By . Quentin Letts . PUBLISHED: . 07:52 EST, 31 January 2014 . | . UPDATED: . 08:32 EST, 1 February 2014 . After one of the great diplomatic custard pies of our age – an incident which makes Prince Philip look like Boutros Boutros-Ghali – the Franco-British summit repaired to an Oxfordshire pub. Barman, a pint of neat gin for my French pal, please. Just the one straw. The Swan at Swinbrook, pretty place, has appeared in Downton Abbey. President Francois Hollande was taken there and offered potted shrimps, a spot of trout and apple crumble for afters. Scroll down for video . Need a drink? M Hollande and Mr Cameron at an Oxfordshire pub yesterday . Not a bad Friday lunch. They even opened a bottle of French wine. Piat d’Or, presumably. But . it might as well have been Chateau Sarsons Vinegar 2014. For a terrible . deed  had been done. Minutes earlier those vilipendious vipers of ze . British press had done it again. Chiens! Roquets! They had raised the unmentionable. They had contravened  the . carefully constructed, Scotchgarded, bullet-proofed niceties of . presidential etiquette. They had asked about – zut, eek, aiee – le legeauver. The . scene of the crime was a hangar at RAF Brize Norton, where M Hollande . and his intimates (that is, his advisers – for goodness’ sake, you’re as . bad as the rest of us) had arrived after breakfast. French President Francois Hollande was seen running out of the pub where he met David Cameron for lunch . The Frenchman appeared to want a quick getaway after a day which saw him clash with Mr Cameron on Europe and face tricky questions about his love life . Their . dinky little executive jet had dropped through the misty heavens and a . great-coated David Cameron was on hand as the doors opened. He’d make a . fair hotel commissionaire, young Cameron. Frisky . Francois emerged, smiling. Good grief. I hope the air hostess was all . right. Behind him was the customary French military bod with kepi and a . uniform adorned with scrambled-egg braid. He follows le President (nearly) wherever he goes and carries France’s nuclear-bomb codes in an impressive briefcase. Or . at least that is what we are always told. I suppose it may simply . contain some sandwiches to keep the fellow going until elevenses. At . the sight of the president the splendid RAF band burst into the . Marseillaise. Should have given him a blast of the Can-Can, lads. More . his thing. Awkward: David Cameron and Francois Hollande tried to look relaxed at The Swan Inn barely an hour after they clashed over the need to reform the EU . After tense talks at the summit Prime Minister David Cameron took French President Francois Hollande to The Swan Inn at Swinbrook in Oxfordshire for lunch . Foreign . Secretary William Hague, Defence Secretary Philip Hammond, Energy . Secretary Ed Davey and Universities Minister David Willetts were in the . welcome line. An RAF . officer was wearing the sort of white gloves favoured by snooker refs. He gave one of those salutes that judders for half a minute after it has . been made. Twangggg! The . summit was ostensibly about defence. Deals have been agreed on a . maritime anti-mine gizmo, a space programme, a drone project and . continued Franco-British military co-operation. One . of the prototype designs of the drone was in the hangar, as were lots . of French journos and the French foreign minister (who had trouble . keeping his eyes open during Mr Cameron’s little speech). The French press corps has proved supine during the scandal of President Hollande and his girlfriends. French President Francois Hollande refused to comment on whether his affair has made France an international joke . Double trouble: Mr Hollande refused to comment on his affair with actress Julie Gayet (right) or the status of former First Lady Valerie Trierweiler . The old ‘right to privacy’ gambit has been deployed – by a man who controls the codes to nuclear war! Has . anyone actually checked to see if his popsy is an enemy agent? Or do I . contravene the sensibilities of some Parisian Lord Justice Leveson if I . make that point? Some say . the president’s trouser-dropping is no business of we Brits. But here he . was, signing military communiques with our lot, in the process learning . some of our military secrets. None of our business? He . and Mr Cameron had been asked about EU treaty re-negotiations. M . Hollande, taller than Ronnie Corbett but not much, radiated nonchalance. Mentioning the Euro, he oozed superiority – he genuinely seemed to think we might covet that currency. In June 2010 Mr Cameron and wife Samantha hosted then-French President Nicolas Sarkozy and his wife Carla Bruni for lunch in 10 Downing Street . Tony and Cherie Blair welcomed French President Jacques Chirac and his wife Bernadette to Downing Street in 2004 . Previous pub diplomacy: Tony Blair sought to win over French president Jacques Chirac in 2000 with a pint in the County restaurant in the Labour PM's constituency in County Durham ahead of a summit in France . Then, . at 12.33pm, it happened. Up popped one of Fleet Street’s finest and . said: ‘Do you think your private life has made France an international . joke? 'Are you still having an affair with Julie Gayet and do you wish she was here?’ David . Cameron doodled, jolly, jolly hard. The French journos sucked in their . cheeks. A nation quivered. And Monsieur le Frisky, tapping his ballpoint . on his lectern, snapped that he most certainly did not intend to answer . zat feelthy question. As moments go, a bit of a bottom-clencher. But one to cherish. The mistress of President Francois . Hollande was yesterday nominated for a French Oscar – for playing a . sex-obsessed government aide. Julie . Gayet, 41, is in the running for a Cesar, the highest honour in French . cinema, for best supporting actress in Quai d’Orsay. The . comedy film is named after the Paris quay where France’s foreign . ministry is based and Miss Gayet plays a mini-skirted adviser who uses . her feminine charms to seduce powerful men. In . real life, the actress was having a passionate affair with the French . president, 59, while he was still living with girlfriend Valerie . Trierweiler. The two secret lovers regularly met in a flat close to the Elysee Palace.
French President challenged during press conference at RAF Brize Norton .
Hollande was asked if he is still having an affair with actress Julie Gayet .
Questioned if he wished she was with him at the Anglo-French summit .
SamCam left at home after David Cameron agreed no spouses at event .
By . Quentin Letts . PUBLISHED: . 07:52 EST, 31 January 2014 . | . UPDATED: . 08:32 EST, 1 February 2014 . After one of the great diplomatic custard pies of our age – an incident which makes Prince Philip look like Boutros Boutros-Ghali – the Franco-British summit repaired to an Oxfordshire pub. Barman, a pint of neat gin for my French pal, please. Just the one straw. The Swan at Swinbrook, pretty place, has appeared in Downton Abbey. President Francois Hollande was taken there and offered potted shrimps, a spot of trout and apple crumble for afters. Scroll down for video . Need a drink? M Hollande and Mr Cameron at an Oxfordshire pub yesterday . Not a bad Friday lunch. They even opened a bottle of French wine. Piat d’Or, presumably. But . it might as well have been Chateau Sarsons Vinegar 2014. For a terrible . deed  had been done. Minutes earlier those vilipendious vipers of ze . British press had done it again. Chiens! Roquets! They had raised the unmentionable. They had contravened  the . carefully constructed, Scotchgarded, bullet-proofed niceties of . presidential etiquette. They had asked about – zut, eek, aiee – le legeauver. The . scene of the crime was a hangar at RAF Brize Norton, where M Hollande . and his intimates (that is, his advisers – for goodness’ sake, you’re as . bad as the rest of us) had arrived after breakfast. French President Francois Hollande was seen running out of the pub where he met David Cameron for lunch . The Frenchman appeared to want a quick getaway after a day which saw him clash with Mr Cameron on Europe and face tricky questions about his love life . Their . dinky little executive jet had dropped through the misty heavens and a . great-coated David Cameron was on hand as the doors opened. He’d make a . fair hotel commissionaire, young Cameron. Frisky . Francois emerged, smiling. Good grief. I hope the air hostess was all . right. Behind him was the customary French military bod with kepi and a . uniform adorned with scrambled-egg braid. He follows le President (nearly) wherever he goes and carries France’s nuclear-bomb codes in an impressive briefcase. Or . at least that is what we are always told. I suppose it may simply . contain some sandwiches to keep the fellow going until elevenses. At . the sight of the president the splendid RAF band burst into the . Marseillaise. Should have given him a blast of the Can-Can, lads. More . his thing. Awkward: David Cameron and Francois Hollande tried to look relaxed at The Swan Inn barely an hour after they clashed over the need to reform the EU . After tense talks at the summit Prime Minister David Cameron took French President Francois Hollande to The Swan Inn at Swinbrook in Oxfordshire for lunch . Foreign . Secretary William Hague, Defence Secretary Philip Hammond, Energy . Secretary Ed Davey and Universities Minister David Willetts were in the . welcome line. An RAF . officer was wearing the sort of white gloves favoured by snooker refs. He gave one of those salutes that judders for half a minute after it has . been made. Twangggg! The . summit was ostensibly about defence. Deals have been agreed on a . maritime anti-mine gizmo, a space programme, a drone project and . continued Franco-British military co-operation. One . of the prototype designs of the drone was in the hangar, as were lots . of French journos and the French foreign minister (who had trouble . keeping his eyes open during Mr Cameron’s little speech). The French press corps has proved supine during the scandal of President Hollande and his girlfriends. French President Francois Hollande refused to comment on whether his affair has made France an international joke . Double trouble: Mr Hollande refused to comment on his affair with actress Julie Gayet (right) or the status of former First Lady Valerie Trierweiler . The old ‘right to privacy’ gambit has been deployed – by a man who controls the codes to nuclear war! Has . anyone actually checked to see if his popsy is an enemy agent? Or do I . contravene the sensibilities of some Parisian Lord Justice Leveson if I . make that point? Some say . the president’s trouser-dropping is no business of we Brits. But here he . was, signing military communiques with our lot, in the process learning . some of our military secrets. None of our business? He . and Mr Cameron had been asked about EU treaty re-negotiations. M . Hollande, taller than Ronnie Corbett but not much, radiated nonchalance. Mentioning the Euro, he oozed superiority – he genuinely seemed to think we might covet that currency. In June 2010 Mr Cameron and wife Samantha hosted then-French President Nicolas Sarkozy and his wife Carla Bruni for lunch in 10 Downing Street . Tony and Cherie Blair welcomed French President Jacques Chirac and his wife Bernadette to Downing Street in 2004 . Previous pub diplomacy: Tony Blair sought to win over French president Jacques Chirac in 2000 with a pint in the County restaurant in the Labour PM's constituency in County Durham ahead of a summit in France . Then, . at 12.33pm, it happened. Up popped one of Fleet Street’s finest and . said: ‘Do you think your private life has made France an international . joke? 'Are you still having an affair with Julie Gayet and do you wish she was here?’ David . Cameron doodled, jolly, jolly hard. The French journos sucked in their . cheeks. A nation quivered. And Monsieur le Frisky, tapping his ballpoint . on his lectern, snapped that he most certainly did not intend to answer . zat feelthy question. As moments go, a bit of a bottom-clencher. But one to cherish. The mistress of President Francois . Hollande was yesterday nominated for a French Oscar – for playing a . sex-obsessed government aide. Julie . Gayet, 41, is in the running for a Cesar, the highest honour in French . cinema, for best supporting actress in Quai d’Orsay. The . comedy film is named after the Paris quay where France’s foreign . ministry is based and Miss Gayet plays a mini-skirted adviser who uses . her feminine charms to seduce powerful men. In . real life, the actress was having a passionate affair with the French . president, 59, while he was still living with girlfriend Valerie . Trierweiler. The two secret lovers regularly met in a flat close to the Elysee Palace.
crime was a hangar at RAF Brize Norton, where M French President Francois Hollande was seen running out of the pub where he met David Cameron actress Julie Gayet (right) or the status of joke? 'Are you still having an affair with Julie