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Macron says no regrets over Uber talks

French President Emmanuel Macron on Tuesday acknowledged holding discussions with Uber executives when he was economy minister from 2014-2016, saying he was "proud" of it and would do the same again.

Published: 12 July 2022 16:17 CEST

Macron says no regrets over Uber talks

France's President Emmanuel Macron gestures as he delivers a speech unveiling plans to build a semiconductor plant near Grenoble. (Photo by Jean-Philippe KSIAZEK / POOL / AFP)

“I’m extremely proud… it’s difficult to create jobs without companies and without entrepreneurs,” the 44-year-old told reporters in southeast France.

“I would do it again tomorrow and the day after tomorrow.”

The pro-business centrist leader came under fire from opponents on Monday following investigations in Le Monde and The Guardian newspapers which revealed repeated discussions between Macron and Uber over the group’s operations in France.

Le Monde said Macron had been “more than a supporter, almost a partner” to the controversial US-based firm by offering to help with lobbying efforts to shape legislation and get around restrictive French regulation.

“We are creating a sort of atmosphere in which seeing the heads of companies, in particular foreign ones, is a bad thing. But I acknowledge it completely,” Macron said on the sidelines of an event in Crolles.

“I’ve seen the heads of companies. What a shock! I saw them, it was always official, with my aides, and I’m proud. If they created jobs in France, then I’m super proud of that.”

The newspapers said some of the meetings with Uber executives were not recorded in Macron’s official diary and took place without the knowledge of other members of then Socialist government.

Macron, a former investment banker, took an openly pro-Uber position amid sometimes violent protests against the firm by taxi drivers and criticism from cabinet colleagues.

Macron defended the group for providing employment for people in low-income areas and breaking the monopoly held by taxi companies.

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French election breakdown: TV clash, polling latest and 'poo' Le Pen

During the election period we will be publishing a bi-weekly ‘election breakdown’ to help you keep up with the latest developments. You can receive these as an email by going to the newsletter section here and selecting subscribe to ‘breaking news alerts’.

It’s now been 17 days since Macron’s surprise call for snap parliamentary elections, and four days until the first round of voting.

TV debates

The hotly-anticipated first TV debate of the election on Tuesday night turned out to be an ill-tempered affair with a lot of interruptions and men talking over each other.

The line of the night went to the left representative Manuel Bompard – who otherwise struggled to make much of an impact – when he told far-right leader Jordan Bardella (whose Italian ancestors migrated to France several generations back): “When your personal ancestors arrived in France, your political ancestors said exactly the same thing to them. I find that tragic.”

But perhaps the biggest question of all is whether any of this matters? The presidential election debate between Macron and Marine Le Pen back in 2017 is widely credited with influencing the campaign as Macron exposed her contradictory policies and economic illiteracy.

However a debate ahead of the European elections last month between Bardella and prime minister Gabriel Attal was widely agreed to have been ‘won’ by Attal, who also managed to expose flaws and contradictions in the far right party’s policies. Nevertheless, the far-right went on to convincingly beat the Macronists at the polls.

Has the political scene simply moved on so that Bardella’s brief and fact-light TikTok videos convince more people than a two-hour prime-time TV debate?

You can hear the team from The Local discussing all the election latest on the Talking France podcast – listen here or on the link below

Road to chaos

Just over two weeks ago when Macron called this election, he intended to call the bluff of the French electorate – did they really want a government made up of Marine Len Pen’s far-right Rassemblement National (RN) party?

Well, latest polling suggests that a large portion of French people want exactly that, and significantly fewer people want to continue with a Macron government.

With the caveat that pollsters themselves say this is is a difficult election to call, current polling suggests RN would take 35 percent of the vote, the leftist alliance Nouveau Front Populaire 30 percent and Macron’s centrists 20 percent.

This is potentially bad news for everyone, as those figures would give no party an overall majority in parliament and would instead likely usher in an era of political chaos.

The questions discussed in French conversation and media have now moved on from ‘who will win the election?’ to distinctly more technical concerns like – what exactly does the Constitution say about the powers of a president without a government? Can France have a ‘caretaker government’ in the long term? Is it time for a 6th republic?.

The most over-used phrase in French political discourse this week? Sans précédent (unprecedented).

Démission

From sans précédent to sans président – if this election leads to total chaos, will Macron resign? It’s certainly being discussed, but he says he will not.

For citizens of many European parliamentary democracies it seems virtually automatic that the president would resign if he cannot form a government, but the French system is very different and several French presidents have continued in post despite being obliged to appoint an opponent as prime minister.

READ ALSO Will Macron resign in case of an election disaster?

The only president of the Fifth Republic to resign early was Charles de Gaulle – the trigger was the failure of a referendum on local government, but it may be that he was simply fed up; he was 78 years old and had already been through an attempted coup and the May 1968 general strike which paralysed the country. He died a year after leaving office.

Caca craft

She might be riding high in the polls, but not everyone is enamoured of Le Pen, it seems, especially not in ‘lefty’ eastern Paris – as seen by this rather neatly crafted Marine Le Pen flag stuck into a lump of dog poo left on the pavement.

Thanks to spotter Helen Massy-Beresford, who saw this in Paris’s 20th arrondissement.

You can find all the latest election news HERE, or sign up to receive these election breakdowns as an email by going to the newsletter section here and selecting subscribe to ‘breaking news alerts’.

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