I am guessing that perhaps those figures are the

greater metropolitan areas rather than the actual city population, and that the Beeb are distorting statistics by comparing it to the number of French in the greater metropolitan area of London.

For example, Wikipedia states the population of Nice to be 344,875 based on 2008 census as opposed to that page which uses the 1999 figures

Posted By: Steve in Holland, May 30, 13:15:13