The British love to think of the French as irredeemably corrupt. But take a look at recent corruption scandals in Britain and France, and it is hard to avoid the impression that it is the French who are taking a tougher line on sleaze than the supposedly upright Anglo-Saxons.

Last month, both the British and French prime ministers were interviewed by the police within a week of each other. But the handling of Tony Blair was noticeably softer than the treatment meted out to Dominique de Villepin. Mr Blair had a gentlemanly chat about the “cash-for-honours” scandal – which involves allegations that the Labour Party essentially sold peerages in return for loans to the party. His interview took place in Downing Street in the middle of the day, and took less than two hours. By contrast Mr de Villepin was subjected to a 13-hour interrogation, ending at three in the morning. He was apparently being questioned about suggestions that he may have attempted to smear fellow ministers in the “Clearstream affair”. (Warning to readers: Do not attempt to understand the Clearstream affair, that way madness lies).

Of course, neither of these investigations has run its course. There may be more trouble in store for Mr Blair – and indeed for Mr de Villepin. But the contrast between the treatment of the two premiers is still striking. And it is not the only recent example of French toughness and British laxity. Last month Britain’s Serious Fraud Office was instructed by the government to drop an inquiry into allegations of bribery, connected to a huge arms-sales contract with Saudi Arabia. The official reason given was that the inquiry was endangering national security.

Compare that with France’s own long-running arms-sales scandal – the Taiwan frigates affair. This soap opera has been running since 1991, and we will probably never get to the bottom of it. (It’s connected to the Clearstream affair, incidentally). But French magistrates were allowed to pursue the investigation and inflicted some serious collateral damage on the French establishment in the process. Senior businessmen were convicted and imprisoned. And Roland Dumas, a former foreign minister, was sentenced to a jail term – although his conviction was later over-turned.

Indeed one cannot avoid the impression that the French are taking the whole business of cracking down on bribery by their companies abroad much more seriously than the British. As The Economist pointed out in a recent editorial on Britain’s non-investigation into the Saudi-BAE systems scandal:
  “Even France, Britain’s nemesis in the arms trade, brought 11 prosecutions for bribery in the 18 months to last June - 11 more than Britain.”

It is true that in the latest Transparency International “bribe-payers index”, Britain gets a considerably more flattering rating than France. But for how much longer?

January 2nd, 2007 in French politics | Permalink