In France's former mining heartland, promises by the Communist Party's first presidential candidate in 15 years to raise the minimum wage, lower the retirement age and tax big business hard resonate with voters who feel ignored by the mainstream left.
That Fabien Roussel, a native of France's industrial north, has for months polled higher than Parti Socialiste contender Anne Hidalgo is a sign of how far the traditional centre left has fallen in a decade, and now risks irrelevance.
