The committee of French inheritance (8)
I believe the answer is:
delegacy
'the committee' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)
'of french inheritance' is the wordplay.
'of french' becomes 'de' ('of' in French).
'inheritance' becomes 'legacy' (legacy is a kind of inheritance).
'de'+'legacy'='DELEGACY'
(Other definitions for delegacy that I've seen before include "Eg a Clyde (anag) - giving authority to others - university department" , "Committee" .)