The UK and the EU: best buds again?

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22 Jan

You’d be forgiven for forgetting that Europe is bigger than Davos this week, but we’ve got three great stories to remind you. First up: it’s been a good week for Berliners making Kartoffelsalat, Kartoffelsuppe, Kartoffelknödel, et cetera et cetera, thanks to an initiative that is distributing more than 170 tonnes – TONNES – of potatoes across the German capital. Then we examine a newly leaked “Made in Europe“ proposal that seeks to promote industrial production in the EU (very very fun, we promise).

We’re also joined by Nick Thomas-Symonds, the UK government minister pursuing a post-Brexit “reset“ in relations with the EU, about how the Labour government might help clean up some of the post-Brexit mess. This one goes out to those of you who like to email to remind us that Britain is still Europe. We see you. We read you.

The Norwegian film Sentimental Value and these 'tasting notes' from a water sommelier.

LISTENER SURVEY: Fear not – we are still seeking responses to our listener survey! It’s not too late to help! It’s simple and really does help us make the show better. Fill it out here and pat yourself on the back afterwards.

SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER: Other things happened/are happening in Europe this week (🫠) and if you’d like to learn more about them, join us over at our newsletter, GOOD WEEK BAD WEEK.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Hello and welcome to the Europeans. I'm Dominic Kraemer in Amsterdam, here with Katy Lee in Paris. We're here to talk to you about Europe's politics, Europe's culture, and this week for reasons that will soon become clear, Europe's potatoes. How are you doing today, Katy?

KATY LEE
I'm good. Qobuz update, or “Cubuzz” as I was calling it – anyway, that app what you can play music on that isn't Spotify, finally downloaded it. Holy shit, song sounds so good on it. I love it.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
It's really worth leaving Spotify for and paying that extra euro or two. I'm glad I've made another Qobuz evangelist out of you.

KATY LEE
There's so many of them now as well. We've had quite a few messages I think from listeners saying I switched to Qobuz because of Dominic. So Qobuz, we're doing free advertising over here for you. Get in touch.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Yeah, they're still not sponsoring us. What's going on?

KATY LEE
But how are you over there in Amsterdam?

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Yeah, I'm fine. I mean, whilst the post-war Western Alliance has been falling apart this week, I was on stage choking on confetti.

KATY LEE
Oh my god. What, like, in a serious way?

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Kind of serious. Yeah. I mean, there's definitely a metaphor in there somewhere like about the current geopolitical shit show and me choking on confetti. I haven't found it yet. It was basically just me inhaling confetti whilst trying to sing my lungs out, which was rather uncomfortable and humiliating, but I can laugh about it already.

KATY LEE
What a weird celebratory way that would have been to die. I do always wonder about this at huge pop concerts where, you know, this thing explodes and loads of confetti comes down from the ceiling. Like you can't be the first performer to have nearly died choking on confetti.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Absolutely. And it was really small confetti as well. So fortunately, that means I wasn't likely to choke to death. But it really meant like a lot of it got in my mouth when I took one of my deep singer breaths and then started coughing up on stage.

KATY LEE
Well, I'm glad you're okay.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
I'm finding it much harder to find anything to laugh about with the geopolitical situation that we're finding ourselves in.

KATY LEE
Yeah, it's a grim time. And, you know, even away from geopolitics and just looking at normal people's lives. We've been following the awful news of this train collision in Cordoba in southern Spain that happened on Sunday night. We still don't know very much about why that first train derailed and hit the other coming in the other direction. So we're not going to be talking about it this week. But we are following this accident, which has claimed dozens of lives. And we are sending our love to Spain.

But what are we talking about this week?

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Well, this week, we have I think our first-ever interview with a sitting government minister, a member of the UK's cabinet, no less. Later on in the show, we'll be joined by Nick Thomas-Symonds, who is, amongst other titles, the Cabinet Office Minister for European Union Relations. We're going to be speaking to him because whilst Donald Trump has been behaving more and more like a 19th-century imperialist monarch who's lost his mind, the UK has gradually been inching a little bit closer towards the EU for the first time since Brexit happened.

That's coming up later. But first, it's time for Good Week, Bad Week.

[MUSIC]

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Let’s start with Good Week. Who are you giving Good Week to, Katy?

KATY LEE
I am going to take up a suggestion from one of our listeners in Berlin, Sarah, who suggested in our Patreon chat that we should consider giving a Good Week to people who live in Berlin because they are in the midst of receiving 4,000 tonnes of free potatoes. There are potatoes galore up for grabs in the German capital right now. It is a Kartoffeln bonanza.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
I have so many questions, which I mean, I guess we'll get on to why Berliners are receiving free potatoes in a minute. But first, 4,000 tonnes, like how many potatoes is that? What does that look like?

KATY LEE
So 4,000 tonnes is 4 million kilos. I do actually buy potatoes in one kilo sacks. So just imagine like 4 million of those sacks of potatoes. Is that helpful for visualising?

DOMINIC KRAEMER
That is very helpful. And that is a lot.

KATY LEE
Okay, yeah, it is a lot. It's also equivalent to the weight of 1000 Asian elephants. I don't know if you find that more helpful or less helpful. But there it is. Just imagine a truly vast quantity of potatoes. It is like a jaw dropping number of potatoes.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Okay, so why are Berliners getting all these free potatoes?

KATY LEE
Well, this story begins on a farm outside Leipzig, a couple of hundred kilometres south of Berlin. This farm had a very good harvest. And actually farms across a lot of Europe have had a very good potato harvest.

Too good, it turns out. As a continent, we've been producing way more potatoes than people want to buy at the moment. Just to give you a sense of scale.

In Belgium, it was reported in October that the national harvest at the end of the year was equivalent to half a tonne of potatoes per Belgian resident. We have crazy numbers of potatoes. Anyway, this particular farm near Leipzig in Germany, they had a deal in place with a big produce trading company that was going to buy their potatoes. So far, so good.

But because there are so many European farmers trying to sell potatoes right now, the price has plummeted. So the trading company that had agreed to buy these potatoes, it didn't want them anymore.

They were like, we can't sell these at a price that is actually going to make money for us, especially once we take into account how much it would cost to transport this huge volume. We don't want them. We will pay you to keep them so that they're just not our problem.

So this farm was left with a warehouse full of unsold potatoes. Now, this is not the first time that a farm has found itself with unsold potatoes. And there is apparently quite a standard solution for this, which is that the potatoes often get turned into biogas.

But the volumes of potatoes that we're talking about here are just so immense that the farm was like, how would we even get them to the biogas plant? And are we really going to burn 40% of our harvest? Like this just feels really wrong. Is there nothing else we can do? And what they decided to do was to get in touch with Ecosia, which you've probably heard of.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
The search engine.

KATY LEE
Yes. Ecosia is a search engine that ploughs all of its profits into protecting the environment. It's a company based in Berlin, and they had recently had a feature written about them in the Berlin Morgenpost, which is one of the city's local newspapers.

So Ecosia got in touch with the newspaper and they were like, could you guys help spread the word and help us find something useful to do with these potatoes? Cynically, I am 100% sure that both of these companies saw this as a very nice opportunity to get some attention and generate some positive publicity for both their brands. But I'm going to roll with it because I hate seeing wasted potatoes.

So yeah, it is being dubbed the Great Potato Rescue Operation. And basically what Ecosia and the Berlin Morgenpost are organising is the trucking en masse of tonnes of these potatoes, most of them to Berlin, because that is where both of these companies are based, but also to the area around the farm nearer to Leipzig.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
So how exactly are they going to distribute all these potatoes in an orderly fashion? Presumably they're not just dumping them all in a big pile in the middle of Berlin somewhere.

KATY LEE
Yeah, that would not be a good idea. There'd probably be a potato-based riot. So a load of the potatoes have gone directly to Berlin's main food bank, 22 tonnes of them for distribution from there.

But otherwise, what the campaigners have done, and it's quite clever, is that they have decentralised the potato distribution. So if you are a business or an organisation in Berlin with a bit of space, you can sign up to receive a tonne of potatoes. And you really do have to take a tonne because they come in these massive bags, like you can't take half a tonne and you definitely can't take half a kilo.

And then these businesses and organisations have been handing out the potatoes to basically whoever wants them. According to our listener Sarah, people have been snapping these potatoes up incredibly quickly wherever they've arrived. So if you live in Berlin, you can go to www.4000-tonnen.de, “4000 tonnes” in German, and there is a map on the website of potato collection points around Berlin, along with the day that the potatoes are due to arrive there. So you can head to your nearest collection point and pick up a bunch of free potatoes and make a nice, I don't know, like a nice leek and potato soup or something, something wintry.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
And do they think they're going to be able to distribute all these 4000 tonnes of potatoes?

KATY LEE
Well, no. So the organisers have been quite upfront about the limits of what they're going to be able to do. Last week, they managed to distribute 42 tonnes of potatoes, not bad.

This week, about 132 tonnes are being distributed, which is pretty amazing. However, there is a bout of cold weather coming after this week, which is really not good for the potatoes. It is also Ecosia and the Berliner Morgenpost who are putting up most of the funding for the transport of the potatoes. And yeah, they're only willing to put up a certain amount of cash into this, even if it is a good branding exercise. After this week, they are probably done, although they're looking for big buyers who might be willing to take more of the potatoes. But they almost definitely won't get anywhere close to redistributing 4,000 tonnes.

And I assume that a lot of the rest will indeed probably get turned into biofuel. But it's cool that they've managed to give people even a fraction of this. You know, it's still a huge amount of free food that we're talking about.

And of course, it's especially great that so much of it would have gone to the food bank and to Berliners who really struggle to buy enough food every week. Having said that, I do want to acknowledge that there has been some criticism of this initiative. It does feel like a kind of feel-good story about people power and preventing food waste. And it is.

But there has been some quite sharp criticism from other German farmers. One farmer who gave an interview to the Taz newspaper, he said that this was essentially a marketing gimmick that is going to hurt other farmers. He pointed out that 4,000 tonnes is equivalent to the annual output in a normal year of a dozen farms, and that giving away these volumes will create disruptions in the market because, you know, people aren't going to need to go buy potatoes for a while. He said it was particularly a shame that people in Berlin who might ordinarily buy potatoes grown more locally or organically are instead going to be eating all of these industrial potatoes grown 200 kilometres away. The farm that they come from, I should say, it is actually gradually switching over to being organic, but these potatoes aren't organic.

I don't know. I hear this farmer, but in the end, it's not actually 4,000 tonnes of potatoes that are going to be given away and eaten. So this farmer will probably end up seeing his favourite solution become a reality, which is that the bulk of them will end up going to a biogas plant.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Yeah, it is one of those like uplifting stories that also does feel a bit depressing that when so many people are starving in the world that like there's all this food here.

KATY LEE
Yeah, why can't it get to the people that really need it?

DOMINIC KRAEMER
And I hope some of it is getting to some of the people that need it.

But yeah, it also kind of reminds me of those images of these huge butter mountains that they had back in the day because of the way that European farming policy worked or wasn't that something? Is that a thing? Have I made it up?

KATY LEE
No, that was a thing. Yeah. The butter mountains were a quite infamous result of EU policy starting back in the 70s.

Basically, after the war, we were struggling across Europe to produce enough food, which is how the common agricultural policy was born in the early 60s. And what it meant at the beginning was that our governments promised to pay a certain minimum price to farmers for producing certain foodstuffs to give them an incentive to produce more. Now, usually what happens when the supply of a thing goes up is that the price goes down because there's more of it available for the minimum prices kicking in.

It was like, oh, okay, if we have the comfort of knowing that we're definitely going to be able to get a certain price, even if there is loads of this stuff available, then sure, let's produce more milk or grain or whatever it is. This initially produced the desired effect, which was more food being available. But by the late 70s, it had led to way more of certain foods being produced than there was actually a demand for.

So our governments, and then later the EU, would buy all of this surplus stuff to help the farmers out, and then they would have to store it for ages. We literally saw governments having to figure out what to do with these insane quantities of milk. Like, can we turn it into powder? Can we turn it into cheese?

The same thing happened to wine. Loads of perfectly good French wine has been turned over the years into industrial alcohol at the cost of hundreds of millions of euros of EU taxpayer.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
What is industrial alcohol?

KATY LEE
So like ethanol, basically, you might want to use it for industrial products, cleaning products, antiseptic.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Yeah, of course.

KATY LEE
Quite a lot of different things. So yeah, quite a lot of that has come from our wine. Anyway, there have been many, many reforms to the common agricultural policy since those huge surpluses back in the 70s and 80s.

We've tried different things like putting quotas in, and we have moved away in general from guaranteeing farmers specific prices to just giving them subsidies, like giving them cash. And that has reduced this overproduction issue over the years as we have tinkered with our farming policy. But you know, the wine thing was still going on in the mid-noughties. And actually, even during COVID, fun fact, there was again a serious oversupply of French wine, and quite a lot of it got turned into hand sanitiser.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
No way.

KATY LEE
Suffice to say, we have been tinkering with how to intervene in the agriculture market for decades in Europe. And it is still a massive work in progress. It is incredibly difficult. We're trying to do different things, you know, we're trying to make sure that European farmers can survive in an increasingly hostile environment. We're trying to protect the land, we're trying to keep prices affordable for all of us who eat. We're trying to make sure that we can still feed ourselves as a continent if World War Three breaks out. So many different things.

So yes, we still do intervene aggressively in the agriculture market. And you're always going to find free marketers complaining that we shouldn't do this and it distorts the market. And it's incredibly expensive for taxpayers.

What I will say is that in the case of this huge sea of potatoes at the farm outside Leipzig, and many other cases as well, you know, oversupply does happen often for reasons that don't have much at all with the way that we've intervened in the market. Right now we have a lot of potatoes in Europe because the weather has been really favourable for growing potatoes. So the farmers are getting lower prices for it. And the big buyers who buy vegetables en masse and sell them to wholesalers and supermarkets, they don't want to buy all of these vegetables.

There's actually a similar case in the Netherlands right now, maybe you read about it. It's on a less epic scale, but there is a lot of cabbages up for grabs.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Yeah, there's been a lot of reporting on this, I think, thanks to the warm and dry spring that we had. And I guess there's a risk that this will happen more and more thanks to climate change, like certain crops will start doing very well if we have lots of warm and dry springs.

KATY LEE
Yeah. And similarly to what's happening in Germany, the Dutch farmers are trying to work with campaigners and food banks to try and get as much as possible used rather than just left to waste.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
I've just realised this is probably why on Christmas Eve when I went to the supermarket to Aldi in London, my parsnips were only 5p and my red cabbage was only 5p. I really thought that there'd been a mistake and I was thinking, oh no, are the security cameras watching me? Am I accidentally stealing this? And then I like went back to the place and saw that they were literally priced at 5p.

KATY LEE
You're such a good boy. I love that was your instinct. If it was me, I would just be grabbing piles of parsnips and running like the wind.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Isn't part of the problem also that like so many people only want pretty perfectly formed fruits and vegetables?

KATY LEE
Yeah. And you know, there's plenty else wrong with the way that our food system operates. Like we haven't even talked about how used we've become to having tomatoes in December and how divorced we are in generally for many sense these days of like how nature works and how seasons and harvest work.

Anyway, I digress. Yes, the fact that we do only want pretty perfect fruits and vegetables is a big part of the problem. So if you do want to do your bit, there are plenty of initiatives around Europe that allow you to buy ugly seasonal fruit and veg often at knockoff prices.

One of our listeners in Belgium, Willem, he pointed out that they have this great initiative there called Waste Warriors that buys unwanted harvests and then turns it into soup and juice and stuff. And of course, there's Too Good To Go, this app, which I know exists in a lot of countries. You use it sometimes, don't you?

DOMINIC KRAEMER
I do. Yeah, especially at the expense of bakeries that I can't really afford.

KATY LEE
Nice. So there are loads of ways that you can help to do your bit to prevent food waste and often save money at the same time. So what is not to like?

If you live in Berlin, though, go and get your hands on some of these potatoes and let me know what you're going to do with them. It's quite funny. I read a lot in the German media about this great potato rescue operation.

And what I read is absolutely confirmation that Germans take potatoes really seriously because every Q&A that I read included the question, are these potatoes of a waxy variety or a flowery variety?

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Important question.

KATY LEE
Very important question. It really affects what you want to do with them. In case you're wondering, these are agria potatoes, which are towards the flowery end of the potato spectrum. So you might want to bake or mash them rather than boiling, steaming or roasting.

Our listener Sarah, who brought the story to our attention in the first place, she is hoping to get her hands on some of these potatoes at the end of the week. There are some arriving in her neighbourhood. She wrote to us, “Let's just say I'm doing more stalking of the delivery updates website than I am on work this week.”

And apparently she has her potato recipes at the ready. Have you got a favourite thing to do with potatoes, Dominic, that you'd like to recommend to people?

DOMINIC KRAEMER
It's funny. I very rarely cook with potatoes. I'm much more of a kind of a pasta or rice guy.

KATY LEE
Well, they're very cheap at the moment. So you might want to reassess that.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Oh, I know what I'd make. I'd make the Dutch national dish, the Stamppot.

KATY LEE
Oh, lovely. Well, these would be perfect for that.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Well, I'm happy for Berliners anyway, that they're getting Good Week, especially after they had that very bad few weeks when there was this power cut across big swathes of the city.

KATY LEE
Yeah, which we didn't actually get to talk about on the podcast, but we did write about it in our newsletter. So – plug – go and subscribe to our newsletter if you haven't already. The link is there in the show notes.

Who has had a bad week?

DOMINIC KRAEMER
I'm giving out Bad Week to people who love free trade.

KATY LEE
Oh!

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Partly to balance out your good week last week for people who love free trade.

KATY LEE
I was gonna say, what a turnaround.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Yeah, so those free trade lovers might be having a slightly worse week this week after some leaks to the European media outlined some plans from the European Commission about incorporating a “Made in Europe” component to an upcoming piece of industrial legislation.

KATY LEE
I'm so glad that you have decided to take on a complicated piece of industrial legislation this week. And finally, I get the light week and I get to talk about potatoes.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Yeah, it's my turn to cosplay as an economics reporter.

KATY LEE
So you say that there were some leaks to European media. Does that include us?

DOMINIC KRAEMER
I wish. Actually, people, can you start leaking to us, please?

KATY LEE
Yeah, we never get leaked stuff.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Hello@europeanspodcast.com.

KATY LEE
Please leak to us.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Anyway, the draft bill was seen by Bloomberg. And I think Euronews saw a different document about the same piece of legislation. But I actually haven't seen any of these documents myself, sadly. So a lot of this is based on their reporting.

The leaks are all about a piece of EU legislation called the Industrial Accelerator Act. Now, I realise that you may be inclined to skip forward immediately, because that sounds incredibly boring. But please stay with me. I promise I will do everything to make this as painless as possible.

KATY LEE
I'm gonna set myself a timer to wake up in. How long do I need for this? Five minutes, seven minutes?

DOMINIC KRAEMER
We'll see. Okay, I'll just talk to myself in the meantime, then. So I am framing this as a bad week for those lovers of free trade.

But that's mainly because Katy had already taken good week for her German potato story. Actually, I could just as well see it as potentially depending on what you think about this kind of legislation, a good week for European industry.

KATY LEE
Okay, yay. Is this that rare piece of good news that you're framing as bad news? Like, it never happens this way around.

It's usually the other way around.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Yeah, I know, right. It could be. We'll see by the end.

Anyway, do you want to know how this Made in Europe component would work? Sure. Okay, that was enthusiastic.

KATY LEE
Go for it.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
It seems like there are a few ideas being floated to help encourage European made industry. One is that the European Commission wants to set new rules for key, big foreign investments. We're talking investments above 100 million euros.

Foreign companies making those kinds of investments would be expected to hire a certain share of local European workers. They would be required to share technology, this is key, I'll come back to it in a bit, and to set up joint ventures with European firms. Then there are some rules that they're suggesting around public procurement processes.

In normal speak, that basically means how governments and public bodies buy things or hand out contracts. Bloomberg says that the lowest price will no longer be the only deciding factor on who gets a contract. There will be strict requirements in member states for a minimum percentage of European origin content in purchased products.

Are you still with me?

KATY LEE
Genuinely, yes, I am. Like, I'm starting to perk up a bit because this means more money for Europe and I like money for Europe.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Yeah, so all this is meant to improve the state of European industry whilst at the same time encouraging large scale decarbonisation in European industry as well. What's not to like? So on the face of it, this all might sound like good news for European industry, but it's not without controversy.

When Politico reported in mid-December that these so-called made in Europe clauses could be folded into this industrial legislation, there was pushback, including from a group of nine countries led by the Czech Republic, who warned that favouring European suppliers like this could end up undermining Europe's international trade.

KATY LEE
Oh, interesting. So even though the idea is to bring us business, this plan is not actually universally adored within the EU?

DOMINIC KRAEMER
No, it's definitely not. I don't know how that group of nine countries are looking at the latest proposals, but some critics say that this made in Europe idea starts to look a bit like protectionism. And there was a great line in the Bloomberg article from an unnamed EU official who said that there was less resistance to this made in Europe idea in China than in some corners of the European Commission.

KATY LEE
Interesting, because I guess going back to last week when we talked about the Latin America trade deal, the Mercosur trade deal, as we know, there have always been some quite committed free traders inside the European Commission, right? Can you briefly, with your economics reporter hat on, explain why those people find this alarming?

DOMINIC KRAEMER
I will try. I think it's because at heart protectionism is basically the opposite of free trade. So the big risk is that a made in Europe clause like this could be seen as giving European producers a clear advantage, and that might provoke retaliation from our trading partners.

And that matters because the EU is extremely dependent on trade. It's actually the world's largest trading entity, accounting for around 15% of all global trade in goods and services. For decades, the EU has been one of the strongest defenders of the World Trade Organisation and the idea of open markets.

But as you have noticed, protectionism and especially tariffs have suddenly become quite fashionable again. So there's this split. Some argue that the EU needs to adapt fast and start shielding its own industries.

Others worry that this could backfire badly, given that roughly half of the EU's goods and services are exported.

KATY LEE
Okay, so what is the argument for the made in Europe industrial idea? Like, how is it supposed to make us richer, more successful, more everything?

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Well, supporters to these proposals would say it's a response to a very real problem, Europe's industrial slowdown. Across a wide range of sectors from metals to cars to solar, European industry has been losing ground. That's due to a number of factors, but some of that is due to high fuel prices since the Russian invasion of Ukraine, but also weaker productivity growth than the US and parts of Asia.

And it's worth pointing out that this leaked proposal has some echoes of what China did whilst it was industrialising from the late 70s onwards. So China required foreign companies to enter the market through joint ventures with local firms, a strategy that was designed to force technology transfer. So stick with me, by sharing ownership, foreign companies also shared their plans, their know how and intellectual property, things that otherwise would have been kept secret, but instead weren't secret, which helped Chinese firms to learn quickly and build their own industrial capabilities instead of simply providing cheap labour.

KATY LEE
And boy, are they doing some interesting things with all of that knowledge now.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Absolutely, yeah. I mean, look at their industry now. So yeah, you could say there's a parallel with what the EU is now trying to do with this Industrial Acceleration Act.

The key, as China's experience suggests, is not to shut out foreign investment altogether, but to be subtle enough to keep it coming while encouraging learning and catch up, especially now that China itself is the technological leader in many areas like electric vehicles, solar power and batteries. I should point out that this contrasts quite starkly with the like blunt protectionist instruments like broad tariffs, like those imposed by Donald Trump, which they are protecting some domestic producers from competition, but they've also raised costs for manufacturers by making imported intermediate goods more expensive.

KATY LEE
Like the stuff they need to make their stuff.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Exactly, a move which is widely criticised by economists. So a more targeted technology transfer focused approach of the sort the EU appears to be aiming for may therefore attract more sympathy than like Trump's across the board protectionism. It is perhaps a bit ironic that the EU seemed to be at least to some extent imitating something that China did decades ago.

KATY LEE
Didn't our friends at 21st Europe, you know, this think tank that we interviewed last year, they dream up like big ideas for Europe. Didn't they have a made in Europe idea as one of their big ideas?

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Yeah, they did actually. In their case, I think they were proposing a new EU wide label and certification system that like turns Europe's regulatory strengths like sustainability, safety, privacy and traceability into a visible mark of trust for both physical products and digital services.

KATY LEE
Oh, a bit like the fair trade label. This is made in Europe and that signifies all of these different things.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Exactly. It's a bit more fun to dream up something like that, I guess, than an industrial strategy, perhaps. So thanks for bringing that in.

But yeah, from what I've heard, this Industrial Accelerator Act should officially be announced on January the 29th. And it could, of course, end up being different to what we've heard about now, because all of this is just based on leaks. There is a long way to go before any of this is law.

KATY LEE
Once again, anyone with more up to date developments within the Commission or elsewhere, feel free to leak to us.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Hello@europeanspodcast.com.

[MUSIC]

DOMINIC KRAEMER
We are really hoping that 2026 will be the year that we become a fully financially sustainable operation. One in which we don't need to keep applying endlessly for the diminishing pool of grants out there that everyone else is also applying for.

The only way this will become possible is if enough of our listeners decide out of the kindness of their own hearts to throw us a few euros or dollars or pounds or whatever currency you prefer our way each month. You can do that by heading to patreon.com/europeanspodcast and donating as little as four euros per month.

KATY LEE
Some lovely, lovely people did that this week. They are Damon, Marcella, Luca, Yueh, Barbara, Eric, HobbsMG, and thank you also to Dan and to Little Blue Heron who are already supporting us but have decided to increase their donations. Thank you so much guys.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Thank you.

[MUSIC]

KATY LEE
We sometimes get feedback that we don't talk enough about the United Kingdom on this podcast, like we just kind of pretend that there's a big gap in the sea between like France and Iceland. I think it's probably just because we're a bit self-conscious about talking about British politics because obviously Dominic and I both sound British and indeed we are British citizens along with you being German of course and me being a French citizen.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
It's true.

KATY LEE
So we feel a bit guilty if there's an episode of the Europeans where literally every voice you hear has a British accent and we're talking about the UK, like it doesn't feel very pan-European. Anyway, it is a New Year's resolution of mine to talk a little bit more, a little bit more about our home country on this podcast from time to time when something big or something weird happens because the UK is a European country too of course even if it is no longer in the European Union. It is part of the European family and while we've been avoiding talking about the UK on this podcast, some quite interesting stuff has actually been happening in terms of Britain's relationship with the EU.

Keir Starmer's new-ish Labour government has been pursuing what it is calling a reset with the European Union, so no plans to rejoin the EU but very much trying to move past the super combative relationship that the former Conservative government often had with the EU.

What does that mean in practise? Well, it means a few things.

For one thing, the UK is currently trying to negotiate a deal to reduce the insane volume of paperwork now needed to export food between the UK and the EU. For another, they're trying to get the UK integrated back into the main European electricity market which will hopefully make electricity bills a bit cheaper for Brits. And at the end of last year, you might have seen the news that the UK is rejoining the Erasmus scheme which is being widely celebrated by people who want to do student exchanges and many others.

What else this reset actually means remains to be seen and some critics of the UK's Labour government are sceptical that this is going to bring anything meaningful beyond just talking a little bit more kindly about the people on the other side of the English Channel. Some other critics are looking at the state of British domestic politics at the moment and saying well, you know, it's nice that you guys are trying to get on better terms with the EU, but is this centre-left government of Keir Starmer's even going to last that long? Like, they're not doing fantastically in the polls.

So what should we make of this whole EU reset business? Is anything going to come of it? We were very lucky this week to talk to the person leading the recent negotiations.

He's the Minister for the Cabinet Office, a job that includes European Union relations, Nick Thomas-Symonds. This interview is brought to you in collaboration with our radio partners at Euranet+.

[MUSIC]

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Nick Thomas-Symonds, thank you for joining us today on The Europeans.

NICK THOMAS-SYMONDS
Absolute pleasure.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
I'd like to start by talking a bit about the British economy, which I think it's fair to say has struggled in recent years with weak growth and productivity compared to many of its peers.

To what extent do you think Brexit has contributed to these difficulties?

NICK THOMAS-SYMONDS
We've never hid from the fact that we had a very tough economic inheritance. I think we inherited a situation where, you're absolutely right, there had been significant long-term issues with productivity. We had public services on their knees and a real sense going around the country, as I was in 2024, that things just didn't work anymore.

And I think you're absolutely right to highlight the previous government's handling of Brexit, and particularly the trade and cooperation agreement that we inherited. And then we got that mandate to improve the relationship in the 2024 general election. We said we wouldn't rejoin the single market or customs union or go back to freedom of movement.

But we did set out that we would be building that closer relationship. And I have to say, I've been extremely pleased with progress, a very close, constructive relationship with my EU counterpart, Maroš Šefčovič.

And indeed, across Europe, the reset is visible in terms of that much more positive relationship. Only last week, I was in Paris for a very productive discussion with my counterpart there, Benjamin Haddad, discussing a range of in the UK-EU reset, including security and energy that in my view are absolutely critical, both the EU and the UK.

KATY LEE
You've talked about now being the time for ruthless pragmatism when it comes to UK-EU relations. What does ruthless actually mean here? I mean, being ruthless implies, to me at least, that someone's going to feel some pain as a result of this strategy.

Who exactly do you envisage as feeling that pain?

NICK THOMAS-SYMONDS
It certainly isn't designed to produce pain. What it's designed to do is to produce material advantages for people. But the reason I used that phrase is because I'm somebody who over the 11 years I've been a Member of Parliament has been right through the different aspects of the Brexit debate.

And for too long, I saw it as one that was being dominated by ideology over what was in people's interests. So that's why I use the term ruthless pragmatism, moving away from that to an absolute focus and decisiveness about what is the best outcome for people on either side of the channel that isn't related to some preconceived ideological idea. And that's exactly the approach I've taken that delivered the common understanding back in May of last year, and that delivered just before Christmas, which I'm very proud of, which is the reaccession of the United Kingdom to Erasmus+, which I think will produce benefits for thousands of people, both here in the United Kingdom, but across Europe as well.

But also the opening of talks on electricity trading, which can be critical both for energy security, and one of the tools we can use to bear down on energy prices too.

KATY LEE
Things like the Erasmus thing coming back are nice, you're not going to see that much opposition to it. But when people hear talk of a reset in UK EU relations, some are sceptical that that is going to amount to anything more than warm words and a handful of nice symbolic things such as cooperation on indeed student exchanges. What would you say to somebody who thinks that this reset is deliberately modest, because you're worried about getting domestic political backlash from voters who were pro-Brexit?

NICK THOMAS-SYMONDS
So the only thing I would just challenge slightly in your question is that Erasmus+, isn't only a student exchange programme, it's often understood that way. But it is far more than that. It's also about vocational exchanges, sports exchanges, there is a real breadth and range to Erasmus+.

But to your central point, again, I would challenge the idea that this is simply a modest reset. The food and drink agreement is going to be worth billions of pounds to the economy. But also the emissions trading system linkage, which will have that exemption from the carbon border adjustment mechanism, which will mean British businesses will be able to save hundreds of millions of pounds in carbon taxes they would otherwise have had to pay.

My challenge to anyone who wants to argue against the work I'm doing is that do they really want to take away additional sharing, additional tools that make people in this country safer? Do they want to take away the security and defence partnership at this critical moment in international politics? And do they want to say to businesses up and down the country, you are going to have to pay these costs again?

Do they want to actually say to people, whether it's energy bills, or whether it is in the price of the weekly shop, they want to risk those things going up because that is the dividing line between the approach that we are taking and those who oppose it.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Do you feel like the mood of the British public is shifting in a way that gives you more or less room for manoeuvre when it comes to collaborating with the EU?

NICK THOMAS-SYMONDS
Well, I actually think that the mood of the British public is very close to the approach that we've been taking. I think there is a real public appetite for the closer UK-EU relationship we're trying to build. But I also get a sense that people want to look forward, they don't want to go back to the battles of the past.

And that's precisely the approach the government takes.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
In the current year, political climate defence and security cooperation seem to matter more than ever. Do you think the UK should be seeking a more structured role in EU defence initiatives? Or do you see NATO as the primary framework, even as one NATO member is threatening another NATO member?

NICK THOMAS-SYMONDS
Well, NATO is the foundation stone. But with regard to the issue you quite rightly raised around Greenland, the Prime Minister has been unequivocal about that in a press conference only a few hours before we are speaking on this podcast, that the future of Greenland is a matter for the people of Greenland and the Kingdom of Denmark and has set out that the use of tariffs is completely wrong. So we've been unequivocal in our position on that.

But in terms of the broader point about European security, security is in Europe a continent-wide challenge. Whether you are an EU member state or whether you are not, that challenge exists for us and exists for us because of Putin's illegal invasion of Ukraine back in February 2022. We have a return, I never thought necessarily I would see it in my lifetime, of return to land war in Europe.

And again, the coalition of the willing is hugely important. Whether you see the E3, Germany, France and the United Kingdom, or indeed the wider diplomatic work that the Prime Minister conducts on behalf of the United Kingdom, you don't need to take my word for it that there's been a reset. You only need to see the close cooperation between them and the relationship, the warm constructive relationship that exists between the Prime Minister and other European leaders to see that in action.

KATY LEE
We have listeners all over Europe and they're very interested in what's happening at home in the UK, as well as the UK's place in Europe and the wider world. You are widely seen as one of Keir Starmer's closest political allies. From where you sit, what is the mood actually like inside number 10 Downing Street right now?

I mean, Labour is polling around the mid-teens behind Reform, the Conservatives, in some polls even behind the Greens. That seems to be a serious political problem.

NICK THOMAS-SYMONDS
Well, the message that we pick up on the doorstep is very much about change. And the Prime Minister has said that 2026 will be the year when we start to turn that corner. And if you just think about some of the measures that we've already taken that will come into effect this year, the £150 of people's energy bills, the abolition of the two-child limit so that families up and down the country with more children will be able to access that support.

And that, by the way, is a real investment in children's futures. So it's a determination to deliver that you'll find right across the government and indeed being led by number 10.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Isn't it a bit of a problem that EU leaders look at these polls in the UK as well? Why would they take long-term UK commitments seriously if the UK government itself looks politically fragile with Reform on the rise?

NICK THOMAS-SYMONDS
If you are conducting and delivering international agreements, as we are, that produce material benefits on both sides, then logic would tell you that they become very hard to unpick by subsequent governments. And that is why it is so vital now we do move towards, as we are, implementation to deliver that tangible change.

KATY LEE
What's happening in politics in the UK is something that's being mirrored in many ways across the continent in terms of the rise of the far right. If the European Union was to move in that direction politically, with even stronger influence from parties led by figures like Jordan Bardella or Giorgia Meloni, how would that affect your vision of what closer UK-EU cooperation will look like in the years to come?

NICK THOMAS-SYMONDS
Well, firstly, in relation to Prime Minister Meloni, who I've met on more than one occasion. We work very well with Prime Minister Meloni and her government in Italy. But more broadly, look, it is a matter for democracies who they choose as their leaders.

It's not for us to choose the leaders of different democracies, it's up to them. We will work with whoever our allies choose as their leaders. And these are deep historic relationships that go beyond whoever happens to be the Prime Minister here or indeed the leader of other countries.

These are very deep, lasting relationships and I'm sure they will continue to be long into the future.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
One final question before we let you go. You talked about having a good relationship with Giorgia Meloni. And I wanted to know which other political leaders or figures within the EU do you find it easiest to work with? And how much do these personal relationships still matter in international diplomacy?

NICK THOMAS-SYMONDS
They hugely matter. And of course, my main relationship is with Commissioner Šefčovič because he is the one that I negotiate with on a regular basis. We are taken to sharing the odd drink together. He is more in the Slovakian red wine territory. I'm much more in the whisky territory. I've particularly been persuading him of late into Welsh whisky.

And I do think that relationship really matters. And of course, it doesn't mean that we don't really push he the interests of the EU, me the interests of the United Kingdom. Of course we do.

But the constructive, friendly relationship we have, I think really does make a difference to our ability to get things done.

KATY LEE
This is a question we should ask all political guests, Dominic. Do you stick national priorities, national exports when having drinks with European counterparts? Nick Thomas-Symonds, thank you so much for joining us.

NICK THOMAS-SYMONDS
Absolute pleasure.

[MUSIC]

DOMINIC KRAEMER
One of the things I found most interesting and telling about that interview is the fact that the minister actually wanted to speak to us.

KATY LEE
Yeah, interesting, right?

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Like it does really suggest to me that the UK has like an explicit strategy for outreach towards the continent. I mean, can you imagine a previous Europe minister over the last 10 years being sent on to our podcast?

KATY LEE
I think we would have had a very different conversation with that person. People who've only started listening to the Europeans quite recently, they probably don't realise that for a long time, we had an almost total ban on even mentioning Brexit because we were just so sick of hearing about it in the British media. It just took up all of the oxygen.

So I'm glad that that's one very small way in which politics has become slightly less exhausting over the past couple of years, even if it's become more exhausting in basically every other way.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
That's true.

KATY LEE
Yay, silver linings. But yeah, I am very intrigued to see if meaningful things come of this reset. It'd be nice to have some concrete, boring things to celebrate coming out of dull negotiations, wouldn't it?

DOMINIC KRAEMER
It sure would. And I think we can agree that an electricity market is a boring thing.

KATY LEE
More boring agreements, please.

[MUSIC]

KATY LEE
Time to head to the Inspiration Station. What have you been enjoying, Dominic?

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Well, firstly, I saw the Northern Lights for the first time last night out of my bedroom window.

KATY LEE
Did you? What, from Amsterdam? You could see them?

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Yeah, isn't that amazing? I have this app which tells me when you might see it and it was like going mad. I got a notification. Aurora Notifier. Anyway, it worked and I saw these amazing, beautiful green stripes across the sky. Does that count as European culture?

KATY LEE
Yeah, I'm not sure it's a recommendation. It's like, be somewhere where you can see cool stuff out the window.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Anyway, I do have a more conventional thing to bring into the Inspiration Station. It was the European Film Awards this past weekend, the 38th edition. And I have to be honest, I've never really noticed this awards ceremony happening.

But this year, the organisers did something quite clever. They moved the ceremony from December when it usually is to January so that the awards would get more attention because we're currently in the midst of that busy time of the so-called awards season, which culminates in the Oscars this year in mid-March. And the idea was that placing this often overlooked European film ceremony between the Golden Globes and the Oscars might shine more light on the ceremony and give a bit of momentum to some of the European films that could be in contention at the Oscars.

KATY LEE
Clever.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
They apparently also employed a stellar social media team because my Instagram was full of acceptance speeches from those awards the day after, which hasn't been the case before. And the film that swept the board at the European Film Awards, collecting six trophies, is a film that is getting a lot of awards buzz in general, also in the US. A Norwegian film called Sentimental Value. Have you heard about it?

KATY LEE
Not on my radar.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
It's made by Joachim Trier, and it stars the amazing Norwegian actor Renate Reinsve and the man playing her father, Stellan Skarsgård, who actually won a Golden Globe for this role earlier this month. I went to see Sentimental Value at the cinema over the Christmas holidays, and I just completely loved it. I have to say, I was a bit sceptical about watching yet another film about a brilliant filmmaker father who is absent from his children's life.

Just a few days before I'd watched the new George Clooney-Noah Baumbach film, Jay Kelly, on Netflix, which has basically got the same premise. So I was like, really? Another one?

KATY LEE
It's a bit like novels about writers, which, as you know, I can't stand.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Yeah, that film Jay Kelly does not really need to be watched, in my opinion. This film, however, is so beautiful.

It's about so many different things. It's about the love between two sisters. It's about intergenerational trauma, the power of theatre and film, the importance of a home.

It's so good. Go and watch it. Many of you will probably have seen Joachim Trier's previous film, The Worst Person in the World, also starring Renate Reinsve. I loved that film too, but I think this is even better. And I'm really happy it's getting all this awards attention. It just feels correct.

So go watch Sentimental Value. And yeah, I also recommend you go and watch Joachim Trier's acceptance speech at the European Film Awards. It's gone a bit viral. I’ll put a link to it in show notes. In it, he makes a moving case for freedom of expression, freedom of the arts, and the power of the arts to counteract polarisation.

What have you been enjoying, Katy?

KATY LEE
I am going to borrow a recommendation from one of our listeners this week. Johannes recommended a recent piece of writing in the Paris Review. And it is a review of Thirteen Types of Bottled Water, written by the Spanish-slash-Argentinian filmmaker Amalia Ullmann.

Apart from being a successful filmmaker, Amalia is also, I have now learned, a trained water sommelier. Do you know what a water sommelier is?

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Well, I mean, I can guess. Someone who tastes water.

KATY LEE
Exactly. It's like a wine expert, but for water. Very much like how a wine sommelier can taste a wine and be like, oh yes, this is a Bordeaux from 2023 or whatever.

A water sommelier is trained to appreciate the different mineral notes that one water might have compared to another. Anyway, the Spanish filmmaker Amalia Ullmann is a trained water sommelier. She got her accreditation at this very fancy water school in Germany.

And she has written this rather delightful piece that is half travelogue and half water review. It's about her going to the annual meeting of the Water Sommelier Union, which held its latest meeting in the Czech Republic. So it is sort of a travel diary of this trip, but it's also reviewing all of the water that she drinks along the way.

And it's very deadpan and funny. It includes a bottle of water that she bought at a McDonald's. One star.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Is it only about bottled water?

KATY LEE
Oh, tell a lie. One of them is a review of the water that she drank at the Source Nature Reserve in the Czech Republic. She also gave that a one star rating.

She said it smelled like rotten eggs and tasted of period blood. Yum yum.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
I really want to go read this. But I also find it a bit ethically questionable to have water sommeliers considering we should be drinking tap water if we can, because of the environmental impact.

KATY LEE
Funnily enough, I actually work with somebody who is a water sommelier in her secret life that is not teaching at university. And she loves Parisian tap water.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Ah, there you go.

KATY LEE
So, Johannes, thank you for sharing this. I know that you didn't share it as an offering for the Inspiration Station per se. Merely as a piece of writing that other appreciators of all things deadpan might enjoy in our Patreon chat.

But I thought it deserved a wider audience. So I will put a link to it in the show notes.

[MUSIC]

DOMINIC KRAEMER
For my happy ending this week, I'm taking us to the mountains of Austria, where the hills are alive with the sound of Veronica the cow scratching her back with a broom.

KATY LEE
Would you like to explain what the hell you're on about?

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Well, my happy news is that some scientists are re-evaluating the intelligence of cows after it was brought to their attention that this one Swiss brown cow that lives in Austria, near the border of Italy…

KATY LEE
Oh, she's a migrant.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
…uses a broom to scratch her back.

KATY LEE
How though?

DOMINIC KRAEMER
She does it with her mouth, with the broom in her mouth, and she scratches the different bits of her back that need scratching.

KATY LEE
Wow, I need to see a video of this Veronica. Let me Google her right now.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
So Veronica is a pet cow. She lives with an organic farmer and baker called Witgar Wiegele. I realise that sounds like a made-up name, but this is definitely not a made-up story, I promise.

Witgar has always known that Veronica was a special cow. She not only learned how to scratch herself with a tool, but she also responds to the voices of family members.

KATY LEE
Wow, clever cow. I'm just watching her do it now. It is mesmerising.

She's so clever. She's just really unmistakably using this to scratch her back with.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
So what happened is a clip of Veronica doing the scratching started doing the rounds, and it caught the attention of some researchers at Vienna's University of Veterinary Medicine, because the use of a tool by livestock has never been documented by scientists. We know that many birds, chimps, dolphins, and even octopuses can use tools, but we didn't know that cows could do that too. And it's not only that she is using a tool, but she is using both ends of the tool, making it officially a multi-purpose tool.

And use of multi-purpose tools have only been convincingly confirmed in studies of chimps, and of course, humans can do it too. Although I often struggle with use of multi-purpose tools while doing my DIY. I'll share a link to a video of Veronica scratching in the show notes.

What's really cool about this research is that the scientists don't think that Veronica is unique. They just think that we've been underestimating the intelligence of cows. And in truth, not many cows live until 13 years old like Veronica.

So maybe if more cows were kept as pets and kind of treated as part of a family, like Veronica clearly has been, and not used in the meat or dairy industry, we'd have noticed how clever these animals are.

[MUSIC]

KATY LEE
That is it for this week. The show was produced this week by Morgan Childs in Prague and Wojciech Oleksiak in Warsaw. Thank you both.

Next week, I'm going to have someone else for company, I think, because you're away, I believe, Dominic.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Yes, you're going to have another mystery guest.

KATY LEE
Tune in to hear me joined by that mystery guest. In the meantime, sign up to get our newsletter in your inbox. It is so good.

And you can also find us on selected social media platforms, Instagram, YouTube, Mastodon, and BlueSky. Have fun singing next week, Dominic.

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Thank you. Thanks for listening, everyone.

KATY LEE
Tschüss!

DOMINIC KRAEMER
Moo!