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French municipal élections - a wave of green

avole

The wise never post on Internet forums
Given a turnout generally speaking below average, political analysts are pointing to the rise of the green. Macrons party is the big loser, but, as some have pointed out, that's also a problem for the socialiste who have not picked up the anti-Macron vote as expected.

Thoughts on this, anyone, given the possibility of parallels in the UK?
 
Happened in Switzy a year ago and I have to say the parliament has undergone a very refreshing transformation. Old Apparatchiks of all sides (especially the far right) have been sent home. Socialists are digging their own grave with their elitism, pretty much like in the rest of Europe, and I’m not unhappy to see the Greens replace them. At the end of the day the right remain in charge, as they should IMO, but with more women and youngsters. All in all a positive evolution, apart from the constant leftie provocation which increases the noise to a sometimes annoying level.
 
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Good to see a revitalised Hidalgo won Paris by a mile. She has always been a greenie, but now, with their support, she can do a lot of the things she always said she would like to do.

Lyon also went Green, as did Strasbourg.
 
Green is a set of principles that should be enshrined in all political parties. I want the principles. I also want capable world class politicians.
 
Green is a set of principles that should be enshrined in all political parties. I want the principles. I also want capable world class politicians.
And Macron is one, if you ask me. He isn't exactly doing what he promised to do before being elected, that's one of the reasons why they hate him. But basically he's doing right IMO, and he is the one who finally has the balls needed to get France into the right direction, i.e. fewer privileges for those who don't deserve them, and less bureaucracy.
Then he is often depicted as a royalist, but that's another story.
 
The pfm community being mostly composed of open-minded European, international, and even global citizens who abhor the insularity of Brexit, I would have expected a little more interest in this thread ;)
 
Given a turnout generally speaking below average, political analysts are pointing to the rise of the green. Macrons party is the big loser, but, as some have pointed out, that's also a problem for the socialiste who have not picked up the anti-Macron vote as expected.

Thoughts on this, anyone, given the possibility of parallels in the UK?
Sadly, I don't think the UK electorate is ready to vote Green just yet. In our last local elections, an acquaintance of mine stood for the Green party. He got around 200 votes, which is about 10% of what he'd need to get elected as a councillor. It's about the same as he received last time out, a few years earlier. This in a broadly left-leaning council ward (our MP is Labour).

The Greens seem to have very little traction at local or national level, in the UK. It's improving, albeit slowly, but we don't have sufficient time to let the trend catch up with the reality. We need a sea change, unfortunately I don't see much evidence that the UK electorate is minded to give us one.
 
I just heard on the wireless some of Macron's speech this morning. I don't speak French like a native, so I may well have missed all sorts of nuances. But I thought he's found the right tone. He's always sounded intelligent to me, but now he sounds serious and authentic and in his element. Will he call a referendum on some green issues?

Re the results, I also heard Melanchon speak about how the low turn out was a reflection of widespread disillusionment with the state. I wasn't totally surprised by the result at Perpignon because I have a friend who lives there.
 
I've just been watching the France 2 lunchtime news.

Whilst it's good to see the Greens doing well, I'm not sure how representative these results really are. The abstention rate was 58%, in places like Mulhouse, 75%. That's down in part to political sceptecism, in part sanitary sceptecism (not safe to vote), according to the pundit, Nathalie Saint-Cricq. (I love her! She's a real character!) The Greens did particularly well in Lyon and Strasbourg, taking both the city and the agglomération giving them a real chance to do something. Bordeaux also fell, after 73 years of control by the right. Juppé didn't look happy.

I was pleased to see Martine Aubry hang on to Lille, if only by 220 votes, Hildago retain Paris, and Marseille get rid of the odious Jean-Claude Godin (he was retiring anyway), even if they haven't quite worked out how it's all going to be sorted out there yet.

It will give the Greens a foot in the door and a chance to shew what they can do; that they can be serious and competent managers and not just campaigners. It'll be a challenge, as there's not much experience, but maybe that's a good thing. After Covid, I don't think people anywhere want the same old. Let's hope they make a success of it, convince people that the right result was declared, and get re-elected next time.

As for Macron, he didn't have that much at stake, as the LREM seems not to have established much in the way of local organisation yet. It'll be interesting to see what happens to Edouard Phillipe, though. He was re-elected easily as Maire in Le Havre. Macron has to decide whether to keep him on as PM. Phillipe may have to choose between the two: PM or Maire.

Pity about Perpignon. It went to a Le Penn sympathiser, even if he wasn't standing (this time) on a RN ticket.
 
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The pfm community being mostly composed of open-minded European, international, and even global citizens who abhor the insularity of Brexit, I would have expected a little more interest in this thread ;)
Bring on the greens for Strasbourg!

Regards,
All of the above except the last one.

Fishies seem mainly parochial in my opinion. If it doesn't obviously affect UK, the thread usually does not last.
 
As a Frenchman I am glad at the environmentalist wave in major cities. Especially in Lyon and Paris. Probably Marseille as well next week.
But the conservatives managed to get a few traditionally left wing city councils too.
The national front (no N and no F) got poor results. A good thing.
The Fillon trial outcome I find highly satisfying too.
I hope they will lose the inevitable appeal.
 
Sadly, I don't think the UK electorate is ready to vote Green just yet. In our last local elections, an acquaintance of mine stood for the Green party. He got around 200 votes, which is about 10% of what he'd need to get elected as a councillor. It's about the same as he received last time out, a few years earlier. This in a broadly left-leaning council ward (our MP is Labour).

The Greens seem to have very little traction at local or national level, in the UK. It's improving, albeit slowly, but we don't have sufficient time to let the trend catch up with the reality. We need a sea change, unfortunately I don't see much evidence that the UK electorate is minded to give us one.

Do you not think that Brits find the greens excessively bossy, even authoritarian, and economically naive? We have made enormous strides, with vast offshore arrays now producing serious amounts of electricity, solar farms popping up everywhere, and coal-burning power stations a thing of the past. Our cities are increasingly closed off for private cars, and increasingly high standards for sustainability in new buildings, and incentives for upgrades in existing stock. The govt is fully signed up to the end of the internal combustion engine, and so on. This country's carbon footprint is seriously diminished.

There is, I suspect, a widespread feeling that all green politicians will do is to limit our freedoms, and at best constrain the economy. The balance has to be right. What we do need is some serious investment in public transport, most relevantly a lot more trams, both within and beyond the metropolitan areas. Europe is leagues ahead on this front.

France, and much of Europe, is turning into a vast windfarm, and the streets are increasingly cluttered up with self-regarding, virtue-signalling green signage in primary colours. I'm not convinced that many would welcome this kind of unfettered uglification here.
 
Do you not think that Brits find the greens excessively bossy, even authoritarian, and economically naive? We have made enormous strides, with vast offshore arrays now producing serious amounts of electricity, solar farms popping up everywhere, and coal-burning power stations a thing of the past. Our cities are increasingly closed off for private cars, and increasingly high standards for sustainability in new buildings, and incentives for upgrades in existing stock. The govt is fully signed up to the end of the internal combustion engine, and so on. This country's carbon footprint is seriously diminished.

There is, I suspect, a widespread feeling that all green politicians will do is to limit our freedoms, and at best constrain the economy. The balance has to be right. What we do need is some serious investment in public transport, most relevantly a lot more trams, both within and beyond the metropolitan areas. Europe is leagues ahead on this front.

France, and much of Europe, is turning into a vast windfarm, and the streets are increasingly cluttered up with self-regarding, virtue-signalling green signage in primary colours. I'm not convinced that many would welcome this kind of unfettered uglification here.
I suggest all anti-Green luddites around the world do a sabbatical in somewhere like Strasbourg or a Scandinavian country. It does not take long to feel the benefits. Obviously, some Brits will probably just go to the nearest Irish bar and complain. But others will get it.

For me, bicycle paths and trams mean it will be very hard to move back to Hull if I ever have to. An e-bike with 250 miles of safe paths in the city is a big deal to me and it makes the city the best place I have ever lived in. Everything is less than 15 mintues away and costs me no money to get there. There are no taxis to be seen anywhere. And hardly any cars in the island section of the city makes it more attractive for tourists.

The commitment the city has made to getting these paths built is pretty impressive. They are wide like proper roads with white lines etc, most are off the main road, and when they are on the road, cars know their place. They stop for bikes.

My car is gathering dust from April to November.

Every city is slightly different, eg, it pisses it down in Hull and so I wonder what the take-up would be if they invested what looks like tens of millions of euros in bicycle paths. But Hull is also flat. So it might really work too. But I can't see it happening in my lifetime.
 
For a tram based transport system to work you need relively widde streets, high population density - ie people living in 5 storey buildings eg Vienna, Copenhagen, Paris and the very centre of London. Most UK towns are too spread out with a low population density in two storey dwellings with narrow streets and sharp bends so trams cannot get round.
 
This country's carbon footprint is seriously diminished.

I'd challenge that. A serious reduction in carbon emissions? It depends how you measure it.

We're still missing an independent apolitical assessor who can balance up whether a particular action reduced carbon emissions overall or not. They would add up everything that went into a particular action and everything it saved and say where guesstimates were used. This needs a new type of scientist to do this.

At the moment I think there's far too much politically motivated bullshit about and not enough reason.

Every year about now I'm faced with a decision about whether to carry on repairing my 19 year old Honda Civic or to scrap it and buy an electric vehicle or something newer. But how much carbon is used to make a car, including any batteries. How long will it last before it needs a new battery or can you fit another one or rebuild the existing one? The answer is that I haven't a clue and neither has anyone else. The manufacturers aren't going to fess up unless they're required to by law.

So far I've come to the conclusion that I should keep it going until something really major goes, like serious structural rust or the gearbox.
 


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