04/05/2017 100 Days+

Hello and welcome to this special edition of 100 Days+. Conservatives

in America are Trinder this day for seven years. Yes, Republicans will

shortly vote to repeal Obamacare. We still don't know what will be in the

new package. Donald Trump could be a step closer to fulfilling a big

campaign promise but it is only step. The Duke of Edinburgh will

retire from public duties this autumn. At 95, it is a well earned

break. Here in France, voters are three days away from picking their

new president. Marine Le Pen and Emmanuel Macron make their final

pitch to voters the day after a heated debate. And we have an

amazing story of survival. The server who clung to his board for 30

hours speech to the BBC. I turned -- they turned around.

And then they saved my life. Hello, I'm Christian Fraser in

Paris. Katty Kay is in Washington. There are important stories on both

sides of the Atlantic. Very shortly, we will turn to the heated debate

last night and television between Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen.

We will talk to guests in Paris as well. Before that, let's focus on

Washington. In the next few minutes we will have breaking news as

Republicans start to vote on repealing and replacing Obamacare.

Yes, the House of Representatives will start that vote shortly. There

seems to have been some glitch. We expected it in the last few hours.

It is a vote on President Obama's most important legacy. President

Trump promised to get rid of it. In the end of those members of Congress

are taking a vote, not knowing how much the replacement bill would cost

are many Americans will lose their health insurance.

Here is a Democrat and Republican. Any health-care bill that came to

this floor should be about expanding coverage and lowering costs. We want

to work with you on that. Instead, you bring a bill that will rip out

care away from tens of millions of people. How can you do this to the

American people? How can you do this to your constituents? This is a

terrible, terrible bill. You should vote no.

If we want to talk about misleading the American people, it started

seven years ago and it ends today. The American people deserve better.

They have been thrown under the bus seven years.

President Trump has tweeted about this process, accusing Democrats

effectively doing some scaremongering. He said insurance

companies are fleeing Obamacare. It is dead. Our health care plan will

lower premiums and the great health care acclamation Mark One of the

things Democrats don't like about the plan... Somebody with stage four

cancer could now pay $132,000 more per year. If you have congestive

heart failure you could pay $18,000 more. And you could face an extra

$17,000 per year if you happen to get pregnant. For more on the

significance of this vote, we are joined by Jon Sopel. It is pretty

extraordinary that we have Republicans and Democrats taking a

vote on a bill that many of them have not actually even read? It is

extraordinary. You can't believe it is a ledger to -- legislative

process. There is a congressional budget office. That is the body that

marks the homework, if you like, of Congress. They look at what is being

proposed. They are independent, bipartisan. And their job is to work

out what the cost would be, how many people will be affected, adversely

or positively. They haven't done that with this bill. So they are

flying blind. They are saying to the captain, we want to go here but we

don't have a map. In the meantime you have lots of outside groups.

Nobody likes a vacuum in politics. They are coming in with their own

numbers. It looks like certain people will end up paying more and

some people could stop getting insurance. How much of a concern

with this B2 Republicans? There is always that thing in politics, what

is the difference between short-term tactics and long-term strategy?

Short-term tactics, the Republicans will get great headlines. Paul Ryan

will get a big boost if the vote goes through, as we expected well.

Otherwise it would be a catastrophe. It will be good for Donald Trump,

short-term. But longer term, if you are going to create a class of

losers, look at the impact that had for Barack Obama when he introduced

Obamacare and suddenly people saw that there are deductibles had gone

massively up. It could go back -- come back to bite the Republicans in

the long-term in the most serious way.

This is the first step. It has to go through the House of

Representatives. It is only one step in the process.

The one thing it is worth reminding our viewers about is that this is

what they call gateway legislation. The Republicans are keen to get on

with it because it leads them onto another key campaign promise, tax

reform? Yes. Tax reform would be a very big

win. There are are all sorts of arguments, and I was with someone

this lunchtime who has been involved in the details, saying, that is what

they should have started with. But the Republicans felt health care was

something they had been promising for more than seven years from the

moment Obamacare had been introduced. Now if they can get

health care reform, then maybe that will embolden them to go on to tax

reform. But we still don't know what the costs are going to be of the

reform measure that will be introduced. You can't go on to tax

reform until you have worked out your budget and how much you have

got to spend. There is still so much that is unknown. Anyone who says it

is clear what the sequencing for legislation is going to be, health

care, tax reform and the infrastructure programme, I don't

think we know yet. Here is a question. What do lawsuits

and eggs they both made it into the French election campaign today.

Marine Le Pen was out campaigning and had eggs thrown at her

entourage. She avoided a direct hit back. She didn't, however, avoid a

lawsuit. Emmanuel Macron filed one against. Kristian, what is going on?

It is quite interesting. There is a lot of focus about the involvement

of the Russians after what happened in the United States. So scared they

of some interference by the Russians, they changed their within

the Emmanuel Macron campaign. Yesterday there were rumours of

paper is coming out which apparently, allegedly, showed that

Mr Macron had an offshore bank account in the Bahamas. It was fake

news. Part of the cyber warfare attack we have seen in other

elections. Today he has filed a lawsuit, effectively a defamation

claim. He doesn't name anybody. It is basically against X. It is an

example of just how tense things have been getting. Three days

remaining. Marine Le Pen and Emmanuel Macron back on the campaign

trail. She has gone to the north. Emmanuel Macron has gone to the

south. It certainly suggest the last three

days will not be particularly easy going for either candidate. Today's

events follow the debate last night. There were a lot of insults. Marine

Le Pen accused her rival of being out of date. He accused her of

spreading lies and fear. He went into the television debate a

long way ahead in the polls, 20% ahead. It looks as though he did not

drop the ball. When you look at how people thought of the debate he came

out clearly on top. 63% of respondentss rated him as the

winner. 34% picking Marine Le Pen. It was a heated debate.

Here are some of the key moments. TRANSLATION: Mr Macron is the

candidate of savage globalisation, economic uncertainty, social

brutality, have every man for himself.

You say globalisation is too hard. So is Europe. Let's shut our

borders. Let others succeed, not's. You have been the Minister of the

economy, an adviser to the president. Why didn't you apply at

the time? Your strategy has been the same for

decades. What is it? Making many lies and saying everything is --

doesn't work for the country. It does work.

Tax hasn't gone down. The safety of our people, the fight against terror

and Islamic extremism -- extremism, you don't want to take it on. I know

why. We need to close our borders straightaway, immediately. That is

what I do the moment I take power. That achieves nothing. There are

many countries outside Schengen that have been hit as hard as us by

terrorist attacks. Since 2015, we put back border controls to fight

terrorism. The Emmanuel Macron camping good

humour three days out. Let's steep -- speaks to Sophie MacLachlan, one

of their fundraisers. How did you get involved in the movement, on

March? I have a very small company. I am the only employee. I have been

very worried now for a? Years because our politicians, left and

right, have not been doing much these last 30 years. I have never

voted before. I voted for the first time in my life for Emmanuel Macron.

I joined the campaign through some friends a year ago and I have been

working with a fundraising team. I am a volunteer. I worked two days a

week. It has been a challenge. We started a year ago with few members.

We are now 250,000. And we have over 40,000 contributors. There is a very

interesting story about this. It is a party that has got up and running

in EU and it is in the second round of the presidential election. It is

down to 39-year-old Emmanuel Macron. But there has been a lot of

fundraising going on in the background. You hired someone from

-- that President Obama had used? Absolutely. We hired the same person

he used for his campaign. Where you are attracted by something they had

done? We liked what they had proposed. We went to grass --

grassroots movements. Bottom up information. They proposed

door-to-door, very new for French people. We not done more than

100,000 doors. We got a lot of very interesting information which we

used afterwards to create the programme. Or at least part of the

programme. When you talk about the failure of Hillary Clinton's

campaign in America, one of the things she forgot to do,

particularly in Wisconsin, Florida etc, she forgot to get out on the

ground and meet the voters. You have been doing that? We have. The

campaign for the fundraising is similar to Bernie Sanders. We

appealed to our members by e-mail, by social media, to help with

whatever money they could, so we get donations from 1 euro to 7500, which

is the maximum authorised in France because our fundraising rules are

extremely strict. No companies are allowed to give any money, only

people like you and I. Let's presume he wins on Sunday. The polls say he

will. Let's presume he does. He will then need a parliament. There are

very important elections in June for a new party such as yours. He is

going to field more than 500 candidates. Half of them have never

worked in politics. Where will you find them? Is not exactly half. It

is one third were never worked in politics. We trained them. The rest

of it is people who have been elected but not with a political

party. We are talking about mayors of small cities that were not right

or left. They just got elected. Some of these people will be joining.

Most importantly, half of the candidates are women. That is very

new. It is legal in France. We have to have half the candidates as

women. Other parties put these women in zones that were not winnable. In

our case the women will be in zones where we can win. Sounds

interesting. Thank you. They will try to revamp the parliament in

France. Emmanuel Macron is saying that not only are half the people

going to be new, but they will only be able to do a certain at a time in

Parliament as well. It's interesting, isn't it? He does

seem to have the wind in his sales, the opinion poll we talked about.

And President Obama stepping in and adore sing him. I don't know if that

helps. It didn't help Brexit very much, did it?

That is an interesting point. When you look at the opposition to the

transatlantic trade deal at the moment, a lot of the opposition in

Europe is actually here in France. And a lot of it is in support of

Marine Le Pen and the far left. I'm sure there will be plenty of people

like Sophie, who welcomed President Obama's involvement today, but a lot

of people will say that you're open globalisation view of France is not

what we want. They will not welcome it.

Let's get back to the vote taking place on health care in the House of

Representatives. It is under way. I am joined by Eric Kanter, a

Republican from Virginia. How important is it to President Trump

that this vote passes? This is a really important vote, fresher. What

this vote of those is a private -- provides the pathway for overall

health care reform, which was one of the major promises by Donald Trump

in his presidential campaign. Repealing, replacing Obamacare has

been a consistent team in election cycle after election cycle for

Republicans. You are no longer in office. You can speak with a certain

amount of candour. Isn't it a responsible for members of Congress

to be voting on a bill that they don't know exactly what is in it?

They don't know how much it'll cost and they don't know what it will to

health care premiums. I don't think that business is fairly accurate.

Because what happens typically in this process is the Congressional

budget office scores the base bill. We have had that score. We have had

that for some time. But the previous version of the bill? If you look at

the amendments that have been offered, they have been offered with

certain dollar amounts. We know the additional spending over the period

was amounting to little over 20 billion. The latest amendment was an

$8 billion amendment that they proffered and adopted yesterday. It

is not quite accurate to say they are Ant budget projections. I think

numbers -- members also know this is the first step in a process. This

bill will go to the Senate and will likely be changed in significant

ways. There may be counting on the Senate to change it. If it comes to

a member of Congress who is a Republican in a moderate district,

who is up for re-election, how much of a problem could voting for this

bill cause them? In the end what matters most is what the product is.

Once this measure works his way through the process and is finally

voted on, and goes on to the president for signature, it depends

what is in that law. Clearly there is an understanding on both sides

that Obamacare is in a death spiral. We have just heard yesterday and

other major insurer has pulled out of yet another state. My state in

particular, Virginia. And what we are seeing is people are not going

to have any choices for health care coverage, the way that it was

promised when the Obamacare legislation was first passed. This

would be an improvement. The vote has now passed. The Republicans do

have the vote. They have the numbers. 216 Republicans have voted

for the bill, 19 against. Donald Trump has got his win. A big moment

for him. It is a big moment. An initial step in a process. The bill

will then go to the Senate. The work will begin there.

Just listening to this, standing in a country where they have one of the

best health care services in the world, they have a high number of

doctors, they spend, comparative to America, and awful lot less per

person, a lot less of their GDP. There will be people in Europe

saying, why is it so difficult for America to find the ideal health

care system? We in America, as you know, have a

different health care system. We believe in the private sector. Our

health care is largely run with competitive forces in the private

sector, with the introduction of Obamacare about seven years ago, it

took a turn towards much more government involvement. And so this

hybrid system that resulted from Obamacare, I think, will be

corrected. There will be a large participation by the government.

Obviously are a senior health care programme is the largest health care

programme. Add the indigent programme of Medicaid and you still

have the government being the largest pay for health care. People

want a choice. They don't want the government to impose it upon them.

That is the thrust behind the kind of repeal and replace reform that we

are seeing undertaken in Congress right now.

OK, thank you very much. We are seeing it happen right now.

Republicans they want to pray that this bill doesn't hurt their chances

of getting re-elected. They may want to start praying today. In America

it is national day of prayer. In the White House, it was marked with

Christian music. # Our father, who art in heaven.

# Hallowed be thy name. # Thy kingdom come, I will be done.

-- thy will be done. That was the scene in the rose garden earlier

today. President Trump then signed an executive order allowing churches

to be more political. The president said he will not allow people of

faith to be bullied any more. I should point out that that executive

order that he has signed is already facing legal contest from the

American civil Liberties Union. They say the actions today are a

broadside to the country's long-standing commitment to the

separation between church and state. They are referring to the sixth

Amendment of the American Constitution, which says you have to

have separation. I have a six lane carriageway behind

me. Was that as bad as it sounded?! Worse? I can tell by your laughter

it was worse! It was quite odd. It was a strange scene. Move on,

quickly! Let's go from France to Buckingham

Palace. The Duke of Edinburgh will stop carrying out public engagements

this autumn. Prince Philip, 96 next month, made the decision himself

with the full support of the Queen. The Queen will continue with a full

programme of official engagements. Peter Hunt is in London. Peter, I

would imagine there is broad support for Prince Philip on this? He's five

years old. He deserves a rest? Yes, on this global programme, can

viewers think of anybody else at the age of 95, 96, who is on the global

stage and still functioning in the way that he has done until now? In

one way it is not that much of a surprise. In the UK, people

generally retire in their 60s. He is doing it in his 90s. It was

something he highlighted in an interview with the BBC for his 90th

birthday. He said he had gone past its sell by date. It has taken in

six years to act on his own advice because, in part, there has been a

lot going on for the royal family. The Queen became the longest bring

-- serving monarch in British history. She celebrated her Diamond

Jubilee and her 90th birthday. At the start of this year he finally

felt he could act on what he said all those years ago and start to

withdraw from public life. Good for him. I'm 52 and I feel like I could

do with a rest. The Queen will not be giving up her duties and will be

taking on more commitments? I'm not sure she will be taking on more

commitments. She will not give up any offer duties. The reality of the

age of being a 90-year-old elected head of state in the United Kingdom

and 15 other countries means she has started to do less. Investitures.

Ceremonies in London and in Windsor where people in public life are

awarded knighthoods, that involves standing for about one hour. She is

doing fewer of those and giving them onto other royals, like Prince

William, Prince Charles and Princess Ann. She, in a statement, welcomed

what Prince Philip was doing. But I think privately she will feel a

sense of loss, really. Obviously she -- he is still in her life. But in

terms of public performances, not having him there would be quite

striking for her. What is noticeable when you see them together is how he

helps to lighten the mood. I saw him when he was slightly younger,

lifting people over crash barriers so they could meet the Queen. And

he, crucially, we are talking about a British royal family in a very

good place at the moment, that wasn't always the case. The house of

Windsor in the 1980s and 1990s had terrible problems, not least the

public and painful collapse of the marriage of Princess Diana and

Prince Charles. Then we had her death. The worst week in the Queen's

rain. Everybody around the couple say Prince Philip 's advice always

got better the worse the problem was.

I have to tell you both ably quick story. When I was Paris

correspondent here a couple of years ago I was invited to the state

dinner the Queen attended. And afterwards, on the terrace at the

back of the lycee Terrace -- Palace, President Hollande mingled with

journalists. The Queen was still there. He didn't speak very good

English but he did get across that they come here to the Arc de

Triomphe to look at the flame of the unknown soldier. He said there were

more crowds for her than there were for his inauguration. What he was

incredulous about was the stamina of the woman. The Queen was just

extraordinary, he said. She was still on the terrace in the evening.

It is exhausting work? Yes. The our we commented on him stepping down.

We're making clear that she is not. She does public engagement and we

will be seeing her continue to do that at this age of 91 when, as is

obvious to people watching, plenty of people far younger have retired

and put on the slippers. That is not something the Queen will be doing

any time soon. Peter Hunt, thank you. This is also

getting a lot of attention in the United States. The royal family

still very popular, despite our little misunderstanding a couple of

hundred years ago, with Americans. They watch and follow Royal Avenue

is consistently. And the news that Prince Philip was stepping down was

headline news all day. You are watching 100 Days+ from BBC News.

Still to come reviewers on the BBC News Channel and BBC World News, the

amazing story of the surfer who survived more than 30 hours clinging

to his board in the Irish Sea. He thought he wouldn't be found

alive. And from Paris, I will be looking at the economics in France

and how employment or unemployment plays into Sunday's election.

Good evening. A lovely day for a large part of the United Kingdom.

Plenty of sunshine. This is the view at mid-afternoon in the Highlands of

Scotland. It wasn't sunny for all. Mid-afternoon in the south-west of

London. Lots of clothes but little rain. It was quite cloudy for many

Southern counties, parts of south Wales as well. Thickening cloud

pushing its way in on the breeze from the North Sea may bring the odd

spot of rain. That will be in the south-east and East Anglia. Clear

skies further north. A chilly night. No major problems in towns and

cities. Five to 7 degrees. In rural parts of northern inland and

northern Scotland we will see a touch of frost. A chilly start for

some. It could be grey around the north and north-east of Scotland.

Elsewhere, a lovely start with plenty of sunshine. And there is a

good deal of sunshine to be had in Northern Ireland. Most of northern

England as well. Wales, the Midlands, across to East Anglia, a

lovely start to the day. Always breezy and cooled and North Sea

coast. Breezy along the south coast as well. That is where we will see

most of the cloud. The southernmost counties in particular seem that

lead. That cloud will be there or thereabouts as you go through the

day. Quite breezy. A dry day pretty much everywhere. Spells of sunshine

for Wales, much of the Midlands and the northern half of the UK

generally. Still cool. Head further west and inland, temperatures up to

18 degrees. Quite a warm day. Through the evening, there may be a

few spots of rain in the Midlands. Rain getting into Cornwall as well.

This weather front in the south-west will not amount to much. Rainfall

will not be widespread on Saturday. It is confined to the strath

south-west of England. It may skirt its way along South Coast later.

Most places will be dry as well. The odd shower possible for the North.

The western side of Scotland doing well, 17 or 18 degrees. This week

weather front drift away to was the near continent in the second part of

the weekend. The winds fall much lighter across most parts of the UK.

Stella breeze and Sea coast. Head further west, temperatures should be

higher. These guys will be brighter as well.

-- the skies. Members of the US House of

Representatives have voted to repeal People in this country, they want to

have a choice. They don't want to have a government impose upon them

the kind of health care they need their families.

The French Presidential candidate Emmanuel Macron has filed a lawsuit

after his nationalist rival Marine Le Pen alluded

to an alleged offshore account during Wednesday's debate.

Returning now to the French Presidential election.

As Marine Le Pen and Emanuel Macron make their final arguments

to the voters, economic issues have taken centre stage.

Compared to Germany, France's economic performance has

fallen behind, and youth unemployment is

one in four Young adults unemployed and a lot of talk last night about

the economics and also about tax affairs as well. We are going to

speak to an economist who is with us.

With me now is Eric Chaney, economic advise to the Institute Montaigne.

He has just arrived this minute so he's going to step into the picture!

He is taking off his scarf! Sorry to drag you straight onto camera! Tell

us a bit about last night's debate. A lot of talk yesterday about

unemployment, which is of course a key issue, and particularly in the

areas of the north of the country where Marine Le Pen has done so

well. Which of the candidates do you think has the answer? There is only

doubt the only candidate has an answer about the labour market is

Macron. Because he has reforms. Whether these are the best one could

imagine, I'm not totally sure, but she has absolutely nothing. She

doesn't want to change anything. She just wants to close the borders,

like the US did in 1930, and she tries to tell people, if we close

the borders everything will be fine. We will get jobs. But there is no

change whatsoever in the labour market. How can you reduce

unemployment if you don't change things? You from the business world

and of course you are in favour of a Emmanuel Macron, but many Le Pen

supporters will say, what has globalisation really done for us?

What has the EU really done? It's taken away our factories and jobs

and brought us nothing. We have exactly the same debate in the US,

France, the UK. Not in Germany, by the way, where they are happy with

globalisation. France is a small economy in a big world. If France

cannot export and it has to import, it will be even poorer. And that is

the answer that is not that easy to tell people. Not really because of

China but because of the incredible technological changes we are seeing.

So if you tell these people, we need to export, if you put barriers on

imports, there will be barriers for exports, and then it will be very

hard to hear that, but it's the truth. What they need to do is cut

spending. It's the highest government spending in the world.

You spend far too much money on the public sector. That's absolutely

right. 56% of the French GDP is made of public spending, of which half is

for the government and half is for the welfare state, so unemployment,

pensions and health care. This is too much. It was probably a bit

ambitious to want to cut it to 50%. Macron wants to cut it to 53, 50

four. Still very high. France is more likely to drift towards a

Swedish Danish model rather than the UK or US because there is this

welfare state and people want to keep it, so you have to streamline

the welfare state but not get it aggressively. This would not be

accepted by the population. Thank you very much indeed for your

thoughts. A lot of focus on Emmanuel Macron if he does win this election

on Sunday and the sorts of reforms he can put in place.

Yes. Interesting. We mentioned this before.

Three days before the election and Emmanuel Macron has

Barack Obama made a video which the centrist candidate

I'm not planning to get involved in many elections now that I don't

But the French election is very important to the future of France

and the values that we care so much about.

Because the success of France matters to the entire world.

I also want you to know that I am supporting Emmanuel Macron

Barack Obama there! Didn't work for him very well! I have done so poor

in the studio. I know you are itching to talk about Barack Obama!

-- Jon Sopel. This is not great. He intervened very strongly in the

Brexit debate, didn't turn out so well! But fascinating scenes at the

House of Representatives. Big win for Donald Trump. But they also

started singing the song from the end of the 1960s... No. "Goodbye".

The Republicans saying goodbye to Obamacare. Not yet. They then filed

out and there were buses waiting to take them for high fives at the

White House in the rose garden, and as they came down the steps, childs

of "Shame, shame" from Democrats, so this fight is not over. -- chancing

of "Shame". People will be thinking, if this is going to affect me, and

also a lot of pressure then on senators to say, do you really want

to back this? Where does your gut go with this vote now that the

president has had a winner on, with which of the song they were singing

from which every decade, does Obamacare get repealed? Finally. Is

that it? Trumpcare has passed the first hurdle. It now exists. I think

the president will be using all his considerable muscle to try to get

senators on board, to do deals that will make further amendments if

necessary to get the Senate support, and maybe it will. Christian, do

members of Parliament sing songs from the 1960s when bills are

passed? LAUGHTER

He's been stunned into silence! I think we've lost Christian in

Palace. You can -- in Paris. There has been other news going on around

the world, not necessarily in US or here in Europe.

University students in Venezuela will lead a fresh round of marches

against President Nicolas Maduro Thursday.

It comes a day after police fired tear gas and protesters hurled

Molotov cocktails in rallies against the President's plan

More than 300 people were reported to have been injured in the clashes.

Russia, Turkey and Iran have signed an agreement to establish four

The proposals drawn up by Moscow were agreed at peace

It comes as an air strike near Damascus.

Representatives of the Syrian armed opposition walked out of the talks,

saying they could not accept the plan.

Under the agreement, Syrian and Russian warplanes

would stop their bombing and opposition groups

Now for an update to a story we brought you earlier this week.

When Matthew Bryce went out surfing on Sunday,

he had no idea that his trip would soon turn into

But after spending more than 30 hours stranded at sea

clinging to his board, he was found and taken to hospital.

Matthew and his family have been talking exclusively

By the night it wasn't just my shoulders. All my limbs were numb.

Matthew Bryce is exhausted, sunburnt and still recovering

from more than 30 hours spent drifting alone in the Irish Sea.

I would say that's probably a yellow surfboard so that

This picture was taken on Westport beach in Scotland on Sunday,

and Matthew believes it shows him at the start of a day's surfing

before strong winds and tides pulled him far out into the water.

The current changes and I can't do anything, and all this time

the wind's pushing me further and further and further out.

He ended up clinging to his surfboard in the Irish Sea

throughout Sunday night and all of Monday, before

he was eventually found closer to Northern Ireland than Scotland 13

miles from the beach he left, found just as the sun was setting

I was pretty certain that I was going

So I was watching the sun set, I had pretty much made peace with all,

And the helicopter flew right over, so I jumped off the board

and I lifted the board up and I started waving

And they flew right over me, I thought they'd missed me.

This is the moment he was rescued from the water, and his family

could finally be told that he was alive.

You have this elation, and then 20 minutes later

And until we got that phone call from Matthew,

The search teams have apparently recovered your surfboard as well.

Are you looking forward to being reunited with your surfboard?

Erm...I think we'll find a good use for it.

And his family are likely to make him keep that pledge.

Chris Buckler, BBC News, at the Ulster Hospital in Belfast.

What an extraordinary story. You know, I've taken the same pledge. I

got stuck in a riptide windsurfing and I thought I was going to be in

France the next day! There's nothing you can do about it once the sea

gets hold of you. I tried it once and it was like being in a washing

machine! That's one lucky surfer and one lucky mum, too! What you rate

the chances of Marine Le Pen turning this thing around in the next couple

of days, then? There a weird thing in France where everybody leaves the

weekend -- leaves the cities and goes to the beaches over the

weekend. Her only chance is a big abstention rate like that. And

particularly on the left. I was talking to one of them on the way to

the broadcast tonight and he said, I just don't know what to do at the

weekend. Do I vote for Macron or just spoil my vote? And that's the

dilemma many are facing on the left at the moment. So never say never,

but I really think she's up against it. Christian will be in Paris for

the rest of the vote and he will bring us the elections and the

results as soon as they come in. In the meantime, we will see you back

here on 100 Days+ next Monday. Join us then and Christian can give us

the results. From Christian in Paris and me in Washington, thank you for

joining us.