Emmanuel Macron accuses Marine Le Pen of 'peddling the same lies as your father'

The two frontrunners in France's presidential election locked horns in a fiery exchange over Europe in a televised debate on Tuesday night as centrist Emmanuel Macron accused the far-Right Front National leader Marine Le Pen of "peddling the same lies as your father".

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Telegraph - The two frontrunners in France's presidential election locked horns in a fiery exchange over Europe in a televised debate on Tuesday night as centrist Emmanuel Macron accused the far-Right Front National leader Marine Le Pen of "peddling the same lies as your father".

The four hour debate involved for the first time all 11 candidates - five main contenders and six "smaller" rivals some of whom draw one percent or less of support in polls, and a majority of which were against the EU.

Half-way into the programme, Mr Macron rounded on the FN leader, who wants to leave the euro, hold a referendum on EU membership and stop immigration, saying her protectionist stance would lead to "economic war".

"Nationalism is war. I know it. I come from a region that is full of graveyards," he said.

The centrist, who claims to be the most pro-European of candidates, comes from the Somme region, which is littered with tombs from the First World War.

Ms Le Pen hit back: "You shouldn't pretend to be something new when you are speaking like old fossils that are at least 50 years old."

Mr Macron then retorted: "Sorry to tell you this, Madame Le Pen, but you are peddling the same lies that we've heard from your father for 40 years."

The comment was a clear dig at Ms Le Pen's efforts to detoxify the party her father Jean-Marie Le Pen founded and widen its appeal to mainstream voters.

The two politicians, who most polls say will face each other in the May 7 runoff for the presidency, were clearly positioning themselves for the final round.

One small candidate, Jacques Cheminade, accused Ms Le Pen of following "the programme of David Cameron" by not leaving the EU immediately but first holding negotiations and  referendum. He said France should "calmly and legally leave the EU via article 50 like the British".

"But Cameron wanted to remain and the British left anyway," was her response.

Mr Fillon also came under attack from Nicolas Dupont Aignan, a sovereignist who is a friend of UKIP ex-leader Nigel Farage.

"Who can one believe you, Mr Fillon, when your government, and your entire political career, you have signed European treaties?," he asked, describing the ratification of the Lisbon treaty as the "rape" of the French people who voted no in the 2005 referendum on the European constitutional treaty.

Mr Fillon then predicted that Ms Le Pen's pledge to hold a referendum on leaving the euro would seal her political doom, were she elected.

"As everyone knows that the vast majority of French don't want to leave the single currency (72 per cent according to the latest poll), that means in reality that Madame Le Pen will have no economic policy, as it will collapse the minute the French vote against leaving the single currency," he said.

Here's what else we learnt:

Marine Le Pen and François Fillon taken to task over corruption allegations

Ms Le Pen and François Fillon, the embattled conservative candidate, both came under fierce attack over corruption allegations.

The former frontrunner, Mr Fillon is facing charges over suspicions he used parliamentary funds to pay his wife and two children around €800,000 (£685,000) for "fake jobs". He denies all charges.

On Tuesday, it emerged that Ms Le Pen's campaign director was the focus of a preliminary investigation into a fake jobs probe.

Ms Le Pen's campaign chief, David Rachline, said the investigation bore the hallmark of "a political attack".

In a sequence on "moralising politics", Philippe Poutou, a Ford factory worker running for the New Anticapitalist Party, laid into both during the debate.

"François Fillon - the more one digs, the more it smells of corruption, trickery. These are the guys who tell us we need more rigour, austerity while they steal from the coffers," he said.

"Then there's Ms Le Pen who pilfers from the state coffers. For someone who is anti-European, it doesn't bother you to nick from EU coffers," he said - referring to a probe into whether the MEP illicitly paid FN members with European parliament funds.

"The FN claims to be anti-system but protects itself thanks to the system's laws on parliamentary immunity," he went on - a swipe at Ms Le Pen's refusal to answer a judge's summons.

"When we are summoned by police, we don't have any workers' immunity," he exclaimed, to applause.

Mr Dupont-Aignan took a swipe, saying: "I've always served the French, not myself."

Visibly weary, Mr Fillon - who is trailing in third place in the race - did manage to hit back when asked how he would define an exemplary president.

"An exemplary president is one who tells the truth to the French about the state of France and the reality of the world. It is a president who after five years can say he has improved the life of the French," he said, complaining that in the debate nothing was said about France's public debt.

France is a university for jihadists - Marine Le Pen hits hard on security

In her opening remarks, Ms Le Pen warned that "this country we love so much is abandoned to terrorism, insecurity and even attacks on our national identity".

Later, she said France" must get its borders back because a large number of terrorists have slipped in via migrant flows, and some of these are responsible for the Bataclan massacre. Now, France is a university of jihadists," she claimed.

"Isil suits you," retorted Benoit Hamon, the Socialist candidate. "It helps you prosper."
'Leave us in peace with religion,' Leftist Jean-Luc Mélenchon tells Marine Le Pen

Mr Mélenchon, candidate for Communist La France insoumise (Unbowed France) told Ms Le Pen to "leave us in peace over religion" after she defended the right of French town halls to install Christmas nativity scenes - despite French laws on secularism banning religious symbols in state institutions.

"Nativity scenes are part of our cultural and historical heritage," said Ms Le Pen.

"These are our traditions Mr Mélenchon, I know they irk you", she said. "The French are obviously attached to their traditions."

"Well no actually Madame," he hit back. "Sixty per cent of French don't have a religion. Leave us in peace with religion. We're no obliged to suffer your caprices, your little finds, your way of imposing on us your way of life that is not ours," he said.

Jean-Luc Mélenchon the most convincing, according to snap poll

The Communist-backed firebrand was found the most convincing performer by French viewers among the 11 candidates running in this month's presidential election, a snap poll showed.

The poll by Elabe for BFM TV said Mr Mélenchon had managed to convince 25 percent of those who had watched the four-hour long debate. Some 21 percent found Mr Macron as the most convincing, the second best score.

Ms Le Pen came in fourth behind Mr Fillon, with 11 percent and 15 percent respectively.

However, Mr Macron was seen in the same poll as having the best programme of all the candidates by 23 percent of viewers, followed by Mr Melenchon with 22 percent and Fillon with 18 percent.