Hollande equals Thatcher? Not quite, Monsieur le President, but keep trying

Have you ever tried discussing the merits of gun control with a Texan, or of deregulated labour markets with a Frenchman and his Belgian cousin? The prejudices involved are much the same.

Many Americans believe that guns in the home and the pick-up truck are their best protection against violent attack, and that the 13,286 US gunshot deaths last year would have hit an even higher number if gun ownership was more restricted. Likewise, French trade unionists believe a 35-hour working week combined with laws restricting any company that is a going concern from making redundancies are the best protection of their economic wellbeing, rather than a root cause of the fact that more than 3.5 million of their compatriots are unemployed. That’s 10.2 per cent, which even if it has fallen a fraction in recent months is still double the rate in the UK.

And so this week, in opposition to President François Hollande’s timid and too-late labour law reforms, the militant Confédération Générale du Travail union — led by the fiercely moustachioed Philippe Martinez, who has called for a 32-hour week — was doing its best to bring France to a standstill by closing refineries, fuel depots and nuclear power stations. Rail workers and Air France pilots were expected to join in, with a view to crippling their own country as it hosts the Euro 2016 football championship commencing next week. Meanwhile in Belgium, rail workers, prison guards, teachers and other public-service workers (principally French-speakers in Wallonia and Brussels, rather than their Flemish counterparts) have been indulging in a general strike against changes in their working conditions.

Let’s not be too smug here: French workers are more productive than our own by a startling margin (GDP per hour worked in 2014 was $50.5 in the UK, $62.7 in France). The number of people in work in the UK has risen by almost 2.5