The new claims come after Fillon went on the offensive, refusing to stand aside, saying he was the victim of a media plot and attempting to kickstart his flagging campaign.
In a statement titled “The Canard Enchaîné’s lies”, Fillon disputed the paper’s sums and said he had provided all the financial details of his wife’s contracts on his website.
Some polls have showed he has slipped from presidential favourite to being likely to be eliminated in the first round of the election in April, with the far-right Front National’s Marine Le Pen and the independent centrist Emmanuel Macron qualifying for the final runoff in May.
Fillon has repeatedly said the jobs for his family were real and legal. He admitted on Monday that he had committed an “error” by employing his wife as his assistant – a practice that is allowed under French law provided the job is genuine, but which is viewed as increasingly unacceptable by French voters.
French prosecutors are carrying out a preliminary investigation into the possible “misuse of public funds” to determine whether or not Penelope Fillon had in fact done any work for her husband. That investigation has been extended to two of Fillon’s children whom he also paid as assistants when he was a senator.
Fillon this week said his wife’s salary averaged about €3,700 a month over the time she was employed. This is judged as high for a parliamentary assistant.
The Canard Enchaîné claimed in its Wednesday edition that investigators had found “no material evidence” that Penelope Fillon carried out the work she was paid to do.
The paper claimed that Penelope Fillon received a first severance payment of €16,000 in 2002, adding that this was higher than the recommended level. Two weeks later she was re-employed as a parliamentary aide.
A second payment of €29,000 was made in 2013 at the end of her last contract working for her husband, the paper alleged.
On the campaign trail, Fillon was asked by journalists about the Canard Enchaîné’s latest story, and said there were “no new revelations”. He told journalists: “Do your jobs, instead of letting slander spread.”
Prosecutors are also investigating a second job in which Penelope Fillon was paid large sums between 2012 and 2013 by a literary review owned by a billionaire businessman friend of Fillon, but where she was alleged to have only written two book reviews. Fillon has denied any wrongdoing and insisted her consultancy job was real.
Le Parisien reported on Tuesday that for a period between 2012 and 2013, Penelope Fillon’s two contracts overlapped and she simultaneously held two full-time jobs - as a parliamentary assistant and for the literary review.
After some MPs in Fillon’s party, Les Républicains, had warned in recent days that their constituents were shocked and angered by the scandal, the party had rallied round Fillon on Tuesday. Senior figures had echoed Fillon’s vow that he would never step aside and there was no plan B for another rightwing candidate to take his place.
As Fillon arrived for a visit in the Aube on Tuesday, one onlooker shouted: “Crook!”
/The Guardian/
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