Well the complaint always wants that when the French surrendered in World War two they neither scuttled nor transferred their navel fleet. So then a pointless and dangerous bombing run that to be undertaken to destroy the French naval vessels before the Nazis captured them, that could have been avoided had the French simply transferred the existing navy to Britain which had been requested but then just not acted on for some reason.

Then there was the whole rainbow warrior thing many decades later which didn't help.

Here's one which is not directly the police but it's kinda because it's who the police really works for:

• After the 2007 Crash, whilst in Britain the rich were asking for even more tax breaks (and, by the way, got them whilst the rest of the population got Austerity), in France the rich were very publicly saying they should be taxed more.

Now, even if the rich in France were being totally hypocrites in their "demands" and knew the politicians they owned would not actually do it (which was what happened), why would at least some of the rich in France feel the need to very loudly and publicly ask to be taxed MORE even whilst in next door Britain the rich very openly wanted to be made even richer?!

Methinks it's to do with the invention of monsieur Guillot and with the French tradition of the common people taking it to the streets and breaking shit up (and, on occasion, said shit being actual rich people) unlike both the UK and US (both countries which even by comparison with the wider Europe beyon France, have very meek and compliant populations).

That said IMHO, Macron's winning against the Gillet Jaunes has seriously reduced the fear the French elites have of public reactions to their abuses.