You can tell that French elections are in the air because legal proceedings are being taken against a leading figure of the French right. So it was with François Fillon of the Républicain party, a key contender in the 2017 presidential elections, whose hopes of winning were dashed during the campaign by legal investigation into alleged misuse of parliamentary funds, subsequently ending his political career. So it is now with Marine Le Pen of the Rassemblement National, as France gears up for the 9 June 2024 European parliament elections, for which her party is the clear front-runner. This week, French investigating magistrates scheduled a hearing for 27 March 2024 to determine whether Marine Le Pen, the Rassemblement National and 27 members misused EU funds in the payment of parliamentary assistants between 2004 and 2016. If found guilty they risk ten years imprisonment, a fine of one million euros and, most significantly, ten years of ineligibility for public office.

A charitable mind might venture that this is merely the work of an overzealous self-confessed left-wing judiciary. In 2013 photographic evidence was published of a notice-board in the premises of the........

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