Cécilia Sarkozy, wife of the new President of France, may not feel she has been altogether lucky in love, but she is extremely fortunate to be conducting her private life in public gaze on the French side of La Manche.

Faced with a similar situation with Mrs Blair or Mrs Brown – although the idea of one of them abandoning their spouse while ensconced in Downing Street seems a lot more remote – the British press would have enjoyed a feeding frenzy. Imagine every political and entertainment scandal that has seen the light of day in the last five years, roll them all into one, and the sensation would still not begin to bear comparison.

Although a few prominent figures in the UK have succeeded in delaying publication of matters they would prefer to keep secret, usually through hugely expensive ex-parte actions (so called when the other side is not present to put their point of view) before sympathetic judges, in the end they have paid a terrible price. Fleet Street is like a giant crocodile: once it has its teeth into the prospective victim, it never lets go, even if afterwards it weeps a few crocodile tears when criticized for allegedly outrageous conduct.

France, in contrast, has a strict privacy law, which the establishment has used unhesitatingly in the past to keep stories about their private life out of the press. There are signs, however, that faced with the enormous temptation to reveal the domestic trials and tribulations of their new First Lady, the French media has been unable to resist and is starting to take risks. As one newspaper editor put it, ‘The interest in this is so high that we can no longer turn a blind eye’.

That of course still depends on which newspaper you buy. Readers of La Journal du Dimanche would have searched in vain for the story of how Cécilia allegedly went to New York to meet a mysterious admirer in the last weekend of the presidential campaign, despite her husband’s furious attempts to stop her from going. The newspaper is owned by the new president’s close friend, Arnaud Lagardère.

The dam had already been tested if not broken by the most unlikely of newspapers, the dour Le Monde, speculating on but not revealing exactly why Cécilia had not been at her husband’s beck and call over Easter. Le Monde’s source was an internet site known as Rue 89, run by some disenfranchised and disillusioned hacks from Libération, a paper that is said to be close to bankruptcy.

That timid reference died a natural death, as no one dared to pursue it, but the New York affair, if affair it was, proved different. Even the television channel TF1, owned by one of Sarkozy's closest associates, Martin Bouygues, ran the story in the equivalent of the BBC’s Ten O’clock news. So far the one indisputable fact about the presidential election is that Cécilia did not vote for her husband, or for anyone else. But what will the French press do if the 49-year-old Cécilia disowns the Elysée Palace and abandons the presidential marital bed once and for all? They may tarry at their peril. The British press is watching. As one French media commentator put it: ‘heaven help Cécilia if Fleet Street starts to regard her as newsworthy for their readers, too’.

May 2007