- Hervé Morin
Infobox Politician
name = Hervé Morin
imagesize = 200px
birth_date = birth date and age|1961|08|17
birth_place =Pont-Audemer ,France
office = Minister of Defence
term_start =18 May 2007
term_end = present
primeminister =François Fillon
predecessor =Michèle Alliot-Marie
successor = Incumbent
party = UDF,New Centre Hervé Morin (born
17 August ,1961 inPont-Audemer ,Eure ,Normandy ) is a French Norman politician and the French Minister of Defence.Member of National Assembly
He was elected as a deputy in the French National Assembly on
June 16 2002 , in the 3rd constituency ofEure , Normandy. He was the president of the group UDF in the National Assembly. After the UDF's candidate for the 2007 presidential election,François Bayrou , didn't make it to the 2nd round, he hinted that he attempted to create an alliance with the Socialist Party and decided to found a new political party: the "Democratic Movement" (or MoDem). Consequently, Morin, who is of the center-right and an ally of the presidential election's winner,Nicolas Sarkozy , made it an organisation within the presidential majority in the National Assembly. It is now calledNew Centre .After the creation of the UMP, he took the presidency of the UDF group at the National Assembly, from 2002 to 2007. He is now a deputy for the
New Centre as well as its leader.A series of controversial policy decisions - including the use of military resources to rescue injured animals - have led some in the French media to dub him "Colonel Plouc" [ [http://www.lemonde.fr/cgi-bin/ACHATS/acheter.cgi?offre=ARCHIVES&type_item=ART_ARCH_30J&objet_id=1052200] ] , which roughly translates as "Colonel Bumpkin". He has, however, been strongly defended by animal rights groups.
Personal life
He is married to Catherine Broussot-Morin, a lawyer with whom he has two 12-year-old twin sons.
His political role models are
Charles de Gaulle andPierre Mendès-France .All his grandparents were Norman farmers (his maternal grandfather, André Cardine, was also the mayor of
Fatouville-Grestain for 30 years) and he wanted to take over the family farm when he was younger but his father, owner of a masonry firm, opposed it so he pursued studies first inCaen and then in Paris instead.Hervé Morin is the supporter of the reunification of both Normandies (a cause for which he created an association in 2000), a pledge he made on
26 November 2006 inÉpaignes , the city where he grew up and of which he had been the mayor since 1995.External links
* [http://www.assemblee-nationale.fr/12/tribun/fiches_id/2236.asp Parliamentary page]
* [http://www.herve-morin.net/ Hervé Morin's official site]
* [http://blog.herve-morin.net/ Hervé Morin's blog]
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