Failing to vaccinate your children against diphtheria, tetanus and polio in France could result in a €30,000 fine and 2 years in jail.

Samia and Marc Larère, from Auxerre in the Burgundy region in central France, are accused of deliberately mistreating their two children, aged three and 15 months as they are refusing to vaccinate them against diphtheria, tetanus and polio.

The Larère parents’ gripe is not the vaccines themselves, but the additives in the jabs that improve their stability and performance, such as aluminium salts.

All French children are obliged to be inoculated against diphtheria, tetanus and polio (DTP). Until 2007, they were also required to be vaccinated against tuberculosis (BCG).

Beyond simply breaking the law, the Larères also risk their children being barred from education in France.

While BCG is no longer a legal requirement, many schools and nurseries will not accept children who have not had the jab.

Mumps, measles and rubella (MMR) jabs are not compulsory either, although doctors will strongly recommend parents to have their children inoculated.

France and Italy are the only western European countries that oblige parents to vaccinate their children for DTP.

Professor Daniel Floret, who heads France’s Technical Council for Vaccination (which reports to the health ministry), warned that failure to inoculate children could lead to the return of diseases once believed to be eradicated.

Single use plastic bags will be banned in France from 2016

Single use plastic bags

French MP’s have voted to ban single use supermarket plastic bags from 2016 to help protect the environment.

The decision was an amendment to a bill on biodiversity.

A voluntary agreement with retailers already led to a drastic drop in the number of plastic bags used at supermarket checkout counters, falling from 10.5 billion to 700 million between 2002 and 2011.

But the government is now focusing now on plastic bags in self-service fruit and vegetable sections.

More than 12 billion of them are still used in stores and supermarkets.

The draft bill intends to completely ban these non-recyclable single-use plastic bags.

Environmental campaigners say that shoppers use them for just 20 minutes on average but they take up to 1,000 years to degrade.

More taxes...

I am on a bit of rant about taxes… it is no secret that the French love a tax or two but in this mornings post I have received an estimated bill of what I can expect to pay next year to have my landfill rubbish (JUST landfill, this doesn’t include recycling waste removal) taken away.

Grrrrrrr......

I should not be surprised. A couple of years ago the communal bins were replaced with individual wheelie bins and last year, these were all chipped to contain details of which property they belonged to and who owned them.

But, I was not expecting to pay €400 year to have my landfill rubbish removed. €400, can you believe that!

Up until now rubbish collection has been included in the Taxes Foncières and our 2014 statement shows that €47.60 of our Taxes Foncières was for Rubbish disposal for both the landfill and recycling.

I’m not even going to calculate the percentage increase here!

Still spluttering!

French women now targeted with the Pink Tax

The French Socialist government is investigating the claims that women are being charged more than men for a range of products and services including, razors, haircuts and dry cleaning.

The move was triggered by an online petition posted by a women’s rights group that claimed women were being systematically targeted by a hidden “pink” – or “woman” – tax.

The group is known as Georgette Sand a play on 19th century French author George Sand, who famously used a male pen name in order to sell her novels.

Taking snapshots of products marketed for men and women, the group singled out Monoprix, a supermarket whose name translates as “one price”, as a particular offender.

Half the amount of razors and more expensive.

In one case, Georgette Sand said women paid an extra eight euro cents for a packet of Monoprix’s standard razors, and got half as many razors as men.

Women, it said, are also being charged more than men for identical services at dry-cleaners and hairdressers.

While some differences in price may appear minimal, the group argued, they add up to an “unjustifiable injustice”.

France’s Finance Ministry has vowed to take action should its inquiry reveal a practice of unfair pricing.

In the meantime, women have had to swallow another bitter pill.

As Georgette Sand pointed out, until 2012 female drivers in Europe enjoyed cheaper car insurance policies on the grounds that they accounted for a fraction of road accidents.

But the European Union has since ruled that this discriminated against men.

I don’t think we have heard the last of this particular battle!

French etiquette even extends to giving flowers

Arrived home this evening to find roses in the sink.

‘Who are the roses for?’

‘You.’

Me?… Mark hasn’t bought flowers in over 15 years…hmmmm and petrol stations don’t sell flowers in France!! (what a harsh thought!!)..

Anyway I’m pleased with my flowers.

Roses... but make sure there are an odd number

Later that evening a french friend came for dinner and he commented on my flowers..there must be 19 there he said.

‘Twenty, I think.’ Mark replied.

‘Oh no, in France we only give an even number of flowers to mark a death.’

Sure enough there were 19 flowers.