AFTER THE ELECTIONS – GAULLISTS MAY FIND THE FRUITS OF VICTORY BITTER

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31728, 11 July 1968, Page 16

AFTER THE ELECTIONS - GAULLISTS MAY FIND THE FRUITS OF VICTORY BITTER

<By

ANTHONY MANN,

writing to the "Daily Telegraph". London, from Pane)

(Reprinted from the “Daily Telegraph” by arrangement)

The statistical message of the French General Election is crystal clear. Well over three-quarters of the seats in the new Assembly will be occupied by orthodox Gaullists (UD-V) and their allies, the Independent Republicans (RI). Mr Pompidou’s UD-V alone commands an overall majority, which frees the Prime Minister from any Parliamentary dependence on Mr Giscard d’Estaing.

In other words General de Gaulle, whose administration was tottering on the brink of destruction on May 30, possesses one month later more absolute parliamentary power than any elected Government since the war. One is tempted to believe that the General’s oft quoted sneer, “The French are cattle,” has more substance than one imagined. Certainly he was right, If the capacity to be stampeded is what he had in mind. In a brief but effective campaign, with no holds barred, he succeeded yet again in convincing the mass of the electorate that only Gaullist autocracy could rescue France from the horrors of Communist tyranny. In the apt words of “Le Monde,” “The Communists are paying for barricades they did not build, and for strike pickets they did not command.”

Got The Message And not only the Communists. The whole French Left and Centre, unable to combine effectively, have been reduced to a parliamentary impotence more abject than anything they have yet experienced. General de Gaulle did not actually tell voters, “Your savings are in danger,” but they got the message and rushed headlong into the corral. So much for the immediate past. What of the future? . Total victory implies total responsibility. The newspaper “Combat" (once more, ironically, an organ of the French Resistance) sums up neatly in a banner headline, “De Gaulle will have no excuses now.”

In fact, the Gaullists have bought electoral victory at the price of almost complete capitulation. Not, it is true, to the muddled idealists of the Latin Quarter and their uninvited gutter allies, but to the tough negotiators of the Confederation of Labour (C.G.T.), the industrial arm of the Communist party. To this extent the Communists can be said to have won the battle with Gaullism (though perhaps not the campaign) before the elections began. Even at the height of the student riots, when Mr Pompidou thought it prudent to accept the resignation of his Minister of Education, it was not the exuberant violence of undergraduates that caused the General’s Cabinet to quake In its shoes. Regime’s Impotence As a Spanish Minister remarked to me in Madrid: “We are not terribly worried by student riots. Most of these lads are good bourgeois sowing their wild oats. They will settle down when they need a job.” The Sorbonne is not so very different. The true importance of the

Latin Quarter outbreaks was that they exposed the impotence of the Gaullist regime in face of mass action, and thus detonated a nation-wide explosion of organised labour —General Strike. Firmly dis-

sociating themselves from the undisciplined rabble of selfstyled Maoists, Trotskyites and Anarchists, the C.G.T. leaders, always in close contact with the party directorate, relentlessly pressed their economic claims day and night in marathon sessions with weary Gaullist Ministers. And they won. In both the public and private sectors they extorted across-the-board wage increases of from 10 per cent to 15 per cent, the guarantee of shorter hours and longer holidays, higher Social Security benefits without increased contributions, and improved pension rights. No reliable estimate of the over-all cost of these concessions to the French economy has yet been published, but it will be colossal. The impact on many industries, and in particular on the inefficient medium and small-sized undertakings so typical of France, will in many cases be fatal. Tactical Position So the Left, though smarting under a whipping at the elections, will in some respects be In a better tactical position in the Assembly during coming months than it would have been if the Gaullists had only just scraped home. Deputies of the extreme Left, the Left and the Centre can watch the Gaullists struggling with their appalling economic responsibilities, while restricting their own role, willy-nilly, to that of gadflies and hornets.

During the earlier stages of the election campaign, Mr Pompidou emphasised repeatedly that the Government would fulfil to the letter the bargains it had made with the unions. There will be more than 120 Opposition deputies still in the Assembly to remind the Gaullists continually of this undertaking. The costs of the General Strike itself, which lasted variously from four to six weeks, must first be absorbed. The motor industry aione. one of France’s export leaders, lost a minimum of 350,000 vehicles and much goodwill abroad. The tourist industry, already ailing, faces a season of almost unrelieved gloom,

i and some holiday zones have ■ claimed tax relief, as distres- : sed areas. I The French textile industry t (apart from some modern and • rationalised firms in the ex- ■ treme North) is in dire

straits. The electrical industry and manufacturers of consumer durables are uncompetitive and in no better shape. Tariff Cuts The General Strike coincided almost exactly with the incidence of the Kennedy Round tariff cuts and the Common Market abolition of tariffs on July 1. This could hardly have been more unfortunate, since the French Government could not withdraw from either set of obligations without declaring itself a voluntary bankrupt, and abandoning its pretensions to be permanent conductor of the Brussels orchestra. It Is evident that France faces a period of rising inflation and, almost certainly, of widespread unemployment Even before the second round of the elections, vague measures designed to check price rises were announced. Even the desperate expedient of local vigilante committees, to denounce “unjustified" increases of price, is now officially sponsored. The Gaullists are thus committed to the familiar doctrine of government in economic difficulties: cost and wages are rising sharply, but there is to be only a marginal rise in prices, In order “to maintain purchasing power.” The French Confederation I of Industry, has already warned the Government publicly that industry will not be able to sustain the burdens placed upon it by Government concessions, unless it is accorded tax reliefs and credit facilities. What It has told the Government in private is so far only a matter for conjecture. Signs Of Recession Simultaneously, the first signs of accelerating economic recession are apparent. The Organisation of Small and Medium-sized Industries bas announced that many firms will close or go bankrupt, French subsidiaries of foreign companies are already cutting their losses and shutting their doors. Ironically, the same French newspapers which announce the results of the elections also proclaim “Economic Europe exists since midnight.” It is an “Economic Europe” in which France has invoked every escape clause she can lay hands on, to avoid the impact of unfettered European competition on the French economy. It is an “Economic Europe” in which the bears of every stock exchange are selling francs short, in the hope of a profit when French currency is devalued—just as the Paris Bourse speculated against sterling and hoarded gold a few months back. This, then, is the backdrop against which General de Gaulle’s new and victorious Government will begin its period of office, as soon as the General has decided which ministers are expendable and which are essential to face the coming storm. There may be fewer of the latter than they had supposed.

After The Holidays First, the Assembly will meet for a statutory fortnight’s session for urgent legislation, which in itself may be instructive. Then Parliament, like everyone else in France, will go away for its paid holidays during July or August. Only when the country returns from Greece and the Costa Brava to the harsh realities of September and October will the General and his party have to deal with the bitter fruits of victory. At the moment. French unemployment figures stand at about 500,000. Labour experts predict that this number will double by Christmas. Despite the immediate euphoria, the sweeping Gaullist success at the polls may yet prove a pyrrhic victori in the months to come.

Though written before President de Gaulle’s dramatic dismissal of Mr Pompidou, this article by a “Daily Telegraph” correspondent in Paris gives a background to the extraordinarily difficult circumstances in which the Gaullists resume power, and implies that many drastic moves will be necessary to counter effects of the General Strike and consequential promises to the trade unions.