year-old daughter". "Stabbing attack at the Gare du Nord: the assailant is a Libyan or Algerian migrant, known under several identities and under several Obligations de Quitter le Territoire Français (OQTF). "Against the feeling of insecurity in Libourne, emergency call boxes to contact the municipal police". "The Alpes-Maritimes department is no longer able to cope with the influx of underage illegal migrants". "Lille: a 78-year-old woman was attacked and raped in her home by Mohamed C., a 24-year-old Guinean migrant, who was under an OQTF and recently released from prison". "Strasbourg: armed with a knife, he attacked random passers-by in the street, including a mother and her two children, before being subdued by an off-duty police officer; the suspect "spoke only in Arabic". "Saint-Nazaire: a 16-year-old teenager attacked with a knife in front of the Cité scolaire".

In January, we also learnt, through the voice of his lawyer, that the murderer of a young girl dragged alive by a car for 800 m, her brain exposed, her fingers gone by the friction, should be released within a year. At the trial, the murderer’s family took the liberty of making a fuss in the presence of the victim's family. In view of the figures above, you will understand that all this must represent one thousandth of what happened in France in January. The worst thing is that, when you talk to French people and even journalists, nobody is fooled about the situation in the country.

Of course, the abnormally high level of violence in France is multi-factorial, and a contributing factor is the doubling in thirty years of the number of single mothers, often insecure, whose children are raised without the father’s authority. It is also due to the very advanced de-Christianisation of France. In January alone, there were attempts to burn down three different churches in Paris. The courts ordered the commune of La Flotte-en-Ré to remove a statue of the Virgin Mary from the public domain. Also in January we learned that 5000 churches are threatened to disappear by 2030, mainly due to lack of the faithful. Emmanuel Macron's former Minister of Culture, the highly publicised Roselyne Bachelot (also a minister under Chirac and Sarkozy), recently declared that France's religious heritage was made up of too many churches "without much interest". In this respect, immigration, particularly from Africa, helps to keep the French church alive...

But what fascinated French opinion leaders and decision-makers in January was the question of how to perpetuate the French pension system. Not that everyone was wondering about the consequences of artificial intelligence and robots on the labour market, and therefore on pensions. Or the low employment rate of young and old. Or that we are no longer having enough children to ensure our future pensions. No, the big question is whether it is necessary to raise the retirement age from 62 to 64. This measure is absolutely necessary if we want to keep the particularly comfortable pensions of President Macron's main voters, the "boomers", at the same level. Everyone knows that when the current pension system was created there were 6 contributors for one pensioner, but today there are only 1.7 contributors, and tomorrow 1.2. Everyone knows that a boomer receives about 60% to 100% more pension than his or her child or grandchild will receive. Everyone knows that one out of every two migrants in France does not work and therefore does not contribute, but receives public benefits. And everyone knows that at least one person in three in France works in the private sector, the rest being civil servants, miners, pensioners, inactive or unemployed. But the big question on the minds of the French is whether the retirement age should be raised from 62 to 63 or 64. According to the government, 1.2 million people took part in the demonstrations against the change to 64, while the trade unions said that 2.8 million people attended. For many experts, France is a powder keg ready to explode at the slightest spark, so fractured is the French society. This fear must be weighed against the fact that all the workers' unions (which are overseeing the current demonstrations), the left-wing and centre parties called for a vote for Mr Macron in the second round (which he won by a landslide) and that the vast majority of the elites still support him...