The Chaser Report - Bon Voyage, Monsieur Firth!

Episode Date: October 28, 2026

Mere days after recording our first-ever video episodes, Charles is jetting off to brave the protest-filled streets of Paris. Why is he going, and what kind of welcome will he receive?See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Chaser Report is recorded on Gatigal Land. Striving for mediocrity in a world of excellence, this is The Chaser Report. Hello and welcome to The Chaser Report with Dom and Charles. And Charles, it's been so enjoyable making the shift to video that nobody at all wanted. It's been great to recording to record in the same room in this beautiful studio that you and Sam have fitted out for us. Thank you so much for all the hard work. Although, Dom, I am actually leaving, like, tomorrow. Yeah.

Already? For a month. I knew you were going back to Europe for Wankanomics. Yeah. You've done like three episodes here and you've done. Yeah, I'm out of here. Okay, so the future video episodes, we have to keep doing video. We said we would.

Oh, fuck. We've created a rod for our bag, haven't we? Terrible idea. You'll have to do that thing where you record remotely on some crappy webcam. It'll be like a Zoom. It'll be like watching a Teams call. That's right. It's going to be so engaging for people.

People will love it. And that'll be for the next month. I challenge you, Charles, while you're away, and we keep doing this, to find the least engaging possible backdrop. Like, make it just look completely on professional. No, this is exciting. You're going to see the world. You can be the correspondent. Oh, no.

And I'm looking forward to because I don't know whether I told you, but I've decided to take a few days off before I... Oh, really? Because I've got a big UK. tour. So you could have stayed longer and recorded more podcasts, but he said you're having a break. Oh, it must be nice. Must be nice being Mr. Wanconomics with your jets. Well, I'm going to Paris.

I'm going to France. Yep. To Paris? Yeah. Last time I, um, I haven't been to Paris for years and I never got to see. Last time I was there, there was the whole things I missed out on. So I'm really looking forward to it. It's, I was there actually in July.

It's been a couple of days there. It's a lovely. time in the middle of summer. It was beautiful. It was idyllic. Charles, things have changed slightly in Paris since I was there and certainly since you were there. What do you mean?

Well, some bits of it are a little, I think, shop-soiled, is the word that I do. Yeah, there's always a bit of, there's a grittiness to Paris. I really love how gritty it is. There's a sort of, you know, the rude waiters serving your coffee on the street corner and while you smoke cigarettes. How much grit do you do? like, do you like, for instance, atmospheric graffiti, for instance? Atmospheric.

You know, do you like graffiti? Like, you're the kind of person that goes in one of those bars with graffiti on the walls and says, oh, wow, this is really cool. Yeah, but isn't that more, there's more Berlin chic, isn't it? I think more. Certainly true. Like, I'm the high culture in Paris. Like, I'm going to do the Louvre, you know, go up the Eiffel Tower, that's the thing.

You could go to the Louvre. The Louve has had, it's been changed somewhat by, what do you do? talking about? I mean, France and Paris has a great tradition of revolutions. It's just that one

of them seems to be underway at the moment. Oh, yeah, are they performing a production of Les Mies? No. Because I'd love to see that.

They're just miserable, I think. I mean, what's happened is that there are thousands and thousands of students have taken to the streets and other protesters.

And so the Lou, for instance, they've blocked it off, they've vandalized bits of it and so. Oh, how inconvenient! But in particular, think of the tourists.

Oh. In particular, Charles, the main target has been the plus to the Republic, which is a beautiful old statue. Oh, yeah, I'm going to go there, definitely. Yeah, the statue is... Go and talk to the locals. It's been extensively graffitied. Oh, really?

You know, I speak a little bit of French Charles, if you don't mind. Basically, it says young people have the shits. La Jernes Emerd is what it says. Look, it's very authentic. Yep, that's the monument, the anarchist symbol. They've got a beautiful anica symbol over that beautiful statue. It certainly adds a lot of atmosphere in grit. The other thing I'd say, Charles, is the...

Holy fuck on the rue Jean-Bois-Bois. But also, Charles, you love a protest. I mean, we've got to be honest. You're going to be joining them on the barricades if they won't immediately get rid of you because you are A, old, and B, English-speaking, which they may well. But no, there have been thousands of arrests. Oh, really?

They've sent out the riot police. And French do really... stylish riot police. Like they're in all black with black helmets. They look genuinely terrifying. Well, I've always thought that the French are revolting, but now it turns out that they are. Oh, my God. You'll fit right in.

But no, a lot of places have been trashed. And one thing that they've done is they've gotten a lot of rental bikes. There are rental bikes throughout Paris. They've made bonfires out of rental bikes. Oh, wow. So I imagine, you know, chemical burn fires. And there are lots of cars have been set alight next to the Port Sandini in the capital. In Marseille, they broke into the city hall.

And so I'm presuming, is it because, like, what's the cause here? Is it because of the brie was slightly off? I think it's on wee. It's on wee. Existential angst. I think, it's just a little certain sense. Yeah, yeah. They were struck by the frustration of life.

Because they did see a thing a few weeks ago about how, like, the students were protesting because the conditions in their schools were absolutely appalling. Like there was literally rat infestations in the classrooms. There was all these TikToks and, you know, Instagram meals. And not your sort of charming ratatouille type. No, it was like... He's your best friend teaches how to cook. And then other people had...

There was a class, you know, where they were literally being rained upon because there was a hole in the roof. There was just water coming through. Moldy walls, the schools are falling apart. So that started. And then the police shot somebody's handoff. Could they? Yeah.

So in response to that, so the students went out and protest. And it was a bit like, remember a few years ago when the student strikers went out here and they protested about climate change? And everyone went, oh, good on you for being civically minded. You care about your own future. Yeah, but the police didn't go out and sort of arm wrestle. to the ground. Over there, they used rubber bullets on the kids and then one of them shot somebody's hand and had to be amputated. Which, which I see, I mean, clearly that's going to

mean that the protesters come back with more people tomorrow. Yes, yes. And now it's spread beyond just sort of school-aged kids to being a sort of malcontent against everything, you know. Do speak like that in France. You're going to go down to. But no, but you're just. Charles, also the heat wave, right? So the canicule, as they call it. I was there during July when the worst heat wave, in late June. I was there on a date with 38 degrees. And none of the old buildings are at all set up for that because it's almost as though the climate has changed, right? Like already we're starting to feel this. They had more kind of red heat alerts than they'd ever had in recorded memory. And I was out with a friend of ours, actually. We were just walking

around. But it does make the brie extra, extra runny. It does. It affects the brie. I mean, we basically found a bar with air conditioning and stayed in it and drank very cold beer, which was a good way to do with it. But kids were in schools. Oh. Maybe, I think they might have been on holidays that week. But yeah, there have been huge health problems. Apparently students have been fainting and having nosebleeds because of the extreme heat. All these old buildings trap heat. And to put air conditioning in them would be enormously costing and difficult to do. So it's become a real flashpoint. A flashpoint.

And so, because Macron's on the nose anyway. Like, I mean, it looks like Marie Le Pen is going to become. Marine Le Pen, yeah. Marine Le Pen. She, I mean, yes, I mean, she may well like all these things, as with Nigel Farage. She may well. Is she going to be allowed to run? An appeals court shortened her ban on holding public office.

So that actually banned her for five years because she, and I'm quoting ABC News here, she received a five-year electoral ban for using money from the European Parliament because she was a European MP to pay wages for staff at her anti-immigrant National Rally Party in France. So the Paris Appeals Court upheld the conviction but reduced the ban so she can stand in the next election. So, yeah, she could well be the next president of France, particularly given that Macron has, Macron can't run again anyway. She's run about three times, isn't she?

She and then her dad before there. Yeah, her dad, Jean-Marie was the president. there for decades. I kind of feel like the problem that actually France has is that both, all sides of politics, they're all just the same. They're all, the political class keeps failing the people of France. They just bring the kids in of the last people. You know what they need. What do they need? They need a clean skin, Dom. Really? They need an outsider who doesn't know anything about France. Are you think that they need a happy go lucky Australian? Yeah, someone who, some fresh ideas. Someone who would never think of shooting a 13-year-old kid in the hand

and ruining their hand for the rest of their life. Right. You know, who would say, no, that's not what we're going to do. Someone who doesn't oppose any of the protesters issues because he doesn't know any of the protesters' issues. And who, when you give speeches, people won't get angry with you. No, they won't understand. No, I don't understand.

I mean, even if they understand English, they probably won't understand. If there's one thing that the French are known to love, it's people who speak English rather than French. But what I could do is put on my fantastic French accent and then they understand me. Look, you've got a long flight to get there. Or you just put on Duolingo and get a little bit. You studied French in high school. You must know a little bit. Can you ask, like, you sound the toilette, that sort of stuff?

Yeah. Turned at the right. Prine the dozeema doche. I'll be your next president. There you go. Well, there you go. Look, I feel like if you listen to the Chase Report, or indeed, watch the Chase Report, you're ahead of the news cycle.

You're ahead of something, yeah. Certainly we started out behind the news cycle, you know, 15 minutes ago. Like Charles. But now, you heard it here first. I mean, this episode is, as with so many things in this podcast, evidence of just how much underprepared people with laptops in front of them can quickly look up things on the internet as per my update on Marine Le Pen. Look, Charles, the thing is, though, this gives you an opportunity to be the first

foreign correspondent for the Chaser report on video. Oh, okay, yes. That's what we should do? Yes, I will call in on my team's call from Paris. I'll go to the Republic. Go to the Plaster Republic and do a report in English and everyone will hate you. No, but the thing to do is to, this is what I want you to do. I want you to be in Paris.

Yes. But then use a terrible green screen. To make yourself look like you're just in the studio faking it. I love it. And it's one shot to prove you're actually there and then go in front of a green screen. No, but look, it's an exciting opportunity to get your uniquely uninformed approach to world affairs from the place in question. You can then, because you're going to be in the UK. I mean, Andy Burnham seems to be very popular with the 10.

TikTok generation, you can fail to understand why in a series of insightful reports from the streets of Britain. Okay, so that's what I'm going to do. It's going to be the reporter at large. Yeah, you can investigate what's happening with Nigel Farage, not find any answers that are meaningful. You can talk to reform supporters and irritate them. Basically, you could set off a new wave.

What I did used to do in the US. Yes. I could do that with reform supporters in the US. You could. And I could do it in France as well, but they wouldn't understand me. You could go and meet Marine Le Pen and irritate her as much as you once irritated Hillary Clinton. No, this is clearly a great opportunity. Yep.

I do think it's possible, though, Charles. Yes. You have to be willing for the consequences of what this is. Oh, do you? Europe, particularly France, particularly the UK, is currently in the midst of anti-immigrant further. Oh. I just think you arriving and doing this sort of work. is only going to exist.

You may make things dramatically worse. So you might also become the kind of conduit through which all of that... Oh, we become the symbol. It'll become... And everyone, but it'll allow everyone to unite. That's true. Because everyone will go, oh yeah, we should be against this immigrant. This particular immigrant is no longer allowed.

So if you're willing to do that, if you're willing to be, you know, the one point of consensus on the passport that should not be allowed to pass, Heard it here Firth On the Taser Report I want to cancel your passport From this country I want to cancel your passport from this country