Two examples of support to British people in France

In this video, Sir Peter Ricketts discusses two very different examples of the work the British Embassy and Consulates are doing to support British people in France.

The Ambassador talks about the consular support offered after the shootings of Chevaline near Annecy. Sir Peter Ricketts also talks about the support provided by the Franco-British Chamber of Commerce in Caen to help British businesses develop their activities in the Normandie region.

Transcript:

After all the work and excitement over the Olympics and Paralympics in London, I thought I’d talk this week about 2 other rather different activities of the Embassy that I have been involved with.

First of all, was the terrible shootings in Annecy, that caught up a British family, and left 3 people dead and 2 young girls in desperate need of our support. We mobilised the whole Embassy in order to achieve that, to do two things really: first of all, to give consular help to the 2 little girls and family members, and we were able to rapatriate both girls. Now one is with a foster family, the other is still recovering in hospital, but both safely back in the UK.

We have also been helping the French police and judicial authorities with the investigation of this terrible crime to make sure that we can bring those responsible to justice as soon as possible. And that is going ahead in both France and the UK, we had large numbers of messages of support, sympathy and shock, and practical help which I’m very grateful.

The following week: different end of France. I was in Caen in Basse-Normandie to help the Franco-british Chamber of Commerce and Industry to recognise the arrival of a new office there, helping British businessmen and British exporters into the Normandy market.

It’s an area of course where we have had long, long historical ties, military, cultural, tourism in many other ways. We have a lot of British people there, in the tourism sector but also people working in high tech and for example in telecommunications. And the arrival of this new office of the FBCCI will be able to give them direct support.

So, two examples of the way that the Embassy is reaching out well beyond Paris to support British people in France.