19: Leo Varadkar: Ireland's Taoiseach on NATO, China, and Joe Biden

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1:15Here we have the Lemo Emu In its natural habitat Helping people customize their car insurance And save hundreds With Liberty Mutual fascinating it's accompanied by his natural ally doug uh limu is that guy with the binoculars watching us cut the camera they see us only pay for what you need at liberty mutual.com liberty liberty liberty liberty savings very unwritten by liberty mutual insurance company affiliates excludes massachusetts

1:49welcome to another episode of the rest is politics leading with me alistair campbell and with me Rory Stewart. Joined today by the Taoiseach of Ireland, Leo Veretka. I'm very very very happy we are to be with you. My pleasure, I'm a big fan. I was hoping to get around to doing this sometime and delighted we've found the opportunity here in Belfast. Thank you. So I want to start by just particularly for an audience outside maybe Ireland and further beyond the UK, just to get a sense of you. And this also does speak to a sense of how Ireland has changed. I think to have a gay background immigrant politician who's a doctor, that's not that common either.

2:29All sorts of things in your story that speak to a modern island. But I just think if you could maybe give us a sense about what it was like growing up here with your background, gay young man in a country that traditionally very, very conservative socially. Yeah, well, you know, I grew up in 1980s Ireland, which was a very different place, a conservative country in which our constitution forbade things like divorce. And when I was four years old, the people voted by an overwhelming margin to copper fasten our ban on abortion back in 83, 84. So that gives you a sense of how much has changed in Ireland in the past 10 or 20 years.

3:09and grew up in West Dublin, in suburban Dublin, as a person of colour, to use the term that people like to use now. Somebody's biracial. My mum's Irish, my dad's Indian. And would have been the only person in my class with dark skin and a funny name. And Ireland is a different place now. You know, Dublin is an extremely multinational, international city with people from all over the world. And I think it's fair to say that Ireland is now a very prosperous country, which it wasn't at the time, and is now a country that is socially liberal, more so than most countries in Europe and indeed the world.

3:42But me becoming Taoiseach, becoming leader of my party, does show how much has changed because it wasn't a big deal. I remember the day I was elected party leader of a party that's a centre-right party, and then was elected Taoiseach, Prime Minister of the country. It was a big news story internationally. You wasn't here? Yes, yeah. So I think in some ways that showed how much we changed, that it was a bigger deal around the world that what's this happening in Ireland, as opposed to Ireland, it already changed at that point, if that makes sense. You mentioned you were a party. If you were a British politician, would you be a Tory?

4:13No. I might have been in the past. Oh, that's a very good question. As a Taoiseach, I probably shouldn't answer that. Historically, Fine Gael would have been seen as closer to the Tories than, certainly than Fianna Fáil and certainly than closer to Labour. That's probably correct at a point in time. and I'm conscious of the fact that the Conservative Party was the party that brought Britain into the European Union and when you had your first referendum, Mrs Thatcher and others fought very bravely to keep Britain in the single market or the common market as they called it at the time. All parties change over time and the Conservative Party is currently, it would appear to me, going through a more nationalist phase and that may change and parties change too.

4:57And, you know, so the convenience now of not having to vote in other countries' elections. So I probably, as I said, wouldn't consider myself to be a Tory. But that's not to say that there weren't Conservative politicians who actually think are deserving of respect and made some magnificent changes. And, you know, we're here in Belfast. John Major, I think, was one of those who was crucial in the peace process with the Downstreet Declaration. Took big risks at the time, both for Europe and for peace in Northern Ireland. Who were your political heroes growing up? Were you particularly interested in certain politicians?

5:30You're growing up through the 80s, early 90s. Who were the people that you looked to? Well, you know, certainly in my own party and from my own party background, we're very much in the tradition of Michael Collins, somebody who believed in a stepping stone approach to our national story and ultimately was willing to make compromises to achieve that. Would have admired another former party leader, Gerard Fitzgerald, a lot, who, you know, was crucial in terms of trying to modernise Ireland in the 80s. And abroad, I mean, for listeners who aren't into the details of Irish politics, if you were trying to explain yourself to an American audience, how would you explain your political heroes, your political ideology, your vision of your role in the world?

6:11That's kind of harder to answer, I think. Definitely would have been attracted in the 90s, you know, when I was becoming more politically aware as a teenager by the kind of third way approach. that people like Bill Clinton, for example, and Tony Blair were trying to put across. And then maybe in a European context, more from the Christian Democrat side, people trying to do something quite similar like Helmut Kohl. But I'm always a little bit afraid to answer those kind of questions because everything is in its cultural context, its national context, and the context of the time. Are you essentially socially liberal and economically quite conservative?

6:47Is that a fair way to label you? Yes, if you need to label me. I think that binary approach to politics of left and right is too simplistic. So socially liberal would be correct, and economically liberal or economically conservative, depending on how you define those terms, would also be correct, in the sense that I believe in balancing the books, and I believe in the private and public sector working together. Which makes you, Tishik, sound a little bit from a distance, like David Cameron or George Osborne, who would have very much seen themselves as that. No, he's much more Tony Blair. Let's just move away from British politics.

7:20Well, if you take, you know, a big change that's happened in Britain, for example, somebody like David Cameron was very committed to overseas development aid and understood the importance of that in terms of soft power and finding a new place for Britain and the world. And I think it's a real shame that you've seen that now go backwards in Britain. And I hope that changes again. And also on climate action, he is somebody who understood that a progressive centre-right party needed to understand that agenda and maybe doesn't now. And gay marriage? And did it, yeah. And did it, yeah, absolutely. And looked at it, A, because he probably believed in it, but B, he also understood that elections are one in the centre and it made sense to move a centre-right party into that space.

8:02And that's changed, but it might change back again. But in terms of left-right thing, you know, often people describe being socioliberal as being centre-left. It doesn't have to be. Believing in people's freedom, in personal freedom, in liberty and in autonomy can also be a centre-right concept. You know, it's not the government's business to tell you what you do in your own life or in your own bedroom. That can be a writer's interview as well. Let's trust ultimate libertarian on the right. But let's stop talking about British Prime Ministers and focus on the Irish T-shirt that we've got with this.

8:35did you grow up in a in a very political household um i think i did but i didn't realize it at the time if that makes any sense because neither of my parents were active politically but we did talk about politics at the dinner table so you know our dinner table debates would have been about politics about what was happening in the news about money religion controversial issues would have been aware how my parents were voting what their thoughts and things were we would have watch the news a lot and because because my my dad spent a lot of time in england and so did my mom because they're both they met in england and got married there very nearly to where to where rory went to school yes so so so you know um they met they met in leicester but they lived in slough for quite some time quite some time um i'm told they worked in the hospital in slough when they were filming carry-on doctor so it's actually that long ago but um but um and got married in maidenhead uh which of course uh history's amazing constituency yeah but um you know again ireland at the time only really had two channels two tv channels one news which is rte and everyone watched the same program on a friday night and went to mass on sunday my household was different we obviously were aware of all of that but we also had radio 4 in the morning we'd the bbc news and you know because because my dad is indian because my folks spend so much time in england i was much more aware maybe than most kids of the broader bigger world out there and what about was your dad political when he was in india i i once got in a cab and somebody told me that they knew your dad and actually thought that if he was uk he would definitely be labor was he more left-wing than you um yes in terms of his sentiments but doesn't wouldn't like to pay higher taxes and would have a very low tolerance of people who don't work and don't make their contributions so So I think probably like a lot of people on the left, left in sentiment, but in reality, you know, is that really what they think?

10:31How important is the Indian part of your background? How important is that to you? It's part of my heritage. But does it make you particularly interested in that region as a politician now? It's just part of your personal background? I'm definitely interested in it. It's a fascinating country. Been many times, very curious about the politics there. it's going to have a big impact on our world. You know, what happens in China in the past 20 years has changed our world. What's going to happen in India in the next 20 years is going to change our world, in my view. But I'm also really interested in what's going on in the US, for example, and you know, I have family there too.

11:05But so, you know, interested, but maybe I should be more interested, quite frankly, than I am. Tisha, one of the great themes, of course, in India at the moment with Modi is populism. And one of the great themes in the United States is the rise of populism. And potentially, you could make the argument that the rise of Sinn Féin in Ireland is also a story of a certain type of populism, a certain type of political messaging, appeal, techniques, tactics. And your political career, I guess I'm sort of handing this to you, do you think it's coincided in a way with the rise of populism? How have you adjusted to that?

11:41What has that meant for you as a politician? Yeah, like Sinn Féin figures describe their own party as a left populist party. So, you know, it's not a, I don't think it's an insult to describe them as populist, left-wing, ethno-nationalist. That is what they are. And that's not what I stand for. But, you know, I think populism is largely an international phenomenon at the moment and is defined by some very simple things. You know, simple solutions to complex problems, emotions being stronger than facts. You know, my emotions are more important than your facts. Demonization of opponents and also these conspiracy ideas of elites plotting against the virtuous masses.

12:21And whether it's left populism or right populism, it's there. It's dangerous. How do you deal with that as a modern politician? Who's trying not to be like that? I'm still trying to figure that out. Still trying to figure that out. And certainly for people who are in opposition, I can see the attraction of it. When we were in opposition ourselves, we were populist a bit sometimes. So, you know, I'm not going to be overly righteous about these things. I think for politicians who are in government, you know, it's you do to continually try to convince people that you're on their side and really want to solve their problems.

12:54Because sometimes they doubt that, particularly when you're struggling to solve their problems. And that can be a real challenge to demonstrate that you're on their side and you care about their problems. And that's what you're spending most of your day and most of your weekend on. And I am, whether it's housing or health care or cost of living issues, you name it. And the other, I think, is actually to make inroads into solving those problems, because what people will accept rhetoric from opposition partitions, from government partitions, they want to see results. Just bringing it on to what's happening here now, what is your sense of where the peace process is, how well the Good Friday Agreement's working?

13:33And I'm particularly interested in your assessment of what Brexit has done to that process, but also to your relations with the United Kingdom. Well, I think the most important thing that we're marking 25 years after the Good Friday Agreement is that we do have peace in Ireland. And we didn't have that for a very long time. I'm part of a generation that has lived most of my life since the Good Friday Agreement was signed. And it hasn't just brought about peace in Ireland, it's also opened the door to prosperity, to social change, to migration into both Ireland and Northern Ireland, which has changed the demographic makeup of our countries for the better, in my view.

14:12And that's the most important thing. What's sad is that the promise of the Good Friday Agreement hasn't been fulfilled. For nine of the 25 years, the power-sharing government here in Northern Ireland has not functioned. And as a result of that, the North-South Ministerial Council hasn't functioned. And the East-West relationship isn't as strong as it used to be or it ought to be. And that's the real shame, is that the promise of the Good Friday Agreement hasn't been fulfilled yet. Is that Brexit? Is that Johnson? What have been the factors that have made that as bad as it's become? I think two things.

14:42initially it was that the more extreme parties became more popular in Northern Ireland. You know, the Good Friday Agreement was agreed by two moderate parties, the SGLP and the Ulster Unionists, and the more extreme, more nationalistic parties became stronger, and that made it harder to make it work. Let's not forget the DUP didn't accept the Good Friday Agreement at the start. It took a lot for them to accept it, including some modifications that were for the worse, not for the better, in my view, in St. Andrews. And then in more recent times, Brexit has definitely upended things. and that weakened and damaged the relationship between London and Dublin and also created issues for the relationships between the communities here in Northern Ireland.

15:20And that was entirely predictable. It's one of the many reasons why more moderate unions, for example, were against Brexit. And it's also why, for example, somebody like William Haig made the case against Brexit because of the impact it would have on the union. Tisha, when you look at Ireland's future, it's easy from the outside to be superficially optimistic, see it as this great success story. And of course, it's been incredibly successful. But over the next 20, 30 years, you, like every leader in the world, are going to be confronting soaring pension costs, aging population, problems paying for the welfare state, rise of artificial intelligence, potentially trade wars with China.

16:02How do you begin to think about how you steer an economy like Ireland out of its period of rapid growth into this more difficult choppy waters? Well, first of all, you know, Ireland is a great success story. There's 200 countries in the world and we're in the top 10 or 20 by almost any index, whether it's life expectancy, the best in Europe, educational attainment, full employment, more people coming into the country than leaving. And that includes more Irish citizens coming home every year than leave. So by any reasonable measure, notwithstanding our very real problems like the housing shortage, for example, Ireland is a success story.

16:38But yes, we face the same challenges that other Western countries are going to face. Our demographics are a bit more favorable than others. And when it comes to pension costs, for example, we're now bringing in a flexible pension age so people can choose to retire between 66 and 70 and their pension will be adjusted accordingly. So a lot of the figures you see around demographics talk about people over 65. And I think that's actually a mistake. You know, first of all, the pension age in our end is 66. And frailty in terms of healthcare terms and healthcare costs really doesn't kick in until 70 plus anymore.

17:12So I think one thing we need to do is plan for changes in demographics, but also not be too alarmist about them. You know, 65 years old is not what it used to be. And, you know, like I say, the pension age is higher than that. an ai t-shirt well that's that that is that's an absolutely fascinating area which i'm learning more about all the time and that's good because a lot of politicians yeah well look i think it's going to change our world as much as the internet has uh for the better and for worse and it's going to be fascinating where do you stand on the balance of better and worse at the moment oh it's i think almost always technology results in more changes for the better than the worse and is this part of your doctor background coming out in terms of what you see as the interest well like like yeah like Among the things in terms of the medical applications, AI being able to read x-rays, read pathology results quicker at lower cost and with less error than is done by doctors and scientists, to me, that is amazing in terms of what can be achieved.

18:10And it's already picking up patterns and markers that we didn't know existed before just because it's so smart. And I think you're not that far away from people being able to have medical consultations with avatars. You know, it's extraordinary if you think about it in terms of the practical applications that are possible from AI. And that's all going to be better from the point of view of the patient, from the point of view of the doctor. We may see the doctor shortage not being as big a problem in five or 10 years time as it is now. Yeah. When you went back to do a bit of keeping your hand in as a doctor during COVID, one, well done for doing that.

18:46That was pretty impressive leadership. But secondly, even in the time you'd been away, had you noticed much change within the delivery of health care? Yeah, look, there's been a phenomenal amount of change, particularly new medicines and new treatments. Because a lot of my partner's a consultant cardiologist and a lot of my friends are doctors, so I still keep in touch with what goes on. But there's been huge developments in new treatments and new therapies. What's frustrating is that so many things haven't changed. Probably not as bad in the UK as in Ireland, but the use of IT is still not where it should be.

19:17You know, you see how the banking sector, for example, has embraced modern technology. We're still going around our hospitals with paper charts, by and large. Not sure that's the case in the NHS, but, you know, it's extraordinary that we haven't made more progress on areas like that. Okay, Leo, thank you. Rory, let's just take a break. Americans told Washington what they want. Lower costs. Yet, Brandon Carr's FCC is considering a merger between TV station giants Nexstar and Tegna. If approved, millions of Americans will pay even more to watch TV. They'll pay more to watch the news, entertain their kids, or cheer on their favorite team.

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21:06I'd love a sense of, we touched briefly on China, but what did you make of Macron's attempt to steer a path from the EU separate to the US when it comes to China? And how would you think about China's threats against Taiwan and where Ireland would be likely to land if conflict develops. Can I just add to that in a similar field? Has the Russia-Ukraine conflict war changed your view or changed your view and the need for an assessment of Ireland's strategic and security interests and even the question of neutrality? I think it's definitely caused Irish people and the Irish government to think about neutrality and think about security in a way we did in the past.

21:48You know, Ukraine was a neutral, non-allied country. It got attacked. NATO countries will not be attacked. That's why Finland, a historically neutral country, has joined NATO and Sweden is going to join. They've made the calculus now that actually not being in military lines can potentially make you more vulnerable. You're a soft target. And that has made us think again. Where's your thinking on that at the moment? I don't anticipate. In fact, I'm sure Ireland will not apply to join NATO. But we will do three things. We're going to increase our own military spending, particularly when it comes to things like radar, cyber security, not just traditional security.

22:23And we will become more involved in European defence and security. We're part of the PESCO programme. Sinn Féin, by the way, wants to take us out of that. I think that's a big mistake, one of the differences between the government parties and the opposition parties. And we are part of NATO's Partnership for Peace, and we're going to renegotiate that link in the period ahead. Perhaps a little bit more important, though, is Irish people are now very comfortable with the idea that while we are militarily neutral. We're not politically neutral. We know exactly whose side we're on when it comes to the conflict between Russia and Ukraine.

22:54If back to the Cold War, it would have been more ambiguous. There would have been people who had a sneaking regard for the Soviet Union, believe it or not. You don't know much of that when it comes to Russia now. Tisha, can I bring you back? Alistair very swiftly came in behind my question. I want to pin you on China. What is your view? Do you think the US is doing the right thing in relation to China? Do you think we need to move into a position of more muscular confrontation with China? Or do you think a gentler approach would be better? You think a lot about the world, you travel a lot, but I haven't heard you talk much about issues with China and the Pacific.

23:24And is that because you're worried about Chinese trade with Ireland? You know, Chinese trade with Ireland is important and Chinese investment in Ireland is welcome. It's a fraction of the kind of investment that we have from the US or the UK or the European Union. So, you know, Ireland is part of the West and we share the same values around democracy and human rights. And when the West is at its best to believe in those type of things, it doesn't always demonstrate that in its action. So, you know, Ireland is part of the West, and that's never going to change. But I don't want the next few decades to be characterized by a new Cold War between the US and China.

24:00I don't believe President Biden wants that either, by the way. And I don't want to see Europe caught somehow in the middle of that. And I think that's a concern that we all have. So I think that's where President Macron was coming from. But perhaps he didn't say it in the right way, because, you know, the United States is showing unbelievable support for Europe, for Ukraine, and to then suggest that somehow, if Taiwan was attacked, and by the way, I don't believe China is going to attack Taiwan, they've... You don't believe that? I don't believe that. No, I could be absolutely wrong about that.

24:28By the way, I didn't believe Russia was going to attack Ukraine. So I, you know, I'm not going to claim to have gifts of foresight that that i don't have i didn't think they'd do it and i don't think that china will attack taiwan um but i think it was just a bit offbeat you know at a time when the us was showing such enormous support um you know in terms of guaranteeing the security of europe and helping to save ukraine from um being overrun uh for any european leader to be you know sort of ambiguous about support for america i think was you know probably wasn't exactly what he meant to say but that's that's sometimes how things happen we we talk quite a lot on the podcast about about the importance of soft power i'd be very interested in your assessment of the president biden's recent visit both the north to belfast very very briefly and then to that rather extraordinary few days in the republic now i know he's got his where is where's his irishness on his sleeve and the relationship's incredibly important but it it sort of felt to me like a pretty important moment am i overstating that no it was an important moment and it was a great visit and he is somebody who whose sense of irishness and his irish identity is very real you know probably the most irish president since kennedy if not more so um and he really cares about ireland really wants to know what he can do to help and wants to be informed about what's going on in ireland and that's not just him it actually then permeates throughout the administration how does that actually in practical terms help a smaller country to have that relationship with one of the two big powers in the world?

25:59I think it did help during difficult periods in the Brexit negotiations. When we were trying to come to agreements around the protocol, Windsor framework, backstop, all of those things. Sometimes Westminster doesn't always listen to what we say in Dublin, but they do listen to what the White House has to say, because it is the most important economic and military power in the world and because of the special relationship between the UK and the US. So if the president says something in London, they hear it. They don't necessarily always hear it. We say, unfortunately, that's the nature of things when you're a small country.

26:31It sounds to me like you've got the special relationship. No, well, I think we've a different sort of relationship. You know, the special relationship between the UK and the US is very real. I know it's important to President Biden, even though some people may doubt that, you know, the UK and the US have fought side by side in world wars and in conflict since then. And it's a very particular relationship that we don't have with the US. The one we have is a different one, but it's important as well, but in a different way. Tisha, you're unusual as a politician and having come into a department that you knew something about, you became Minister of Health having been a doctor.