My mission is to put France back on its feet. The priority is employment. Efforts have to be made, but those efforts must be made fairly.

In an election, one needs both hope and audacity.

I think that France has not made it clear enough recently to our German friends how important it is to introduce euro bonds as a tool against speculation. And how the necessary budget discipline needs to be accompanied by growth.

I don't want to drive the markets crazy. I don't want to create trouble, but rather order and rules and norms. We have to struggle against financial excesses, those who speculate with sovereign debt, those who develop financial products which have done so much harm.

What the French want is coherence, stability and justice. If I am in a favorable position today, it's because my fellow citizens want to make the effort to straighten out the country, and at the same time they want it to be just and equitable.

What is at stake is preserving our relations with the United States. They should not be changed because of what has happened. But trust has to be restored and reinforced.

That is now my mission: to provide a European vision of growth, employment, prosperity - in one word, our future.