French press review 7 July 2014

Pride of place this morning goes to the so-called social conference, which opens here in Paris today.

This will be the third edition of the meeting between government; bosses and trade unions, under arguably the most difficult conditions since François Hollande inaugurated the annual gab-fest just after his election in 2012. With the number of French people out of work at 3.3 million, and the economy as drowsy as a poisoned princess, this third conference is likely to be dominated by division and distrust.

Conservative paper Le Figaro warns that recent government gestures to the employers have left the unions wondering if they can really count on their socialist rulers. The bosses are refusing to give any concrete guarantees on job creation in return for the 40 billion euros theoretically available under President Hollande's employment creation scheme. And the socialist government itself is showing a few cracks as internal disputes rage about the best way of getting the country out of the economic doldrums.

Le Figaro's editorial is scathing, the headline "Stop talking, start doing," giving the general tone of a call for action rather than yet another energy sapping debate.

The right wing paper quotes former French Prime Minister, Georges Clemenceau to the effect that the best way of burying a problem is to set up a committee. That's how Le Figaro sees this two-day conference. We've already had two of these meetings, last year and the year before that, and France is now even further down the economic and social waste pipe. We need policies, and the courage to put them in place, not another round table.

The problems hindering the French economy could not be clearer.  For Figaro, they are too much tax, too much red tape and too many rules and the right-wing paper wants action to change those fundamental facts, not another gas factory to give tired voters the illusion that something is really being done. The socialist government has got to stop cringing before a reactionary trade union movement determined to hang on to the advantages won in a different century. Prime Minister Manuel Valls earns Figaro's praise for his ability to call a spade a pelle, but his government colleagues will have to get behind him and share the responsibility.

Catholic La Croix is not too optimistic about the outcome of the conference either, saying the participants come together in a climate of mutual distrust. That hardly bodes well for the spirit of co-operation necessary to any serious reform.

Communist L'Humanité warns that the unions are not coming along for the tea and sandwiches. The representative of organised labour intend to make their voice heard, particularly on the vexed question of a continuation of austerity policies. At least one union has decided to boycott the meeting, dismayed at government assurances to the employers, assurances themselves offered in order to prevent a boycott by the bosses.

We'll have news from the first day of that cranky conference in tomorrow's programmes and press reviews. Don't expect any miracles.

Le Monde's weekend edition looks at proposals to change the French junior school programme, with a view to making school more fun. You can bet the teachers won't like it.

Libération looks at the growing tension between Israelis and Palestinians, suggesting that hatred is the only thing those two tortured communities have in common. For the left-leaning daily, a third intifada, or arab uprising, is now a terrible possibility.

Finally, on the front page of the European edition of the pink paper, The Financial Times, we learn that Paris wants to see global trade "rebalanced", notably by basing international transactions on a wider range of currencies, not just on the US dollar as is the case now.

Under the headline "Paris rails against dollar dominance," we are told that France’s political and business establishment has hit out against the power of the dollar in international transactions. This, after US authorities fined French bank, BNP Paribas, about six and a half billion euros for helping countries avoid US sanctions.

French Finance Minister Michel Sapin said he would raise the need for a weightier alternative to the dollar with fellow eurozone finance ministers when they meet in Brussels later today, although he declined to go into detail about what practical steps might emerge.