Out early for Patreon people… When a government fails to deliver the basics – like getting petrol to the pumps – can it ever win back the confidence it has lost? Is Keir Starmer pulling off the relaunch he needed at the Labour conference ? We ask special guest Stephanie Lloyd , former deputy director of Blairite think tank Progress, if the Party’s centrists have enough to offer beyond “Not Corbyn Any More.” And can James Bond still be a fantasy of omnicompetent Britishness in an age when Britain...
Sep 28, 2021•54 min•Season 1Ep. 410
They cancel Christmas earlier every year, don’t they? As petrol queues swamp Britain, will the EU lorry drivers we told to get out come back now we need them? (Spoiler: non, nein, όχι). Plus the German election results, Keir Starmer’s big moment at the Labour Conference, and phone hacking is back back back! Alex Andreou starts your week. “HGV drivers are not short of work in Europe. Offering them a visa is far too little, far too late.” “We’re now being told that Brexit means we can solve the pr...
Sep 27, 2021•27 min•Season 1Ep. 409
With gas prices soaring, and energy companies going bust, is it time for the Government to intervene? And while the Business and Energy Secretary described events as a “perfect storm”, how much of that storm was warned about, and even self-inflicted? Former energy trader and co-founder of one of the UK’s largest green energy suppliers, Amit Gudka tells Alex Andreou why Britain is so exposed to volatile prices, what the Government should be doing to solve the crisis, and if Brexit is to blame. “ ...
Sep 26, 2021•27 min•Season 1Ep. 408
Hear the music from every edition on our rolling playlist . Our new weekend pop culture roundtable returns with special guest Lynval Golding of The Specials , and their latest album, Protest Songs . Journalist Ian Harrison joins us to chew on new films The Farewell and Sweetheart , and we all listen to Bright Magic, the latest offering from Public Service Broadcasting . "The history of music can almost be seen as one long protest song." - Sian Pattenden. "I was born in Jamaica, I am living in Am...
Sep 25, 2021•1 hr 2 min•Season 1Ep. 407
Are humans really driven by desire for power, money, sex and comfort – or is something even deeper at play? Beneath greed, acquisitiveness, and even altruism and self-sacrifice is an even more fundamental motivation, says science writer Will Storr : the scramble for status. He tells Andrew Harrison about his new book The Status Game: On Social Position And How We Use It , and the hidden social systems that program us to perform acts of great benefit to our fellows, deeds of heroism… and some of ...
Sep 23, 2021•23 min•Season 1Ep. 406
COVID has transformed the way we work. But not everyone’s a winner, especially women, with many in jobs that make working from home is impossible, undertaking twice as much unpaid overtime, or being pushed back into the office at risk of potential pay cuts. So what can be done to support working women? Naomi Smith talks to Maya Jeyabraba and Rose Lasko-Skinner from DEMOS, who have just published Distanced Revolution , a report all about how COVID caused a revolution in home working - and what ne...
Sep 22, 2021•24 min•Season 1Ep. 405
As gas prices soar and energy providers go out of business, is Britain heading for another winter of discontent? Plus, how is the Republic of Ireland finding Brexit? Is there any sympathy for the UK in Brussels? Tony Connelly , Europe editor for Irish state broadcaster RTE, joins us to discuss. And are the French right to be angry about the new AUKUS alliance? “ On gas providers the Government sounds like Lord Farquaad, ‘ some of you may die ”' - Marie Le Conte “ Europe is worryingly dependent o...
Sep 21, 2021•55 min•Season 1Ep. 404
As Johnson and Truss head stateside, what will their New York trip mean for the UK’s environment strategy? Could AUKUS prove awkward at the international dinner table? And: why have so many people stopped wearing their COVID face coverings? Ros Taylor and Yasmeen Serhan chew on the new cabinet appointments, gas shortages, and the Great British Bake Off stars to watch. • “A lot of Johnson's New York trip is about making COP26 a success.” - Yasmeen Serhan • “The AUKUS is a direct challenge to Chin...
Sep 20, 2021•17 min•Season 1Ep. 403
Nuclear anxiety was an everyday emotion in the 1980s, sparking atomic pop culture and peace camps across the world. September 2021 marks 40 years since the RAF Greenham Common protests, when a handful of Welsh women left their homes to march against the arrival of US nuclear warheads at the base in Berkshire. Professor Jane Holgate and Stephanie Davies , author of Other Girls Like Me , are both former Greenham women. They tell Ros Taylor about their time at the camp, why Greenham was a vital spa...
Sep 19, 2021•23 min•Season 1Ep. 402
Hear the music from every edition on our rolling playlist . Welcome to the debut of our new weekend pop culture roundtable, as the podcast formerly known as Bigmouth joins The Bunker. This week, special guest Dan Gillespie Sells, composer of Everybody’s Talking About Jamie joins us to talk over the musical’s transition to Amazon Prime film. Critic Michael Hann helps us unpack Sex Education Series 3 on Netflix, and The North Water. Plus friend of the podcast Naomi Smith joins to share her pick of...
Sep 18, 2021•1 hr 11 min•Season 1Ep. 401
If Apple Inc. was an economy, it would be the eighth largest in the world. But facing huge lawsuits across the world, it is finally starting to encounter the weight of its success. Has the company abused its market monopoly position in tightening its technological grip? Alex Andreou talks to Brooke Masters , Chief Business Correspondent at the FT, and Reuters Tokyo’s Tim Kelly about big tech battles in India, Japan, and South Korea…and why Epic has merely taken a byte out of the Apple Store. “Ap...
Sep 16, 2021•27 min•Season 1Ep. 400
Parties are the engines of democratic politics. But they also pit us apart as people and polities. So what are the new ways of political polarization, and what can we do to tackle them? Alison Goldsworthy , CEO of the Depolarization Project and former Lib Dem deputy chair, and behavioural scientist Alexandra Chesterfield are two of the authors of Poles Apart and the brains behind the Changed My Mind podcast. They talk to Ros Taylor about deconstructing confirmation bias, why facts and stats can ...
Sep 15, 2021•30 min•Season 1Ep. 399
As we brace ourselves for “permanent” shop shortages and price hikes, we hear from lorry driver and transport expert Tom Reddy and Food and Drink Scotland’s James Withers on what’s behind the HGV driver shortages. Plus: how did hapless Education Secretary Gavin Williamson get to where he is today, and what does it take to make a sporting hero? And from the States, Joanna Walters unpacks Texas’ constitutional battle over abortion. "The margins in hauling are next to nothing." - Tom Reddy "I'm onl...
Sep 14, 2021•1 hr 2 min•Season 1Ep. 398
As the Government pushes ahead with plans to vaccinate children , is their COVID strategy only guided by the science when convenient? Plus: could Emma Raducanu’s stunning US Open success strike back against Priti Patel’s oppressive immigration policies? Alex Andreou and Arthur Snell unpack Afghanistan’s new cabinet , whether the latest lobbying scandals will affect Johnson’s rumoured cabinet reshuffle, and what Westminster will do to quell Sturgeon’s demands for Scottish independence. “We may be...
Sep 13, 2021•26 min•Season 1Ep. 397
When award-winning author and journalist Evan Osnos returned home to America after a decade away, he found a nation gripped by fear and anger, with democratic norms under attack. But how did this happen? Evan talks to Dorian Lynskey about his latest book, Wildland: The Making of America’s Fury, which chronicles two decades of political fury and disfunction, from the September 11th attacks right up to the January 6th Capitol Siege, by following ordinary people in the places he grew up, as they na...
Sep 12, 2021•30 min•Season 1Ep. 396
Hear the music from every edition on our rolling playlist . Welcome to the debut of our new weekend pop culture roundtable, as the podcast formerly known as Bigmouth joins The Bunker. This week, special guest Sarah Cracknell of pop couturiers Saint Etienne joins us to talk over their new album I’ve Been Trying To Tell You . Plus critic John Mullen helps us dissect the new Steve Martin/Selena Gomez/Martin Short crime caper Only Murders In The Building plus new albums from Antipodean punks Amyl &a...
Sep 11, 2021•53 min•Season 1Ep. 395
The book index might be an unassuming tool, yet it has a remarkable history - not least because it has shaped the modern world. Author, English professor and book historian Dennis Duncan talks to Alex Andreou about his latest novel Index, A History of the , which tells the remarkable story of our first search engine, from its invention (twice) in the 14th century, to preventing someone from becoming Speaker of the House, right up to our current love for Ctrl-F. “When we started to use books rath...
Sep 09, 2021•30 min•Season 1Ep. 394
Chances are you haven’t willingly eaten an insect. But two billion people are already bugging out on this sustainable source of protein. Could insects offer the perfect solution for our post-Brexit and pandemic supply chain problems? Entomologist Brian Fisher and Imperial College London’s Dr. Tilly Collins join Ros Taylor to chew on how we can change perceptions about insects in the West, how health clinics are battling for cricket powder, and why Welsh schools are already using mealworm mince i...
Sep 08, 2021•36 min•Season 1Ep. 393
You couldn’t make it up: the 20th anniversary of the September 11 attacks coincides almost perfectly with the fall of Afghanistan and the West is left wondering what it was all for. Gavin Esler, former diplomat Arthur Snell and terrorism expert Dr Maria Norris recall where they were on the day the world changed, and ask if we’ve learned the right lessons. Plus, will climate change plus conflict create a new kind of crisis in Afghanistan? And how did 9/11 change pop culture. “We were told we’d se...
Sep 07, 2021•59 min•Season 1Ep. 392
Parliament returns to a family-sized party pack of Government cruelty and ineptitude: a National Insurance hike that hits the lowest-paid the hardest, an end to the £20 Universal Credit bonus for the neediest families, and an Elections Bill that makes it harder for us to vote them out. Business as usual, then. Plus: the Texas Taliban’s war on abortion, the 20th anniversary of 9/11, and where in the world is Andrew Neil? Alex Andreou starts your week. “The message to backbenchers is, stop opposin...
Sep 06, 2021•27 min•Season 1Ep. 391
What stopped Heseltine, Ken Clarke, Dennis Healey and Kinnock from taking the top slot? Why didn’t Barbara Castle become Britain’s first female PM? The Observer’s Nick Cohen talks to the political columnist and podcaster Steve Richards about his new book The Prime Ministers We Never Had … the intriguing factors that prevented these politicians from reaching power… the tragedy of the Miliband Brothers… and the alternate futures we could have seen if these flawed talents had won. “Those with a for...
Sep 05, 2021•34 min•Season 1Ep. 390
The Middle Ages are an unloved tract of history, by turns alien and baffling – but these thousand years of violence, crisis and conquest set the foundations for our modern world in the most unexpected ways. Historian, TV presenter and journalist Dan Jones tells Alex Andreou how his new book Powers and Thrones unveils a medieval world few of us understand, the parallels between Millwall and the Middle Ages, and why Dick Whittington deserves more than his panto fame… “The real Dick Whittington was...
Sep 02, 2021•27 min•Season 1Ep. 389
The sight of Michael Gove getting his rave on in Aberdeen is the only cheering moment in a week of unremitting grimness. As the collapse of Afghanistan gives way to a growing refugee crisis , why is the UK Government doing the bare minimum for those who helped us? And what will the debacle mean for relations between government and military? Plus the Pen Farthing fiasco and the tyranny of TripAdvisor. “I am a Dog Fiend, but this Pen Farthing story made me so angry.” – Marie Le Conte “The Taliban ...
Sep 01, 2021•56 min•Season 1Ep. 388
Schools are back. Will the decision not to vaccinate 12-15 year olds turn classes into superspreader factories – or do we actually want school-age kids to catch COVID and build up immunity? Plus, why the Government won’t provide the catch-up funds that education needs. What the Pen Farthing episode tells us about sentimental Britain. And the shame of Afghanistan is just beginning. Ros Taylor starts your week. “It’s simple – the Government is pursuing de facto herd immunity by not vaccinating chi...
Aug 31, 2021•23 min•Season 1Ep. 387
For many he’s the great leader that Labour should have had. Now that he’s left frontline politics, Alan Johnson is trying his hand at writing fiction with his debut thriller The Late Train to Gipsy Hill out now. In a wide-ranging interview, he talks to Andrew Harrison about his love of suspense novels, whether the book’s plot alludes to the Litvinenko murder, Starmer’s first year in charge, Labour’s Brexit turmoil… and that infamous election night monologue against Jon Lansman. Also featuring mo...
Aug 30, 2021•25 min•Season 1Ep. 386
British-Turkish novelist and academic Elif Shafak is an international feminist icon followed by legions of passionate readers. She tells Dorian Lynskey about her latest novel The Island of Missing Trees , a story of identity, belonging and love that takes place between Cyprus and London – and how she too finds comfort in two places, her home city of Istanbul and her adopted home in the UK. Listen for a fascinating exploration of the power of fictional escapism and what it means to a citizen of t...
Aug 29, 2021•31 min•Season 1Ep. 385
Does the year we were born really shape us people? Are Gen X Snowflakes really battling Baby Boomers in an intergenerational war? Friend of the podcast Professor Bobby Duffy returns with Ros Taylor to discuss his latest book Generations , why age cohorts aren’t so consistent, and how COVID has changed Gen Z forever… “The cliches around generations are presented as cohort characteristics. But Gen Z are more materialistic just because they’re young.” “It’s simply a myth that Gen Z are more risk av...
Aug 26, 2021•25 min•Season 1Ep. 384
If we stopped trying to do everything, would we finally get chance to do what counts? Do to-do lists create anything but meaningless pressure? Can we ever really get everything done? Journalist Oliver Burkeman talks to Dorian Lynskey about how to answer the ultimate time management problem – the question of how best to use our brief moment on the planet – in his new book Four Thousand Weeks. “We’re all drawn to things that we struggle with.” “There shouldn't be anything embarrassing about the co...
Aug 25, 2021•24 min•Season 1Ep. 383
What sort of psychological shock with the fall of Afghanistan cause to the British establishment’s self-image? Will the country again became an incubator of terrorism? And how the hell is Dominic “Sun Lounger” Raab still in a job? Special guest SHIRAZ MAHER is the world authority on militant jihadism. He joins us to explain what the Taliban conquest of Afghanistan means. “We have a culture from the top down where nothing is a resignable offence.” – Justin Quirk “A belief set in that the US was t...
Aug 24, 2021•1 hr 3 min•Season 1Ep. 382
Recriminations worsen over the US withdrawal from Afghanistan and the UK’s indolent response to the refugee crisis. Can Dominic Raab survive as Foreign Secretary – and what does the debacle mean for Joe Biden’s presidency? Plus, get ready for COVID at the centre of healthcare forever. And does the Brexit-COVID logistics crisis mean that Christmas is already cancelled? Naomi Smith starts your week. “Johnson doesn't want to hold Raab to any standards that he might have to face himself.” “Afghanist...
Aug 23, 2021•25 min•Season 1Ep. 381
