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[elladastinkardiamou]

“There are two camps in Europe,” George Stathakis tells me, in his cramped parliamentary office: “The one that wants to go on with austerity, and the one that says: use quantitative easing and fiscal expansion to boost growth. Syriza is part of that second camp.”

Mr Stathakis, an MP for the far left Syriza party and professor of economics in Crete, is currently shadow development minister. But within six weeks, if the polls are right, he could be running the Greek treasury.

...Syriza’s progamme is clear. It will ask the EU to write off half the country’s debts and the ECB to be lender of last resort for the next 60 years for Greece. “Debt servicing costs would fall from 5 per cent of GDP to 2 per cent,” says Mr Stathakis. It will try to position itself alongside the new Spanish party, Podemos, and the German Left Party, as part of a wider anti-austerity movement in the eurozone.

What if the Europeans refuse? I ask him. Overnight a report in the German newspaper Die Welt quotes a German government source saying there is a plan to cut Greece off not just from ECB lending but from all EU funding, should Syriza wins. I put that to him and he smiles.

“The EU is run by statutes and regulations. I don’t think the ECB would cease funding Greek banks for reasons of political favouritism.”