French press review 27 January 2012

French press is dominated by the 60-point plan revealed by Socialist Party presidential candidate François Hollande.

Up until now, many critics have accused Hollande of lacking substantial plans as much as they have accused him of a lack of charisma. But, the press seems to have changed its tune after yesterday.

Left-wing daily Libération has a photo of Hollande delivering the speech and looking stateman-like and simply says de gauche (leftwing). They dub his plan ‘soft anticapitalism’.

The paper says that he has unveiled a plan unlike that of any other candidate in France, in seven pages of detailed analysis.

Libé breaks down the 60-point plan but highlights the "generational contract" which Hollande mentioned as a way of boosting youth employment. He has made this a priority from the beginning of his campaign.

Communist paper L’Humanité is slightly more cautious in welcoming the plan and also looks at the "contradictions in the plan, particularly economic contradictions".

Among today's media, it dedicates less time to Hollande and focuses on other smaller parties, particulary the Greens.

Catholic daily La Croix is also cautious. Whilst hailing economic reform for rebalancing social justice, it raises concerns about other propositions such as legalising euthanasia.

At the other end of the political spectrum, Le Figaro focuses on how much the plan is going to cost. It points out it could be 49 billion euros or more.

The paper, on its front page editorial, accuses Hollande of a "two-speed waltz" - first of all presenting himself as the man to reunite the Left and to resurect the ghosts of socialism.

On the other hand, he is revealing his plan in minute detail. They claim, rather dramatically, that this plan will shatter when up against a broken global economy.

However, inside the pages, the paper does concede that Hollande still heads the polls with 27.5 per cent , ahead of Sarkozy who has 24 per cent of the public opinion ratings.

Les Echos, the economic daily,  focuses on the increased tax, saying that Hollande has "put his cards on the table".

As may be expected from a business paper, it gets into the nitty gritty of the plan and  says that it will lower France's deficit by 2013.

The website of centrist Le Monde, has plenty of analysis of the other event in Hollande’s diary yesterday, the televised debate with Foreign Minister Alain Juppé. They conclude that Hollande was the winner.

Le Figaro’s coverage focuses on Foreign Minister Juppé's comments that Hollande lacks coherence.

Aujourd’hui en France has an interestesting take on this question. It points out that Sarkozy is sending his "heavy weights" into the political foray,  refering to Prime Minister François Fillon and Foreign Minister Alain Juppé.

The paper points out that while Sarkozy has not yet officially announced his candidacy, the three of them are meeting on a weekly basis to keep up the pressure on Hollande. But despite this, in the paper's opinion, Hollande stood-up well to Juppé's pressure in the debate.

The daily chooses not to lead with the Hollande story but instead carries the less party-political story about how the crisis is threatening schools, public transport networks and sports facilities of French towns.

They claim, of the 20 billion euros necessary to finance local projects, between 8-13 billion is missing, depending on which estimates you believe in.

They blame the bank's reticence to lend to local authorities. The paper fears this is going to put thousands of jobs at risk.

Another story covered by the French press is the news that Jean-Claude Mas, the head of the implant company PIP which manufactured defective breast implants, was arrested on Thursday January.

And not a moment too soon for Liberation and L'Humanité which point out that it has been a long time coming. L'Humanité dubs Jean-Claude Mas the "king of low-cost implants".

He is,  of course, at the centre of a scandal in which 30,000 women in France alone have received the implants with  40,000 in the UK and thousands of others around the world. He is being charged with manslaughter after one woman died of cancer after getting the PIP implants.