The details of King Charles’ state visit to France later this month were announced on Wednesday. His Majesty’s deputy private secretary, Chris Fitzgerald said that the occasion state will celebrate the countries’ ‘shared histories, culture and values’.

One thing France and Britain haven’t shared for many years is the same view on school uniform. We wear it, they don’t, although they might be about to change.

In an interview on Monday, Emmanuel Macron agreed that school uniform may be the best way to avoid any future controversies about what children wear to schools in France.

He was referring to the furore that erupted last week when his new Minister of Education, Gabriel Attal, declared a ban on the wearing of the abaya. This long baggy Islamic outfit became in vogue at the start of this year, but, like headscarves, kippahs and crucifixes, it has been added to the list of proscribed items in the Republic’s schools.

Attal also announced that as of this autumn school uniforms will be trialled in a number of schools, a decision obviously endorsed by his president. Macron believes that the benefit of a school uniform is the avoidance of ‘clothing that refers you to a religion, because that excludes you and separates you’.

The president also cited his wish to ease the social pressure on children who cannot afford to come to school wearing the latest street fashions.

The possibility that school uniform might become compulsory has pleased the right – although Eric Ciotti, the leader of the Republicans, was quick to remind people he had already taken the initiative in this matter. In a newspaper column last Sunday, Ciotti said that in the southern department of the Alpes-Maritimes, where his Nice constituency is situated, the wearing of uniforms will be trialled this school year.

Ciotti has been one of the leading figures in the long-running campaign to reintroduce school uniform into French education. When Napoleon Bonaparte founded the Republic’s prestigious lycées in 1802, boarders were required to wear uniforms and it was the custom for the next hundred odd years. In the 20th century, however, the tradition declined as did the wearing of smocks by primary school children.

These had been worn primarily to protect children’s clothes from ink stains but the invention of the Bic biro in the 1960s made them superfluous. That same decade witnessed the West’s social revolution, and in France the events of May 1968 hastened the demise of the school uniform; the left now held cultural power and in their eyes any form of uniform was a symbol of oppression.

A uniform is still worn in a handful of private schools, predominantly Catholic institutions, and in some of the Republic’s Overseas Territories it is the norm. In Martinique, for example, pupils in all but two of the island’s secondary schools come to school in uniform. Teachers, parents and pupil are overwhelmingly supportive. As one member of staff explained this week: ‘This way, there’s no difference. Everyone wears blue and white…so students don’t come with big logos on their clothes.’

Their argument was that such a measure would iron out inequality, boost pride in one’s school, and serve as a bulwark against ‘sectarianism’

In France the movement on the right for the reimposition of school uniforms is driven more by a determination to fight back against what they regard as a concerted campaign by Islamists to undermine the Republic’s secularism.

Eric Ciotti was one of several MPs who in 2015 tabled a parliamentary bill for the return of school uniform. Their argument was that such a measure would iron out inequality, boost pride in one’s school, and serve as a bulwark against ‘sectarianism’.

Such a bill was never going to see the light of day during the presidency of François Hollande, a socialist of the 68 era, but it did receive large support among the public. A poll in 2016 found that 60 per cent supported the return of school uniform.

It was also endorsed by Marine le Pen and Francois Fillon, the Republican candidate, during the 2017 presidential election, to the amusement of some left-wing media, which mocked their ‘obsession’.

Le Pen returned to the subject at the start of this year when her party tried to pass a bill in parliament to bring back uniforms. She said it was her belief that its wearing would eradicate ‘brand competition and pressure from Islamists on children attending school’.

The Republican party lent their weight to the bill but le Pen still fell short of majority support among centrist and left-wing MPs. That result is likely to be reversed in any future bill now that Macron has come out in favour.

His wife is already on board. Brigitte Macron, a former teacher, outlined her reasons why in an interview at the start of this year. ‘I wore a uniform as a pupil’, she said, referring to the private Catholic school she attended. ‘I enjoyed it. It erases differences, saves time – it’s time-consuming to choose what to wear in the morning – and money.’

In the current climate, the return of school uniform would save France time, money and future confrontations with religious rabble-rousers.