France and Britain have been bickering again, this time about the chaos at the ferry ports over the weekend. The ‘clown’, as Emmanuel Macron reportedly dubbed Boris Johnson, may be on his way out, but there seems no end in sight to the circus that Anglo-French relations have become. Might that change with a new ringmaster in No. 10? Maybe, if Rishi Sunak wins the contest to become prime minister.
Sunak and Macron are similar in many ways beyond their background in finance; presentable and polished but, so say their detractors, ideologically shallow.
In this week’s Spectator Douglas Murray describes Sunak as resembling ‘someone who has floated to the top and rarely had to get his hands dirty with political debate, never mind political warfare’. Ditto Macron. The president doesn’t like to debate, or even to give interviews because, as he memorably declared in 2017, his thoughts are ‘too complex’ for ordinary mortals.
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