Social progress

French TV is showing a programme on 27 January called L'abolition about the end of the death penalty in France in .... 1981. The last person to be guillotined was in 1977. Britain got there rather earlier, with the Murder (Abolition of Death Penalty) Act 1965.

One of the main forces behind the abolition in France was a lawyer called Robert Badinter, who became Minister for Justice in 1981. He was also responsible for decriminalising homosexuality in 1982. Again, England got there first, in 1967, although the Scots had to wait until 1980 and the Northern Irish, for some reason, until 1982.

France has also lagged behind on other social reforms. Women have been able to vote in the UK since 1918, subject to limitation, and all women since 1928. French women got the vote in 1945. British 18-year olds have been able to vote since 1969; French ones, despite (or maybe because of) the 1968 riots, only since 1974. Britain has had separate taxation of husbands and wives since 1989; France hasn't got there yet.

Still, in one area of life the French are a century ahead. Church and state were formally separated in 1905, and laïcité is now a central Republican value. Not so in Britain, where the connection goes right up to the very top and, incredibly, 25 bishops still sit in the House of Lords.