Rory Stewart

You said the reason why Europe is going down the drain.

Is Europe going down the drain?

Oh yeah, it's gone, finished.

Because of what you call socialism for the banks and austerity for the people?

And looking into FTSE 100 performance shows that this maxim would only have worked for two of the last 10 years.

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Welcome to Restful Politics Leading with me, Rory Stewart.

And with me, Alastair Campbell.

And I think I'm right that the first and only Greek we've had on the podcast was Kyriakos Mitsotakis, who's the current centre-right prime minister.

Today's guest, Yanis Varoufakis, is someone with a very different politics, a very different view of the economy and how it should work.

He's had a lifetime studying, teaching and writing about economics.

But he became a prominent political figure well beyond Greece when he was their finance minister during the financial crisis, which pitted him against the giants of France, Germany, the global banks, the IMF and more.

He resigned after winning an anti-austerity referendum.

He's returned to writing and since established a party in Greece and the pan-European movement and is a regular contributor to political debate around the world.

So it's a pleasure meeting

to have him here.

So we normally start by asking our guests about their childhood, but you yesterday celebrated your 65th birthday.

And you were telling me before we started recording, you did it with an amazing event, which sounds like with some very interesting guests.

And I'm going to spring a bit of surprise on you, including the owner of your favorite ears on the planet.

Oh, no.