meta_pixel
Tapesearch Logo
Log in
Brussels Playbook Podcast

COP26 catch-up — Tech boss John Collison — EU gets (even) funnier

Brussels Playbook Podcast

POLITICO

News, News Commentary, Politics

4.4202 Ratings

🗓️ 4 November 2021

⏱️ 34 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

The COP26 climate talks, a top European tech entrepreneur and a return to the question of whether the EU is funny all feature in this week's episode. POLITICO's Karl Mathiesen joins Andrew Gray and the podcast panel from the press tent at COP26 in Glasgow with the latest insights into what is, and isn't, being accomplished. Also in Glasgow, POLITICO's Esther Webber gives us the lowdown on how Boris Johnson and his government are faring as the host and whether he's playing nice with Scottish leaders. And POLITICO's Matthew Karnitschnig in Berlin tells us how green the next German government could be. Then we move on to another big event taking place in Europe this week: Web Summit in Portugal. Ahead of the global tech gathering, POLITICO's Pieter Haeck sat down with one of Europe's most successful start-up founders, John Collison. The Irish native co-founded Stripe, an online payments platform, along with his brother, Patrick, a decade ago — and the company is now valued at $95 billion. He spoke to Pieter about the EU's start-up scene, how it differs from the United States and what he thinks policymakers can do to foster a stronger entrepreneurial ecosystem in Europe. Finally, we return to a super-serious issue we tackled on the podcast earlier in the year: Is the EU funny? POLITICO's Paul Dallison tells us about the birth of a new EU institution — a monthly Brussels comedy night called The Schuman Show — that came about partly as a result of that episode of EU Confidential. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

EU Confidential gets started right after this.

0:03.0

Today's episode is presented by Equinole.

0:06.0

Europe aims to provide sustainable, affordable and secure energy for its citizens and industries.

0:12.0

We in Equinole believe our energy sources and solutions will contribute to the carbon neutral Europe of the future.

0:18.0

All those promises will be nothing but blah, blah, blah, to coin a phrase.

0:24.7

And the anger and the impatience of the world will be uncontainable unless we make this COP26

0:30.2

in Glasgow, the moment when we get real about climate change.

0:35.3

Welcome to EU Confidential, the number one European politics podcast.

0:39.3

I'm Andrew Gray, Politico's EU editor in Brussels.

0:42.9

And that, of course, was UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, channeling climate activist Dretta

0:48.6

Tunberg.

0:49.5

There is no planet B. There is no planet blah.

0:52.9

Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. In his opening speech at the COP28

0:57.9

climate talks, we'll check in with our team in Glasgow to get on the ground insight into how the

1:04.0

talks are taking shape. And we'll also debate the outcomes of the G20 summit, which took place

1:09.6

in Rome last weekend, and touched on everything

1:12.6

from vaccines to tariffs and global taxes, not to mention climate as well. We'll get to all

1:18.6

of that in just a moment with our podcast panel. And later in this episode, you'll hear from one of

1:23.6

Europe's most successful startup founders, Irish tech entrepreneur John Collison,

1:29.2

on the state of Europe's tech scene and what he thinks policymakers can do to make it better.

1:35.1

And finally, we have an update on the pressing question we debated earlier this year.

1:40.3

Is the EU funny?

...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from POLITICO, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of POLITICO and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.

Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.