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The Monocle Daily
France relaunches military service, Pope Leo’s first foreign trip and the housing crisis
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- [00:02]
Nina Dos Santos
Every day, the world presents you with hundreds of headlines. What do you believe? Who do you trust? The Financial Times cuts through complexity with clarity, accuracy and global perspective. Its journalism is guided by independence, not agendas. That's why leaders in business, policy and culture turn to one trusted source for facts, for insight, for what matters next. Source FT Read more and subscribe@ft.com.
- [00:36]
Stefan de Vries
You'Re listening to the Monocle Daily, first broadcast on 27 November 2025 on Monocle Radio.
- [00:44]
Andrew Muller
Has France taken a step towards reintroducing conscription? Why has the Pope made his first overseas trip to a country which doesn't appear to offer him much of an audience? And is fame really a health hazard? I'm Andrew Muller. The Monocle Daily starts now. FOREIGN. Hello and welcome to the Monocle Daily, coming to you from our studios here at Midori House in London. I'm Andrew Muller. My guests Nina Dos Santos and Elizabeth Bro. We'll discuss today's big stories and our weekly letter from has a Dutch stamp on it. Stay tuned. All that and more coming up right here on the Monocle Daily. FOREIGN. This is the Monocle Daily. I'm Andrew Muller and I am joined today by Nina dos Santos, international broadcast correspondent and former CNN Europe editor, and by Elizabeth Brawr, senior fellow at the Atlantic Council and author of the imminent title Undersea War. Hello to you both.
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Nina Dos Santos
Hello.
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Andrew Muller
Hello, Elizabeth. By queuing up what I'm sure is going to be an interminable series of rolling book plugs, you have been recently away speaking about maritime security, specifically undersea maritime security.
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Elizabeth Braw
That too, but generally about all the disorder that's happening on the oceans. And that is not an insignificant matter, because if there's disorder on the oceans, we don't get the goods that we depend on. And the same goes for the seabed, as I think we have all become.
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Andrew Muller
Aware in recent times, cables being snapped and so forth.
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Elizabeth Braw
Exactly. And just a few days ago, Yantar, which is a famous infamous Russian research ship, turned up off the coast of the uk and it's infuriating every time she turns up. But the problem is every vessel has a right to sail wherever they like outside Canter's territorial water. So that's why the order on the oceans and underneath the waves is so important and it's disintegrating.
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Andrew Muller
Nini, we'll plug someone else's book now because you have recently been attending the book launch, to which, scandalously, my invite appears to have been lost in the post of somebody who was recently on this very program talking about the very book in question, which is, and I will overcome my seething bitterness to acknowledge this, excellent.
- [03:17]
Nina Dos Santos
It is indeed Evan Osnos's book, which is the haves and the have yachts. And he's been talking about a different type of vessel completely, the Giga yacht, which has now been embraced in full conspicuous fashion by a whole bunch of tech bros from the United States. And the size of these particular vessels and just the extreme luxury of them really makes the mouth water and the eyes goggle. And I suppose one of the points he's also making in this book is that this is no longer the preserve of your kind of Bond villain type Russian oligarch. These ones are your sort of technorati types and they're even more expensive and often they come in twos because you've got to have a smaller yacht to follow your big yacht, as you know, Jeff Bezos says, obviously. And for your wife's helicopter, well, even more obviously, as opposed to your own helicopter, like say members of the Middle Eastern royal families.
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Andrew Muller
I mean I. It's the ostentation, Nina. I get by with just the one. I don't know why people need it.
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Nina Dos Santos
Whatever floats your boat.
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Andrew Muller
Exactly. I don't know why people need entire squadrons of them. How was it? Was it your standard London book launch? I. E? Was it people standing awkwardly about with undrinkables in vandal in crinkly plastic cups?
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Nina Dos Santos
No, the wine was pretty good. It was over at the Bluebird in Chelsea. But there were no seats this time actually, so it was standing room only. Next time I'll take you.
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Andrew Muller
Please, please do.
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Nina Dos Santos
I thought he'd been on your show.
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Elizabeth Braw
On a related note of what these super rich American tech bros don't understand is they. They also spend their money buying or building shelters and bunkers for the imminent or not so imminent apocalypse of the world. But I wonder what they'll do in those bunkers. Because it is lonely in a bunker. So it's better to just be with people. When of the world camps.
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Andrew Muller
If you've got that much money, you can buy friends. We will start in France, which in common with many European nations saw the end of the Cold War as a cue to desist with conscription, and which in common with many European nations more recently has wondered if they might have been premature in ceasing to regard Russia as a menace. President Emmanuel Macron has announced a new national service program. Starting next year, 18 and 19 year olds can volunteer for 10 months of military training paying circa €800amonth. The first in intake will be around 3,000 recruits, rising to 50,000 annually by 2035. Nina, as regular listeners will know, you have lived in France at various points. Had you been qualified for such a program, would you have hastened to your local recruiting office?
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Nina Dos Santos
Well, I was educated in French, including here in the United Kingdom. And I do remember that there's an annual day when they sort of hoist the flag and everything and, you know, try and keep this military spirit going, which has gone on since basically the French Revolution, since I think it was 1798 when they brought in the first rules that decreed that each French man at the time was also born a soldier. And so essentially what Emmanuel Macron has been trying to do for some years here is trying to regenerate this sense of sort of civic duty. He initially had a scheme that he launched a number of years ago that was far more limited. It was viewed as being not terribly successful and quite expensive, but trying to encourage young people to voluntarily start considering the idea of conscription. But now France is going one step further, as you were saying before, 25 years, years after conscription, now are suggesting that they would pay 18 to 19 year olds a salary of €800 per month if they were to volunteer their time for more than a year or so. France, you know, is having something of a wake up call. We had this new chief of staff, General Fabien Mendon, who famously made that speech about seven days ago where he sort of shocked the political establishment in France and said, look, you have to realize we may come to a time in the next three or four years where we may have to sacrifice our own children if we go to war with a belligerent neighbor like Russia. So France is waking up. But it's not the only one. Belgium has taken similar steps. We know that the Baltic countries are very much concerned that they've been needing to mobilize their citizens for many years and have been doing so with some effect. There are some outliers, the uk, of course, and Spain, that do not want to engage in any kind of talk about having a conscription again.
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Andrew Muller
The Belgians, I Note, are paying €2,000amonth. So people with, you know, dual French, Belgian nationality have a fairly clear choice there. That's actually quite good money for a 17 year old, apart from anything else. But, Elizabeth, does this feel like President Macron is, is testing the waters somewhat, trying to see what public enthusiasm there is? Because this is, so far, to be clear, a voluntary program. They are not going to start yanking teenagers out of their beds and forcing them to peel Spuds and bash the square. But does it feel like that's sort of what he and perhaps other countries are working towards?
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Elizabeth Braw
I don't think so. And that's why it's important to remember that it's not conscription, it's national service, because nobody has to go. And what different countries have been experimenting with or introducing is a selective national service. Norway volunteered or pioneered it years ago and Sweden has since introduced it to Lithuania. And now Germany is looking at the similar scheme, although they are debating very passionately whether it should be a lottery or whether it should be by selection. But anyway, so we're seeing all this innovation in Europe because. And the really important point is no country needs every teenager in its armed forces. The armed forces don't work the way they worked when Prussia set up conscription back in the day.
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Nina Dos Santos
So.
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Elizabeth Braw
But then you have to decide, as any given country, how do you select the people you want? Do you do a lottery? Do you assess everybody, which is what the Norwegians do, and now Sweden also, or what is it you do or do you do like France is now going to do? You essentially ask them to sign up voluntarily. And the point is, I think that it should be an attractive proposition. Right, so if it's not attractive, who would serve you would not get particularly skilled or talented young people. But if you make it an attractive choice, then obviously the outcome for the armed forces will be better.
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Andrew Muller
Is the pitch, though, perhaps, if not so much. Nina, working towards bringing back conscription, as it was understood. Is this another way of European governments trying to make it clear to European publics that this is serious? This actually is something we need to think about. I mean, today, for example, it looks to, I don't think anybody's great surprise, like the latest mooted peace deal in Ukraine is on the verge of pancaking. Are things like this a way of saying to European publics, you do need to start getting your head around this?
- [10:15]
Nina Dos Santos
Yes, I think so. And, you know, it was only a year or so ago, wasn't it, that Kaia Kallas made her famous statement where she said, look, Russian troops could breach NATO in places like the Baltics within the next four years. Now you've got the, you know, senior members of the French military saying it could be within three to four years. So the timeframe is accelerating, the risk is accelerating. They're all spending, like Billio, on military hardware, including Germany, and France is making a lot of that hardware. But actually what they're realizing is they don't have the manpower to operate some of This, I mean, you look at the size of the French military personnel, it's about 200,000, with another 47, 50,000 reservists. The UK, 136,000 if you include, you know, the Royal Navy, the army, the RAF and so on and so forth. And they've got to start getting people ready and trained to use this military hardware and to use it in a new fashion, because, you know, spending money on the old types of things like expensive missiles and aircraft carriers is one thing, but the reality is the war that's being fought in Ukraine is a technological war and it's also quite cheap. It's done with drones and it's done in a completely different fashion.
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Elizabeth Braw
I do have to come in there. There's still traditional infantry warfare, which is why casualties are quite significant, significant on both sides. And that is the unfortunate reality. If that were not the reality, then we would need more people for the armed forces. And I remember back when Donald Rumsfeld was in charge, he was talking about a completely new kind of war that wouldn't require a lot of people. Well, it's still there, unfortunately, which is unfortunate for all the young people out there. And I feel bad for 18 and 19 year olds. We have left 17 year olds, 16 year olds, we have not left them a good legacy. And now they are going to. They may have to. They may be asked to serve. Let's hope that the proposition is such that they will want to do it, because if we force them to do it, then they are not going to like it and they are going to ask why they were not consulted. So that's why it's so important to make it selective and pick the best in any year group.
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Nina Dos Santos
Just the one thing I suppose I was referring to is in the Baltic countries, in some of these countries, they are already starting to experiment with computer games to teach children, I suppose, how to use drones. So, yeah, the nature of warfare is changing, but the manpower is still needed.
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Andrew Muller
Well, to Turkey now, where Pope Leo XIV has descended on his first foreign trip. In his present role, it is perhaps a surprise on a couple of fronts. One, that it has taken him six months to bestir himself from the Vatican and get out. And about two, that he has chosen a country whose population is perhaps 0.2% Christian and Catholic to a degree insufficient to even register on most surveys. In fairness, Leo is undertaking an itinerary originally planned by his late predecessor, Francis. From Turkey, he will travel to Lebanon. Nina. Nevertheless, is it a bit weird that he spent six months in the Vatican before deciding, I will go out and see the world.
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Nina Dos Santos
Well, going to see the world has become an increasingly important part of the papacy over the last few months, under.
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Andrew Muller
Francis, though, in particular, who.
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Nina Dos Santos
Yes, that's right. And I remember when I was working in Rome at the time of John Paul ii, just before he died as well, some of the popes were a lot more elderly, a lot more infirm and weren't able to, you know, undertake these big voyages. But now there's a sense that, you know, the Catholics around the Western world are not growing in large numbers, and also that the Pope can extend the importance of the papacy to other parts of the world where, yes, there are small populations, but still the Pope's role can be important in diplomacy. And what's interesting about him choosing Turkey is not just because we've got the 1-700-year anniversary of the Nicene Creed, so he's going to be taking in the important town of Iznik. It's also that he's going to Lebanon as well. And Turkey has played such an important role in what's happened over in Syria. And there are concerns that perhaps Syria may at some point be able to take some territory from Lebanon and that there are Christians living there. So I suppose that this is the backdrop as well to that kind of international Vatican diplomacy, which I know you've done shows on here on Monocor radio, because I've listened to them, they're very good. So I think it's part diplomacy and also part of, you know, that pastoral flock that still remains in Turkey that, by the way, Recep Tayyip Erdogan was not terribly nice to at the start of his time in office a few.
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Andrew Muller
Years ago, he was not. Elizabeth, is there value, though, too, or diplomatic value in the Pope going well anywhere, really, but especially to Turkey. And Turkey has put on a full dress production for him, as they kind of obliged to, because he is, as people, I think, sometimes forget, not merely the Pope, he is a head of state, admittedly the head of a very small state, but nonetheless, he's a head of state. Does he command a presence? Does he have diplomatic heft in a place like Turkey, where. Where the Catholic population is as small as it is?
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Elizabeth Braw
He does. And we shouldn't discount the importance of Turkey, which used to be. It hasn't been Turkey for that long, this particular place on the planet. We shouldn't discount it because has been crucial in the history of Christianity. The Nicene Creed is the creed of global Christianity. It is what everybody who is Christian signs up to say they believe in. And this is what the world's Christians, when they got together in the 3002 actually was 325, was it not? That's how they decided what it is that you believe in as a Christian. They agreed on that there. That's why it's so incredibly important. And so it's how often does an anniversary like that come along? How many things, how many things last for 1700 years? So here we are. But it's also, I think, obvious that the Christians in the Middle east have suffered a great deal in recent conflicts. And Pope Francis felt very strongly about supporting Christians in Gaza. And now we are seeing Christians, along with others in the west bank, also suffering. And of course, Lebanon continues to struggle. And it's an important signal. And yes, the Vatican is a tiny state, but it's backed by 1 billion people. How many other leaders do have 1 billion people that they represent?
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Andrew Muller
Nina, I think everybody is still Catholic and not getting used to the idea of a pope with a Chicago accent. And obviously, I think his most anticipated foreign visit will be when and if he goes to the United States, not least because he has been fairly disguised in his criticisms of the United States, current head of state. I mean, he's gone about as far as a pope legitimately can. How big a deal is that going to be?
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Nina Dos Santos
Well, I just thought that would be really, really interesting one to watch because remember, J.D. vance, the Vice president, is a Catholic convert. There are some very significant members of the MAGA movement who are Catholics, and some of them are actually Catholic converts and who are very vocal about their views on which political direction they wanted the Vatican to take. A number of them were qu hostile to Pope Francis when he was still alive and wanted perhaps somebody who would go back to the old days of the more traditional Catholic doctrine and dogma in place in the Vatican. And obviously that hasn't happened. But I don't know, to be a flyer in the wall would be interesting to see how Donald Trump would deal with Pope Leo. Didn't he at one point say that he wanted to be wouldn't mind being pope as well as everything else?
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Andrew Muller
He did post an AI image of him as Pope Donald, which did seem mildly sacrilegious, if anything, is just finally, though, on this, Elizabeth, broadly speaking, if we look at the trip he has undertaken to Turkey and is undertaking to Lebanon, do we yet get any sense of what kind of pope he wants to be, perhaps especially in comparison to his predecessor Francis, who was a very different pope from what he succeeded?
- [19:04]
Elizabeth Braw
Well, it is extraordinary, is it not, that the cardinals manage to sel elect be inspired to appoint a leader who is somehow well liked by everybody. He is a moderate, but not too much of a reformer, but he is a reformer. So he has received universally positive reviews so far. And the reason that that matters is that, yes, you are not selected or voted into Office by the 1 billion people you represent, but you still have to be credible with them and around the world. And so we saw that the pendulum swing from Pope Benedict, who was traditionalist, quite interested in scholarly matters and liturgy, to Francis, who was more of an activist. And I think Leo is a combination of the two, sort of the two in, let's say, in moderation, and appeals to a lot of people as a result. And heaven knows, so to speak, heaven knows we need a global leader who enjoys the trust by people, not only the people he represents or the or who have voted for that person, but who can drum up some sort of global opinion for the things that the world has to solve, because there is no other leader with global credibility at the moment.
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Andrew Muller
Well, on the subject of things which the world has to solve, if there are two vexations which most of the world's advanced democracies presently have in common, they are a shortage and associated expense of housing and an eruption of far right populism tending towards the xenophobic. The Progressive Politics Research Network, for one, believes the two phenomena to be related, and it is not difficult to see why. It is the easiest play imaginable for the populist tub thumper to tell people struggling to buy or rent a home that the reason is that someone foreign is already living in it. The positive upshot, this research suggests, is that if parties of the centre can take care of the problem of housing, the problem of populism might take care of itself. Elizabeth, is it necessarily as simple as that, do we think? I'm not saying that solving the problem problem of housing is something that can be done overnight, but if it could be, would it fix the other thing?
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Elizabeth Braw
I have to say, first of all, your segue from the Pope to social housing was unsurpassed. So that has to be put on the record. Then, when it comes to social housing or housing provided by the state at some sort of discounted rate, I hear the same debate in every country. No country has figured out how to do it to a degree that satisfies most people. There is one version in France, a different version here. In Scandinavian countries, they were actually quite ambitious decades ago. In Sweden, for example, there was something called the 1 million program, where the government built 1 million housing units, not just social housing, but built by the government to make sure everybody had a place to live. But isn't the fundamental issue, Andrew, what we expect the government to do to even out differences in access in our societies? And I have yet to encounter a country that has found a solution that pleases most people.
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Andrew Muller
Is the argument against this proposition, Nina, not perhaps, that supposing the problems of housing, which are considerable, were solved, the far right would just find something else to block, blame foreigners for, wouldn't they? I mean, that's not. It's not really the issue that matters. It's being able to get enough people to blame foreigners for whatever it is.
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Nina Dos Santos
No, the underlying issue is a lack of security. So it's quite interesting. I remember when I was covering the European parliamentary elections in the summer of 2024, when we saw that far right surge among European MEPs and support for them. Basically what you heard time and time again in the campaigning running up to that was this conflict conflation of the idea of Europe's borders not being secure, your future not being secure, your economic future not being secure, your families not being secure on the streets because of migrants, allegations that migrants would attack family members of yours. It goes time and time and time back to this issue of security, fundamentally economic security, whether that includes having a house over your head, because housing costs are the biggest component here of people's expenses, especially young people's. And if people are more insecure, they are more easy to manipulate. And I think that is why this far right message becomes so seductive to them, because it's this, against this backdrop of lack of security for the younger.
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Andrew Muller
Generations, is it therefore actually as simple as build more houses, Elizabeth, or do governments need to find other means of reassurance? Because again, on the subject of manipulating people, it's not hard to persuade people that they are, in some respect, insecure, because everybody is to some degree or.
- [24:15]
Elizabeth Braw
Another, yes, everybody is insecure. And we're only one illness away from encountering significant problems ourselves. I think there needs to be. The government in any Western country needs to, to be much more transparent about the burdens facing our societies. So if the expectation is because voters don't know any different, if the expectation is that the government will solve the housing shortage, then there will obviously be a massive upset when that doesn't happen. But at the moment, how can our governments possibly solve the housing shortage? And by the way, where would those houses be built? I hear academics say all the time, well, we need new cities. Well, who would live in those new cities? Not new, not you professors, because you would want to live in the nice parts of London. So you assume that somebody else will want to live in a newly constructed community. But then the other issue is how much money is available for the government for these sorts of initiatives. Also, considering the deteriorating security situation that will force government, it's already forcing governments to spend much more on defence.
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Nina Dos Santos
And if I may, just going back to our original story when we were talking about the French reintroducing this idea of voluntary national service, I mean, the reality is, is that the current French government's biggest competitor is the far right. And structurally, France has had huge problems with youth unemployment. So this idea of sort of getting young people into some form of work or some form of sort of community motivation isn't necessarily a bad one. Here in the United Kingdom, just yesterday we had a big budget which, you know, again was quite contentious because it involved high taxes to pay for a lot of people who often work, including because they've got mental health problems and they've never been in work because they're young. So there are advocates who say that, you know, this type of national conscription, if you want to call it that, or if you want to call it national service, isn't actually a bad thing and could turn people away from the far right.
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Andrew Muller
Well, sticking somewhat with the theme of apparent exceptions to the normal rules of supply and demand to fame, a condition which remains widely prized despite the fact that it has never been easier to acquire in the social media. Pantechnican, pretty much any bozo who can be bothered can acquire a measure of renown. It now seems that there are other reasons why the pursuit of fame is best avoided. According to new findings by boffins who studied the lives of 648 singers of varying prominence. The brighter the spotlight, the likelier it's subject to wilt. Beneath its glare, a Listers were 33% more likely to die younger than the also rans. Elizabeth, they say that being famous is as bad for you as smoking. I don't know what they say about famous people who also smoke. I didn't, I'll be honest, get that far into the report. Does that seem like a plausible proposition to you?
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Elizabeth Braw
It does. So don't try it. Andrew, you can keep smoking, but don't try this double whammy. But if you look at child actors, for example, can you think of a single child actor other than Shirley Temple who has had an enjoyable and fulfilling life after being a child actor it's misery. And by the way, I looked up the other day, what happened to the stars, the two child stars of Fanny and Alex. So Alexander is now a famous professor of medicine, so he has done very well in his chosen field. Fanny works in the customer service center. So you don't necessarily as a child star or any sort of star go on to continued success and what misery it is to have been famous and then not be recognized anymore.
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Andrew Muller
Is it arguable, Nina, though the, the thing here is that the kind of people who become famous rock stars are possibly the kind of people who were likely to overd it somewhat even if they weren't famous. And it was just the fact that being famous and presumably wealthy gave them more opportunity to overdo it.
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Nina Dos Santos
I'm not just rock stars. I've worked in broadcasting for 25 years on US TV and you know, you have even among the sort of more stoic news crowd, you have big personalities and the reality and you have big audiences as well. So the stakes are really high and people are hyper focused when they're live on air in front of hundreds of millions of people. But then the sort of emotional comedown and this roller coaster ride of emotion, you're trained to do it as an anchor person. I was an anchor woman at CNN for many, many years. But the reality is it does take an emotional toll. And I think also as you pointed out quite rightfully, people who are creative and have these natural personality traits are drawn to these industries. They get a kick out of performing but then they don't like as you were saying before Elizabeth, when the spotlight moves on and then they have to readjust to a completely different type of life and they find it quite difficult. Now rock stars also you he'd written about this industry for many years, Andrew, aren't making quite the money to cushion their retirement as they used to in those days. So that's an added disadvantage for them too. To deal with this, I did want.
- [29:33]
Andrew Muller
To close by asking you each in turn. I'll ask you first, Elizabeth too. I mean I think humbled yourself before the wisdom we have just broadcast out there. Was this something you ever coveted at any level did you at any point dream of, I don't know the kind of things people dream about when they think I'd like to be on the front covers of magazines, etc.
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Elizabeth Braw
Well, to make this broadcasting interest broadcast interesting, I should say yes, but I have to say no. I did, I did want to become a famous, successful fall athlete, but I don't think I Ever considered the fame?
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Andrew Muller
I mean, Nina, the only magazine I've ever been on the front cover of was the color supplement of the Wagga Wagga Advertiser.
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Nina Dos Santos
And that when you said color supplement.
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Andrew Muller
Yeah, that paused. Yeah. That did not disrupt my life untowardly. I was still able to walk the streets unmolested. Even the streets of Wagga Wagga. Was this something you ever aspired to other beyond being obviously a face on a screen recognizable to many, many millions?
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Nina Dos Santos
Well, I've got a twin sister who Paul thing is not on TV and gets stopped all the time. I mean, I get stopped and I'm asked if I'm her and then they say, who. Who are you? I said, well, clearly you're not very famous television presenter anyway. But I've got a confession to make which I haven't made before. I was on Coronation street as an extra age 6 with my twin sister. I think that was the only time she was on tv. But no, I mean, I fell into broadcasting because I like journalism and, you know, TV seemed to be a sort of glossy sort of place. The reality is, as we all know, TV news isn't quite as glamorous as, say, rock stars and God knows what. But I think at the end of the day, look, this is becoming more. The visibility question is becoming more and more of an. For everybody, not just whether you're a TV presenter, radio presenter. Politicians are having to deal with having to choose that poison chalice of visibility and all the kind of negative feedback they get from anonymous accounts. Because the reality is, whoever you are, if you're a successful business person, you just can't afford to be anonymous in today's age. And so, unfortunately, I think everybody's gonna have to share a little bit more of that depression online.
- [31:46]
Andrew Muller
Well, on that cheerful thought, Nina Dos Santos and Elizabeth Brough, thank you both for joining us. Finally, on today's show, time for our letter from. And Today contributor Stephane de Vries takes us to the Dutch village of Mordijk.
- [32:01]
Stefan de Vries
There is a peculiar quality to the light in Moordijk on an autumn afternoon. Golden leaves scatter across neat Dutch streets, while just beyond the village boundaries, the skeletal frames of refineries and chemical plants pierce the skyline. This is a community living in the shadow of Europe's largest as sport, where the rhythm of industry has become an inescapable part of daily life. But soon that rhythm will be all that remains. This village of 1130 souls is about to vanish, not through natural disaster or gradual decline, but through a decision taken by its Own municipal council. The land is needed, they say, for the expansion of the power port region, a critical link in the Netherlands energy infrastructure. The high speed rail line to London and Paris thunders past Mourdijk without stopping, a rather apt metaphor for a village that European progress seems determined to leave behind. Within three hours, passengers can reach either capital, yet they barely register this community's existence from the Eurostar windows, according to national newspaper reports. The announcement at this month's community meeting landed like a hammer blow. Residents described a mixture of shock and resignation. Many had suspected this outcome for years, yet hearing it confirmed proved devastating nonetheless. The municipality requires 450 hectares for energy infrastructure, three new power stations, high voltage voltage transmission lines and hydrogen production facilities meant to replace natural gas. The grid operator will construct a substation here essential for meeting future electricity demands from industry, housing and shipping. It's a national mandate, part of the hugely urbanized Netherlands frantic search for space and energy independence in an increasingly uncertain world. What makes this case particularly strange, striking is the timeline. A government commission recommended Mordack's removal 60 years ago, leaving residents in what the Volksrand, a national newspaper described as a perpetual state of uncertainty. Recently there were even plans to renovate the harbour and construct new housing. Seven wind turbines were erected with subsidies offered for home insulation. One resident told reporters that contractors had begun sustainability improvements on his home home the very day after the villager's fate was announced. The newspaper interviews paint a picture of multi generational displacement. Elderly residents spoke of having fled during the war and again during the devastating 1953 floods, and now facing a third upheaval, this time orchestrated by their own government. Families describe living on the same street for days, decades, with children and grandchildren in neighboring houses now facing separation as they scatter to find new homes. By 2028, construction on the energy stations is scheduled to begin. They should be operational five years later. The mayor has indicated that residents might remain for up to a decade, though compensation packages remain frustratingly vague. The village council speaks of fair financial arrangements and and housing priority, but specifics are scarce. Residents questioning the timing and necessity of the decision. Alternative locations were apparently considered, but deemed unsuitable, as they would affect multiple surrounding villages rather than just one. The logic of sacrificing Mordyk to spare others offers cold comfort to those who've built lives here. Perhaps most poignantly, several residents mentioned the village cemetery. Generations of families buried in plots where descendants had expected to join them. That particular form of continuity, stretching backwards and forwards through time, is about to severe. Some have suggested the municipality can retain the name Mourdag even without a village bearing it, after all other Dutch municipalities have done the same. And that way names can persist as administrative ghosts. But as one long time resident told the regional broadcast, names aren't communities. The carnival associations, the neighborhood networks, the organic rhythms of a place where people have lived for generations, these cannot be relocated or compensated. Soon the church bells will fall silent, the lawnmowers will stop and children's voices will fade from these streets, and the only sound remaining will be the hum of transformers and the distant rumble of trains that never stop carrying Europeans towards their futures, built quite literally on the foundations of places that used to be home. This is Stefan Vries for Monocle in the Netherlands.
- [37:05]
Andrew Muller
Thank you, Stefan. That is all for this edition of the Monocle Daily. Thanks to our panelists today, Elizabeth Broh and Nina Dos Santos. Today's show was produced by Carlotta Rebelo and researched by Joanna Moser. Our sound engineer was Steph Chungu. I'm Andrew Muller here in London. The Daily is back at the same time tomorrow. Thanks for listening, Sam.