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Emmanuel Macron celebrates after topping the first round of the French presidential election on Sunday. Photograph: Vincent Isore/IP3/Getty Images

Monday briefing: Macron and Le Pen make history

This article is more than 6 years old
Emmanuel Macron celebrates after topping the first round of the French presidential election on Sunday. Photograph: Vincent Isore/IP3/Getty Images

First round of the French election redraws the country’s politics … Infighting has broken out in the Labour camp … and welcome back Bananarama

Top story: Relief in Europe as Macron secures lead over Le Pen

Good morning, this is Bonnie Malkin bringing you a first look at the news you need to start the week.

The first round of the French election is over and – as the polls predicted – independent centrist Emmanuel Macron will face the far right’s Marine Le Pen in the run off vote on 7 May.

Macron, who is not a member of any political party and is the youngest ever French presidential candidate, is the frontrunner, with 23.7% of the vote to Le Pen’s 21.5%. The result has prompted a modicum of relief across Europe, with Macron now expected to go on to secure the presidency and block the anti-EU Le Pen from affecting a Trump-style upset.

Investors were also buoyed by what the market regarded as the best of several possible outcomes, the euro soared 2% to $1.09395 when markets opened in Asia. However, the very fact of Le Pen’s arrival in the final round cements the rise of her Front National party in French politics and the results also mark the rejection of the traditional ruling political class. It is the first time in 60 years that mainstream left- and rightwing parties were rejected in the first round.


Labour pains – Infighting has broken out in the Labour camp after Tony Blair suggested over the weekend that voters should consider backing Tory or Lib Dem candidates in June’s election if they pledge to vote against a “hard Brexit”. In a BBC interview Blair also said he was so dismayed about the prospect of Britain leaving the single market that he was tempted to return to frontline politics.

The former prime minister’s comments have not impressed Jeremy Corbyn, who urged the nation to choose a Britain for “the many not the few after Brexit” and vote Labour. Shadow Brexit secretary, Keir Starmer, also insisted the best way to avoid giving Theresa May a blank cheque in the forthcoming negotiations with the EU over Brexit was to vote Labour. Labour MP Chuka Umunna said: “Tony Blair is wrong to suggest in any way that voters should look elsewhere and form some anti-Brexit alliance.”

Don’t forget about the Snap, our daily briefing on the UK election front. Details at the bottom on how to sign up.


Common sense prevails – There is good news for the London-born children of an EU couple who were told by the Home Office that their application for permanent residency had been refused. Following a Guardian report on their situation their plight went viral and they have now been told they can stay in the country after all.


Truth and beauty – “Organic” beauty products might not be all they seem. The Soil Association has warned consumers that some cosmetic companies have been pouring more money into marketing than they spend on making sure their products are environmentally-friendly and toxin-free. There are no legal standards for the use of the terms organic or natural on beauty products, which means a face cream, shampoo and make-up can be labelled as such even if it contains virtually no organic or natural ingredients.

Beauty companies might be misleading consumers. Photograph: Bloomberg via Getty Images

North Korea detains another American – Pyongyang has detained a third American citizen as tensions rise on the peninsula and Japanese ships join a US carrier group for war games in the region. Tony Kim was detained by officials as he was trying to leave the country. His arrest comes as North Korea threatened to sink a US aircraft carrier and said it could launch a nuclear strike against Australia.


Driving ambition – Police in Australia have stopped a 12-year-old boy who was attempting to drive solo across the country. The boy had set off from Port Macquarie on the east coast and was reportedly heading for Perth when he was pulled over 1,300km into the trip by police in Broken Hill due to a broken bumper bar. The boy was intercepted before he reached the Nullabor Plain, a vast arid desert that takes six days to traverse.

Lunchtime read: I want you back

Time to break out the denim overalls and big hair, Bananarama – the biggest girl group of the 80s – is back. Rebecca Nicholson talks to the trio about their heyday, their acrimonious split in 1988 and how they started thinking about a reunion at 2am in a Bethnal Green back garden. Siobhan Fahey, Sara Dallin and Keren Woodward describe their time in the pop spotlight as if it were an endless school trip and discuss why they want to do it all again with a tour kicking off in November.

Bananarama in New York in 1982. Photograph: Ebet Roberts/Redferns

Sport

Arsène Wenger praised Arsenal’s players for banishing doubts about their mental strength by coming from behind to beat Manchester City at Wembley and set up an FA Cup final against a Chelsea side that will include the newly crowned PFA player of the year, N’Golo Kanté. Liam Livingstone, the Lancashire captain, furthered his Test credentials with a knock of 168 against Somerset, becoming a very real contender for selection for July’s Tests against South Africa.

Welsh club runner Josh Griffiths burst on to the world stage at Sunday’s London Marathon after finishing his first race over 26.2 miles as the fastest Briton in the field. Ilie Năstase, the man at the centre of the weekend’s tennis storm in Romania, has a long history of behaving badly and the game’s authorities have done it a disservice by not challenging him with sufficient force, writes Sean Ingle.

And Lionel Messi has done it once again – the Barcelona player scored his 500th career goal with the very last kick of the clásico to seal a 3-2 win over Real Madrid and keep his side in the Spanish title race.

Business

Emmanuel Macron may be leading the race for the French presidency, but the real winner from the first round was the euro. The single currency hit its highest spot for five months against the US dollar – $1.084 – on the back of investor confidence that the pro-euro former investment banker will win in two weeks’ time.

This from Ray Attrill, head of foreign exchange strategy at National Australia Bank: “Markets are happy … that Emmanuel Macron will be confirmed as the next president of the French republic in two weeks’ time.”

Stock markets were also up in Asia in the hope of a more pro-establishment winner in France. The FTSE is expected to be up when the markets open in London this morning.

Meanwhile the pound also lost out to this sentiment, diving 1.2% to €1.179. Sterling also dipped against the dollar to $1.279.

The papers

The French election result – or at least the way it was leaning – makes it on to many of the front pages. The Mail goes all 1789 with its headline “New French Revolution”, saying voters had turned their backs on the establishment with their vote.

Front page of The Guardian, 24 April 2017. Photograph: The Guardian

The Times goes with “French elite humiliated as outsiders sweep to victory”. It says ‘mutinous’ voters turned their backs on the traditional parties to push Le Pen and Macron into a runoff. The FT calls Macron’s victory “extraordinary” saying he had helped to break the political mould.

The Telegraph is the only broadsheet not to lead on France for its first edition instead having a go at Jeremy Corbyn with the splash headline: “Labour’s nuclear implosion”. It says Labour’s credibility on defence “was in tatters” after Corbyn, in an interview, “ruled out ever using Britain’s nuclear deterrent”.

The tabloids meanwhile go their own way. The Mirror splashes on a claim that Madeleine McCann may have been ‘snatched to order by slave traders’ according to a former detective. The Sun leads with updates on the acid attack at a nightclub in Dalston at the weekend.

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