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I am attached to a strict approach to Brexit: I respect the British vote, but the worst thing would be a sort of weak E.U. vis-a-vis the British.
What matters to me is to find rational solutions for those that are facing difficulties so that France preserves jobs and its ability to innovate.
The strategy we must follow is to defend the special relationship between Great Britain and Europe and, more specifically, between Europe and France.
The challenge is to open a new page in our political life and to take action so that everyone is able to find his or her place in France and in Europe.
We are a continent of refugees, and if you say we can't integrate refugees, that's not consistent with our values, even if borders cannot be wide open.
I am not shy. I am for an open society. I am for a progressive world. I do not propose to reform France; I propose to transform it at its deepest level.
De facto, you have a multi-speed Europe. You look at the Schengen, you look at the euro zone, all this kind of cooperations, you have a multi-speed Europe.
As to the euro zone avant-garde, it must go towards more solidarity and integration: a common budget, a common borrowing capability, and fiscal convergence.
The only way governments or would-be governments respond to ills these days is by seeking to lower the temperature... and that tends to mean public spending.
The refugee crisis is a challenge for the whole of Europe, and Europe - it's a very fair point to say it's not just a security issue. It's also an economic issue.
You can suddenly have a series of countries waking up and saying, 'I want the same status as the Brits,' which will be, de facto, the dismantling of the rest of Europe.
Under the French system, you have to take into consideration that every five years, the president is directly elected by the people. He's the one that has the legitimacy.
We have the eurozone. Could we accept to be cleared, regulated, and de facto have inflows and outflows from a country that has decided to leave the E.U.? For me, definitely not.
I've taken my time. I've thought about it; I've consulted, and I've decided that we are going to create a new political movement, one that will be neither on the Right or the Left.
We ask our companies to restructure; we ask employees to work more for less money because there is overproduction, but then we're unable to defend them from cheaper Chinese imports. We are insane.
The financial passport is part of full access to the E.U. market, and a precondition for that is the contribution to the E.U. budget. That has been the case in Norway and in Switzerland. That is clear.
We are implementing an in-depth reform on labor market, not to reduce rights for workers but to provide more visibility and more efficiency to investors and employers because it's the key for job creation.
I don't want a tailor-made approach where the British have the best of two worlds. That will be too big an incentive for others to leave and kill the European idea, which is based on shared responsibilities.
We have to be extremely strict on the implementation of Brexit so there is a common approach between member states. We must avoid a sector-by-sector or country-by-country approach, and ask the U.K. to be clear.
Leaving the E.U. would mean the 'Guernseyfication' of the U.K., which would then be a little country on the world scale. It would isolate itself and become a trading post and arbitration place at Europe's border.
If the U.K. wants a commercial access treaty to the European market, the British must contribute to the European budget like the Norwegians and the Swiss do. If London doesn't want that, then it must be a total exit.
There are two projects facing each other. There's Marine Le Pen's project of a fractured, closed France. On the other hand, you have my project which is a republican, patriotic project aiming at... reconciling France.
You need basically some accountability rules, which means democratic checks and balances at the euro zone level, and definitely, you have to increase convergence in terms of taxes, in terms of social affairs and so on.
Our interests lie in attracting added value and talent to France as a result of Brexit, but also in having a balanced relationship with Great Britain. We must not sacrifice the short term for our bilateral relationship.
I don't believe that killing the French model in order to become the U.K. or the United States overnight is the solution. You have a big debate on inequality there, and for our society, a lot of inequality would not be bearable.
Our mission... it will be difficult, it will take time, it will be demanding for all men and women... will be to act in such a way that French people of the Muslim faith are always more proud of being French than of being Muslim.
I kept trying, proposing, pushing... If you want to succeed, you cannot leave work half done, and unfortunately, many things were left half done. The choice was made not to launch a second wave of economic reforms that I was proposing.
France was given up to fire and bloodshed, she experienced famine, she experienced the worst of things, she was nearly chopped up in pieces forever because of the decision... to exclude, to brand one party as guilty and annihilate them.
To avoid the trap of Europe fragmenting on the economy, security, and identity, we have to return to the original promises of the European project: peace, prosperity and freedom. We should have a real, adult, democratic debate about the Europe we want.
I touched the limits of our political system, which pushes one to last-minute compromises. Explanations are rarely given. It plays to people's fears because it hasn't built an ideological consensus. It produces flawed solutions and too often ignores reality.
It's about our ability precisely to integrate a people and offer jobs, and that, for me, is one of the key rationales of the reforms I'm pushing, and I'm a strong believer in that when you lift barriers, when you deregulate a lot of stuff, basically you improve the equality of opportunities.
You need a debate and a vote on the principles: Do you want more Europe or less Europe? Do you believe we are more efficient with defense and security with Europe, or not? Do you believe we are more efficient for our companies with or without Europe? Those are the questions we have to discuss and push our people to vote on it.
A romantic or classical view of the French approach would have been to say, 'It's a French company; let no one attack it. Let's block any merger. But the reality is Alcatel-Lucent is not a French company; it's a global company. Its main markets are China and the U.S. Its ownership is foreign; most of its managers aren't French.
When you discuss your steel industry with China you are credible because you are part of the E.U., not because you are just U.K. You will be completely killed otherwise. You will never be in the situation to negotiate face to face with the Chinese because your domestic market is not relevant for the Chinese in comparison with their domestic market.