“Fires on Marseille’s doorstep,” is the headline in this morning’s edition of local paper La Marseillaise. The paper notes that an 8km arc of fire spread from the eastern suburbs right down to the south of the city. La Provence’s headline is “The Great Fear”. It explains how military test fire by the French Foreign legion in a nearby army camp sparked the blaze. Overnight, some 500 people were evacuated from their homes. Well over a thousand hectares of scrub and forest have been affected with warm winds helping the fires to spread. Comments left on the paper’s website are highly critical of the military. Some are already calling for sanctions, saying their behaviour was irresponsible, especially in current weather conditions.

Libération is covering a new carbon tax being introduced by a reflection group on Climate and Energy headed up by former Socialist Prime Minister, Michel Rocard. He will issue a report to the government next week. Everything that pollutes and contributes to CO2 emissions should be taxed, it advises. In concrete terms, this would lead to a€32 euros in tax for every tonne of CO2 emitted. This means the French would pay 7c more per litre of petrol. Half of French households would end up paying some €300 in extra taxes per year. According to Rocard, the French are heavily taxed already for petrol and partly because of this they use three times less petrol than Americans. He hopes it will soon be the same for CO2. The French communist paper, l’Humanité is more cynical about the move, calling it a ‘camouflage tax’ that is essentially using the environment as an excuse to levy more taxes on the French.

Le Figaro covers the ongoing trials and tribulations of the Socialist Party. Martine Aubry has been heavily attacked by many in the party in the past couple of weeks and this morning, the paper says, she is due to speak on French radio to defend her leadership of a broken Socialist Party. Those in her inner circle say despite all the criticisms - especially following the party’s disastrous result in the European elections (16.5%) - no one has called for her departure. Yet, the paper asks, can she continue to lead a party which is tearing itself asunder daily in public? Just yesterday, the president of the Lorraine region in Eastern France called for an extraordinary congress to put an end to the tragic farce that is playing itself out. Particularly notable last week was the exchange of open letters between Aubry and the up-and-coming Arnaud Montebourg who is being compared by some to Tony Blair – a young, modernising force in the party who is not however altogether faithful to socialist principles. She called for him to “stop his criticism of the party or leave”. Since then, Paris mayor, Betrand Delanoë, has come out in support of Aubry. Even her arch-nemesis Ségolène Royal said that solidiarity is needed and Aubry must be supported.

To finish, there’s an article in l’Equipe about Sarkozy congratulating the Schleck brothers. The Luxembourgish pair is rising through the ranks of the Tour de France. Frank Schleck won the 17th stage yesterday. His brother, Andy Shleck, came third behind Alberto Condator. This means that the two brothers are now ahead of Lance Armstrong and in the overall race, second and third place behind Contador who still leads by a considerable distance – 2 minutes, 26 seconds.