Joly wants Jewish and Muslim holiday

GREEN presidential candidate Eva Joly has called for equal treatment for religions and that Yom Kippur - the Jewish day of atonement - and Eid, the Muslim holiday that ends Ramadan, be made into national holidays.

She said "each religion deserves equal treatment in public life" and added that equality was a "key element of the French national identity" and it had been "battered by five years of the Sarkozy presidency".

"When I listen to Claude Guéant and Marine Le Pen I fear for my France; I fear for our France."

Her call for new national holidays comes as a survey said French working hours were the lowest in Europe apart from Finland. The study by the COE-Rexecode economic think-tank said full-time workers in France worked 1,679 hours in 2010 - 224 hours less than in Germany and 177 less than the UK. It said that the French experiment with the 35-hour working week had failed.

However, figures from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development say French workers worked an average of 1,562 hours in 2010 - more than the Germans on 1,419 but less than the British on 1,647.

Photo: Eva Joly 2012