Emmanuel Macron held MPs and peers in the palm of his hand.
Immaculately suited, the French President arrived at the gilded Royal Gallery in the Palace of Westminster and winked twice at his audience like a game-show host, soaking up the applause.
His message was a carefully crafted mixture of serious foreign policy and some digs at his host nation, in which he warned the two countries “may end up strangers” if they did not “move forward side by side” on key strategic decisions.
Macron talked up the UK and France working together on numerous issues, including defending Ukraine via forces sent by the so-called coalition of the willing, an idea put forward by Sir Keir Starmer. The French President said it was a signal that “Europeans will never abandon Ukraine. Never.” Cue much applause.
But there was also pressure on Starmer to back one of Macron’s projects. He has been pushing for allies to recognise Palestinian statehood, even organising a summit to discuss the idea. The meeting, originally planned for late last month, was hastily pulled after Israel and the US bombed Iran.
However, even in the run-up the UK had been dragging its feet about signing up to the French plans, partly because Israel is yet to agree a lasting ceasefire and partly because diplomats felt an announcement could lack impact if done prematurely. It could also annoy the Americans, something Starmer has been keen not to do.
But Macron insisted joint recognition of the state of Palestine was “the only path to peace” and “the only way to build peace and stability for all in the whole region”, putting the idea firmly back on the table for when official talks start in earnest on Wednesday.
The French leader, accompanied by wife Brigitte, also warned that the UK and France have “excessive dependencies” on both the US and China, who both have a disregard for free trade. In the week Trump sent out more stern letters on tariffs, Macron has a point.
“We have no other choice if we want to be lucid, to build a sustainable future for our children, to de-risk our economies and our societies from this dual dependency. We want an open world. We want to co-operate but not depend,” he said.
He also earned himself laughter by sarcastically joking that he has “great memories” of the difficult Brexit negotiations. It’s not a gag a French leader could have made to a British audience even 18 months ago.
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The hardman of Brexit didn’t let up there, urging Britain and the European Union to strike a full youth mobility scheme. “Let’s allow our students to have the same opportunities as the ones we had,” he urged. Starmer’s Government has been publicly reluctant to sign up to this too, given the likely impact on overall migration numbers.
It’s also still unclear whether an announcement on Starmer’s coveted one-in-one-out deal on illegal migrants will be settled during this visit. It would allow Britain to return small boat migrants to France in exchange for accepting asylum seekers with a family connection in the UK.
On Tuesday Macron simply said the two sides would agree action on migration that delivers “tangible results” to “fix today what is a burden for our two countries”. But he also said the root of the issue must be tackled at the European level, to counter pull factors.
A ripple of applause greeted the news that the Bayeux Tapestry would be installed at the British Museum next year. Clearly all present were recalling fondly – perhaps with rose-tinted spectacles – their own school trips: happy days on the vomit-inducing ferry to Normandy, baguette au jambon et fromage followed by a stern lesson in losing control of your country to a foreign invader via the medium of embroidery.
In return the French will be loaned the Sutton Hoo Anglo-Saxon burial treasure hoard. Macron had clearly practised hard with the “h” in Hoo. His charm triumphed.
He acknowledged a standing ovation with a hand on his heart. He’d won them over and he knew it.
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