Arnaud Montebourg

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Arnaud Montebourg (born October 30, 1962, in Clamecy, Nièvre) is a French politician, and a deputy to the French National Assembly for the Socialist Party.

He used to be one of the founding members of the political current known as the Nouveau Parti Socialist (New Socialist Party). He left this current to create a new movement within the socialist party called "Rénover, Maintenant" ("Renewal Now"), and continues to call for significant constitutional change in France, leading to the founding of a Sixth Republic. He is one of the leading critics of President Jacques Chirac's immunity from prosecution, especially concerning the corruption scandals in the Paris region. Montebourg also supported reporter Denis Robert for his role in revealing the illegal system of double-accounts maintained by Clearstream, a clearing-house based in Luxembourg.

He has been engaged in a campaign against the rules governing taxation of foreign nationals and banking secrecy of Switzerland.[1]

He was appointed as spokesman of the Presidential campaign of Ségolène Royal following his support for her candidacy during the Socialist Party primary election of November 2006. On January 18 2007, Royal suspended Montebourg from her campaign for one month after he appeared on a Canal+ talk show the previous night and stated "Ségolène Royal has only one fault, her partner."[2] He was referring to the contradictory statements made by Royal's partner, François Hollande who is also leader of the Socialist Party, with regards to tax policy. Montebourg had offered his resignation, which Royal refused to accept.