I must justify my opinion that the progress made towards a European consensus on free competition and on the limits of the role of political authorities in the economy is the result of a gradual rapprochement between Brussels and Paris, and not of the French falling into line on the most “liberal” ideas (see this column of yesterday). With his habitual, slightly ironic half-smile, Mario Monti said that the meeting had taken place… in Lille (geographically closer to Brussels than Paris,...