Socialists strong in France

Of the three elections held at the weekend only France's produced a clear outcome. In Greece and Egypt the implications of the results remain to be clarified but Francois Hollande saw his rather narrow presidential victory over Nicolas Sarkozy strengthened by a comfortable overall Socialist majority in the French parliament. There are now no domestic legislative obstacles for President Hollande to overcome in putting into effect his campaign promise to give growth as much attention as deficit reduction. Whether he will win over his EU partners, Chancellor Merkel in particular, to his way of thinking is another matter entirely.

There were some interesting sidelines in the French election results. The far-right Front National won two seats and will be represented in parliament for the first time since 1986. One of these seats went to Marion Marechal le Pen, a niece of the party's founder while his daughter Marine le Pen, now leader of the party, lost by 114 votes to a Socialist and has asked for a recount.

The saddest story in the election was probably of Segolene Royal, Hollande's former partner and mother of his four children, who unsuccessfully fought Sarkozy in 2007 for the presidency but on this occasion lost to a dissident member of her own Socialist party who was publicly supported by Valerie Triesweller, currently the new President's partner. They do things differently in France.