Alas Vine & Hitchens

On this week’s episode, Peter and Sarah tussle with medical tourism and bloody murder. Peter wants to know what drives an assassin to kill and Sarah is asking why we’re allowing our already overrun NHS to become a destination for so called health tourists.Elsewhere, modern Methodism, being heckled by Danny Kruger while he was still a staunch Tory and is it the Union Jack or Union Flag or can it be both? Tune in to find out.On our reading, watch and listening list this week: ·      Night Falls On The City – Sarah Gainham·      The Rage Against God – Peter Hitchens·      Critical: Why the NHS is being betrayed and how we can fight for it – Dr Julia Grace PattersonPlease do get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’.Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously PopularTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On this week’s episode, Peter, and Sarah struggle to think of Camilla as Queen but for quite different reasons, though Sarah did very much enjoy her cosy supper at Clarence House, not least the excellent wallpaper and furnishings.While both bemoan the sinking state of Britain’s submarine fleet, and Peter recalls the time it was leaked that we once leased our missiles from the US much to the fury of then PM Margaret Thatcher.Elsewhere, yet another listener has been dreaming of Peter, Peter and traffic lights, and we finally find out what car he drives, please do stay tuned for that.On our reading, watch and listening list this week: ·      The Horse and His Boy – C.S. Lewis·      Cracked: Why Psychiatry is Doing More Harm Than Good – James Davies·      No Room for Mistakes: British and Allied Submarine Warfare, 1939-1940 – Geirr HaarrPlease do get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’.Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously PopularTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On this week’s episode, Peter and Sarah discuss vexillology, or flags for the layman. Not least how Peter was once saved by flying a rather tattered Union Jack while attempting to flee Somalia.While Sarah pores over our copious emails to mull over the suggestion from a listener that we take illegal migrants and put them in the army or at least to work.Elsewhere, someone’s been dreaming lucid dreams about Peter and our hosts bemoan the state of our ever-failing education system. On our reading, watch and listening list this week: ·      Worth Dying For: The Power and Politics of Flags – Tim Marshall·      Jabberwocky – Lewis Carroll·      Education in Britain: 1944 to the Present, 2nd Edition – Ken JonesPlease do get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’.Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously PopularTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this exclusive episode, Sarah Vine & Peter Hitchens managed to grab lady of the moment Nadine Dorries, fresh from her unveiling at Reform’s conference.They tackle the state of the right, where it all went wrong for the Conservatives, whether the union to end all unions if one the cards, and yes… whether singing on stage is an acceptable face of a serious party.It’s a hum-dinger - you won’t want to miss it.Please do get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’.Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensGuest: Nadine DorriesProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously PopularTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On this week’s episode, should we be worried about Keir Starmer’s digital IDs when, according to Sarah, we’re a slave to the digital idiom as it is. Not that Peter quite sees it like that. Nor do the pair see eye to eye on the raising of children and what staying at home means for the parents or baby. Voices were raised, thoughts were shared, it would be untrue to say compromises were met.Elsewhere, Peter doesn’t know what car he drives, its size he’s fairly sure of and that it can get him to the occasional funerals of his friends. Sarah told him to check the badge on the bonnet, which went well.On our reading, watch and listening list this week: ·      Boomers: The Men and Women Who Promised Freedom and Delivered Disaster – Helen Andrews·      The Invisible Rainbow: A History of Electricity and Life – Arthur Firstenberg·      Girl, 20 – Kingsley Amis·      Flashman at the Charge - George MacDonald Fraser·      Night Watch: A Discworld Novel – Terry Pratchett ·      Down with Skool! A Guide to School Life for Tiny Pupils and their Parents – Geoffrey WillansPlease do get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’.Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously PopularTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On this week’s episode, Sarah wonders if Kier Starmer’s perceived weakness in leadership might have kicked open the door for Nigel Farage to come through? And Peter would like to ask; the hijab, a sign of oppression, or something that as a society should make us think more?Elsewhere, did any government in living memory impress Peter? Don’t count on it. Why did Christopher Hitchens once storm out of The Great Lives recording studio and who did our hosts choose to revere when it came to their turn in The Great Lives chair? Plus, is there really a better biscuit then the classic Custard Cream? On our reading, watch and listening list this week: ·      The Roads To Freedom - Dir: James Cellan Jones·      Crooked Cross – Sally Carson·      Tales Of The City – Armistead Maupin (Radio 4)·      The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy – Douglas Adams (Radio 4)Please do get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’.Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously PopularTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On this week’s episode, Sarah wonders if it’s worth putting into your pension pot anymore as new government policies promise to make your golden years anything but. While Peter would like to ask why does nobody likes appeasement until it suits them? Not that Sarah can help with that, she’s one of life’s great appeasers. Elsewhere, all things considered, Peter would rather be a rich Edwardian, Sarah misses Swansea and one of our presenters gives a spirited rendition of the rallying cry of fans of the Arkansas Razorbacks. It’s quite something.On our reading and watch list this week: ·      A Pocket Full Of Rye - Agatha Christie·      The Lie - Agatha Christie (Drama on 4)·      The Nine Tailors – Dorothy L Sayers·      The Sign Of The Four – Sir Arthur Conan Doyle·      Tales Of The Unexpected - Now TVPlease do get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’.Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously PopularTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Peter would like to know why Britain slept walk in to the First World War and what our country might look like if we’d never stumbled into that national tragedy.Elsewhere, Sarah and Peter pore over our bag of electronic mail and ruminate on everything from the benefits of counselling (Sarah is for it, Peter less so), how to write a novel – not that either have – the power of Billy Wilder’s The Apartment and how Peter never actually ran with a motorcycle gang and why he’ll never wear a leather jacket again. The world couldn’t bear the fall out.On our reading and watch list this week: ·      Germany's Aims in the First World War – Fritz Fischer·      The Guns Of August - Barbara W. Tuchman·      Covenant With Death – John Harris·      The Great Silence: Britain from the Shadow of the First World War to the Dawn of the Jazz Age - Juliet Nicolson·      Bodyline – TV Series·      Army Of Shadows – Dir: Jean-Pierre MelvillePlease do get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’.Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously PopularTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In light of the recent documentary, Lucy Letby: Beyond Reasonable Doubt? Peter reiterates his call for a retrial of the convicted nurse.Elsewhere, Sarah asks if students are so worried about AI spoiling their chances of building a career, then why are they all using ChatGPT to write their exam papers?Also, Peter’s written a thriller, well, the first chapter at least. We can reveal very little of the plotline apart from the fact that someone dies by fax machine just after exiting a toilet. This is all true. On our reading and watch list this week: ·      12 Angry Men – Dir: Sidney Lumet·      Unmasking Lucy Letby: The Untold Story of the Killer Nurse - Jonathan Coffey and Judith Moritz·      The Rose of Tibet – Lionel Davidson·      Mrs. Beeton's Book of Household ManagementPlease do get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’.Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously PopularTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Peter is up in arms – who knew? – over Sarah’s use of centimetres over inches even though she was raised on the continent and it’s all she knows. A measure of distance which, he insists, are simply made up. For her part, Sarah tells us that if you’re going to employ a nanny, make sure it’s not an English one.Elsewhere, Sarah, admits she enjoys going to church, if only because it’s the one place where no one can hear her sing and the discovery that Peter can be found online portrayed as a housemaid and a lemming. He is neither.On our reading and watch list this week: ·      Micah Clarke - Arthur Conan Doyle·      About The Size Of It: The Common Sense Approach To Measuring Things – Warwick Cairns·      The Measure of All Things: The Seven-Year Odyssey and Hidden Error That Transformed the World – Ken Alder·      Don't listen to the whingers: London needs immigrants – Andrew NeatherPlease do get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’.Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously PopularTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Peter is inflamed! Why, he wants to know, searching around him in vain for an ashtray, does smoking seem to be on the rise once more in the UK? Is it vaping? Is it fashionable once more, heaven forfend? He sincerely hopes not. For her part, Sarah doesn’t smoke, well, only after three glasses of wine.Elsewhere, Sarah asks is rioting on the rise once again? And asks are we now too far gone as a country where we can’t expect anything but civil unrest? Though it’s not all doom and gloom, we have poetry, plump up your cushions and settle back as Peter and Sarah take turns to soothe the savage soul with hand selected verse. On our reading and watch list this week: ·      Stopping By Woods On A Snowy Evening – Robert Frost·      Under Milk Wood – Dylan Thomas·      The Raven – Edgar Allan Poe·      The Dragon Book of Verse - VariousPlease do get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’.Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously PopularTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Peter has a five-year plan for the five pairs of identical shoes he owns, buy in bulk, rotate diligently, but another set in five years times. Sarah, for her part, can’t walk past a shoe shop with a sale sign in the window, it’s like catnip to her. Elsewhere, Peter has had enough of cities changing their names – and not just because it keeps making his maps out of date – and Sarah muses on a song some people consider a national treasure which she could happily never hear again. And don’t get Peter started on the Beatles…On our reading and watch list this week: ·      The Lifelong Scruff – Peter Hitchens·      A Small Town In Germany - John Le Carre·      Return Via Dunkirk – Gun Buster·      Great Expectations – Dir: David Lean·      Dunkirk – Dir: Leslie NormanPlease do get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’.Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously PopularTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The love of cinema, Peter’s sonorous baritone, Sarah’s hatred of hot weather, the case for changing the way we adopt in the UK and does Peter ever go to watch Millwall and throw lager about? He does not. And those are just the topics and questions posed by listeners.Peter and Sarah also ask why we now embrace organisations that were once proscribed as terrorists? And in light of Coldplay being the most boring band on earth (scientific fact), why can’t we make decent rock stars anymore. On our reading and watch list this week: ·      The Greening of the White House – Conor O’Clery·      Never Look Away – Dir: Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck·      The Cruel Sea – Dir: Charles Frend·      Bicycle Thieves – Dir: Vittorio De Sica·      Ida – Dir: Paweł PawlikowskiPlease do get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’.Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously PopularTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

From Lord of the Rings lesser liked characters to the ‘deep state’ of government according to Dominic Cummings, and drinking beer beneath the Northern Lights, Peter and Sarah take on listener questions before wrestling with the thorny subjects of the pain and pleasure of train travel – it depends very much on where you board and depart your train and helps if that’s not in the UK.  While Sarah’s been hiding indoors as the continental sunshine has bene visited on the UK, and she would very much like to complain about this latest heatwave and at some length too. Shade your eyes…On our reading and watch list this week: ·      Corridors Of Power – C.P. Snow·      Ernst Marples: The Shadow Behind Beeching – David Brandon & Martin Upham·      British Rail – Christian Wolmar ·      Night Mail – WH AudenPlease do get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’.Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Alex GrahamProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously PopularTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sarah and Peter wrangle everything from the latest abortion legislation to how to purge the world of nuclear weapons (Sarah suggests we move them to the Moon – pity the poor astronauts who next land there), Star Trek and what the Federation really alluded to. Did Hollywood treat Napoleon fairly or meddle with history for its own ends? And, more happily, we cast Peter as Badger in Toad of Toad Hall with remarkable results. Stay tuned for that.On our reading and watch list this week: ·      Take A Girl Like You – Kingsley Amis·      The Abolition of Britain – Peter Hitchens·      Racing The Enemy - Tsuyoshi Hasegawa·      Farm Hall – Katherine Moar·      The New Men – C.P. Snow·      Star Trek (original series)Please do get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’.Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously PopularTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Flared trousers, the fate of Northern Ireland, free speech, swimming with Gordon Brown and childish children’s books. All human life, as they say, is here. Sarah wants to know why we’re afraid of difficult conversations and saying what we really think, is it that we’re always being shouted down by those who don’t agree with us? What ever happened to civilised debate? Not that our debates are ever civilised.While Peter reminisces about his time in Iran some decades ago and how it’s not the country torn from recent headlines with a huge number of its people who actually want to live in a peaceful, secular society, not the regime enforced on them under mullah rule.  On our reading and watch list this week: ·      The Apartment – Director: Billy Wilder·      The Wind In the Willows – Kenneth Grahame·      The Hobbit – J.R.R. Tolkien·      The Water Babies – Charles Kingsley·      Black Beauty – Anna Sewell·      Iran: A Nation of Nose Jobs, Not Nuclear War – Peter HitchensPlease do get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’.Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Alex GrahamProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously PopularTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

As Sarah’s book sends shockwaves through former political grandees and the corridors of power, Sarah and Peter sit down to ponder listener questions (and some of Peter’s thoughts too) related to ‘How Not To Be A Political Wife’, a book that has been described as ‘fascinating, embarrassing and fundamentally tragic’, ‘witty, wry and incredibly touching’ and an ‘unflinching account of life at the heart of politics.’ Expect questions and answers on falling in and out of love with Michael Gove, is there such a thing as a happy political marriage and would Sarah ever bite the bullet and go into politics herself? On our reading and watch list this week: ·      How Not To Be A Political Wife – Sarah VinePlease do get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’.Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously PopularTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

To paraphrase Randy Newman, you’ve got a friend in me, but for just how long? Especially when you’re Sarah Vine and you’re supposed best friend’s husband is on the side of staying in the European Union while your then husband is all for pushing Brexit through. As Sarah discovered, loyalties are soon divided and what ultimately makes a true friend anyway? While Peter Hitchens looks askance at the continent and wonders, as Poland lurches to the right with its latest elections results, if the European Union can leave its meddlesome ways behind it and let democracy work for once. On our reading and watch list this week: True Grit – Charles Portis· The Go-Between – L.P. Hartley· Orderly and Humane – R.M. Douglas· The Confession – Director: Costa-Gavras· Berlin Rules – Paul LeverPresenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie East A Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

As rampage killings are on the rise both here and abroad, we ask if the long-term effects of drugs are impacting on our societal norms and encouraging a violent recklessness not seen before? As charges for cannabis possession are fast becoming a thing of the past and modern culture embraces increasingly strong strands of weed, is there a case to be made for really doubling down on those who break drug laws or as cannabis legalisation creeps across the globe, we ask, is it already too late?On our reading and watch list this week: * Attacker Smoked Cannabis: Suicide and psychopathic violence in the UK and Ireland – Ross Grainger * The War We Never Fought – Peter Hitchens * Tell Your Children: The Truth About Marijuana, Mental Illness, and Violence – Alex BerensonTo get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’. Take our show survey at:https://ex-plorsurvey.com/survey/selfserve/550/g517/250305?list=9 Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie East A Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Books, plays and films have been written about it, its onset feared in some quarters, pilloried in others, and it will, eventually, affect almost all women. Though that’s not why Sarah Vine wants to talk about the menopause, but why, in some circumstances, it can be a huge liberation for women; finally freed from being slave to one’s hormones, and that’s just the beginning. So, why, do so many women fear the onset of the menopause? Plus, Peter Hitchens, is told several times a week (online, never in the street or to his face), how much cleverer his older brother Christopher was, and that Peter should have died in his stead. This used to annoy Peter, understandably, but now he finds these brickbats amusing and interesting, and is left wondering, sibling rivalry, what is it all about? On our reading and watch list this week: · Fahrenheit 451 - Ray Bradbury · A Series of Unfortunate Events - Lemony Snicket· The Menopause Brain: The New Science Empowering Women to Navigate Midlife with Knowledge and Confidence – Dr Lisa MosconiTo get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’. Take our show survey at:https://ex-plorsurvey.com/survey/selfserve/550/g517/250305?list=9 Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie East A Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

To Peter Hitchens, the idea of capital punishment (at least at home here in the UK) could make for a country that is less vengeful and, he goes so far as to suggest, even more gentle. Having experienced two executions while working in the US, he knows the power of that final switch and the deterrent it might bring. But is he right, would the shadow cast by capital punishment be enough quell violent crime and those who commit it? Plus, on a much lighter though no less graphic note, we look at holidays and Sarah’s memories of her dad driving the family home from Rome to West Wales, steering with only his knees, a cigar in one hand, a beer in the other, and music blaring to the point where it made both children travel sick. Childhood holidays, it’s not all sandcastles and ice cream. On our reading and watch list this week: · Great Expectations – Charles Dickens · 12 Angry Men· The Kraken Wakes – John WyndhamTo get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’. Take our show survey at:https://ex-plorsurvey.com/survey/selfserve/550/g517/250305?list=9 Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie East A Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sarah’s two children are currently at university, which is rather handy as a regular listener has asked that Peter and Sarah chime in on the current state of the education system here in the UK. And how times have changed, Peter spent his university years trying to kickstart social unrest, while Sarah pursued a job at The Body Shop. And as the Union Jacks flutter in the hazy afterglow of VE Day, Peter rand Sarah reflects respectively on their father and grandfather’s service, one at sea in Scapa Flow transporting weapons to Russia, the other fighting in the jungles of Burma. On our reading and watch list this week: · The History Man – Malcolm Bradbury· Quartered Safe Out Here - George MacDonald Fraser· The Phoney Victory – Peter HitchensTo get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’. Take our show survey at:https://ex-plorsurvey.com/survey/selfserve/550/g517/250305?list=9 Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie East A Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sarah’s brother was at home in Madrid this week when Spain underwent a blackout, alone in the dark with the only the thing in his house still working, his old radio. This week too saw the start of the great switch-off of analogue phones; and just look at the chaos caused by a cyber-attack at Marks and Spencer in the last few days. So, Sarah’s question is this, as we fall under the thrall of ever updating technology, are we going unwittingly back to the dark ages? Meanwhile, Peter is as reluctant as the average vampire to be seen in the sun, so why, every summer, does he turn the colour of an expensive riding saddle? Tune in for a remarkable, death-defying story of being stranded in Mogadishu and having to flee across the desert to escape. And sunburn. On our reading and watch list this week: · The Stand – Stephen King· Black Hawk Down· Leave The World Behind – Rumaan Alam To get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’. Take our show survey at:https://ex-plorsurvey.com/survey/selfserve/550/g517/250305?list=9 Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie East A Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Not unlike the Rolling Stones, Peter Hitchens is ready to toss his TV through the nearest window. He’s in accord with the late, great Groucho Marx who was once moved to remark: "I find television very educating. Every time somebody turns on the set, I go into the other room and read a book." Once forced to rent a TV to watch the news before being quickly lured towards shows like Minder, Peter is now wary of the television, to the point he blames it for a lot of the world’s woes. Tune in for that.And as the customer friendly ad for the Inland revenue insisted, tax doesn’t have to be taxing. Try telling that to Sarah and her circle of friends who have tried and failed to reach the HMRC to query a bill or simply get help. The revenue sent bailiffs to the door of one friend, while another chum had to draw down part of their pension to meet a tax demand. So, here’s the question, why are the inland revenue so awful and insistent on treating people like criminals?On our reading and watching list this week: · The Wonder Years· Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business – Neil Postman· The Great Tax Robbery: How Britain Became A Tax Haven For Fat Cats And Big Business – Richard Brooks To get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’. Take our show survey at:https://ex-plorsurvey.com/survey/selfserve/550/g517/250305?list=9 Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie East A Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sarah Vine wants to bin it off. Though given the decline in public services nationwide, that’s getting harder and harder to do. As the Birmingham bin strike rolls on, the council declares itself bankrupt and rats invade the city’s streets, we ask what the hell is going on with our public services and is this just part of a wider societal malaise? Also, could someone please take this rubbish away?They were once the so-called lungs of the earth, but as a centuries-old oak tree with “more ecological value than the Sycamore Gap tree” is hacked down by owners of a nearby Toby Carvery, Peter Hitchens asks why we’re chopping down our majestic, sometimes ancient trees and why is it so damn easy to destroy something so beautiful and filled with life? Also, how do say crikey, exactly?On our reading list this week: · The Fifth Estate: Britain's Unions in the Seventies – Robert Taylor· The Magic Faraway Tree – Enid Blyton· Tiger Tim’s Annual 1937To get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’. Take our show survey at:https://ex-plorsurvey.com/survey/selfserve/550/g517/250305?list=9 Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie East A Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Peter Hitchens hates to be blunt about these things, well, not really, but he’d really like to know why the police are so useless. And not in one specific instance or area, but generally. No coppers on the beat, rarely answering emergency calls and heaven forfend they actually bang someone up. What happened to policing in the UK?While Sarah has spent her week at a wellness centre (don’t call it a fat farm), and while she has returned glowing like a rare gem, she did manage to put some weight on. But did a week of wheatgrass colonics, waddling about and living on liquids take her to some higher spiritual ground? Possibly…On our reading list this week: · The Abolition of Liberty – Peter Hitchens· Broken Windows: The Police and Neighborhood Safety - George L. Kelling and James Q. Wilson· The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma Paperback – M.D. Bessel van der KolkTo get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’. Take our show survey at:https://ex-plorsurvey.com/survey/selfserve/550/g517/250305?list=9 Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie East A Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Peter Hitchens puts forward his defence of ‘Whataboutery and asks why does the west delight in attacking its current enemies like Putin for things it allows its friends like Tayip Erdogan to do with impunity? What is it with all this posturing hypocrisy?While Sarah makes the case for the ancient art of astrology and wonders if we’re looking at star signs for answers as conventional faith is failing us daily. Or, as she puts it, what makes your sky fairy more important than my sky fairy? She may have a point.On our reading list this week: · The Water Babies: A Fairy Tale for a Land-Baby - Charles Kingsley· The Roads to Freedom – Jean-Paul Sartre· The Voyage of the Dawn Treader – C.S. LewisTo get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’. Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie East A Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

All human life is here.Dogma, closed minds, modern slavery, net zero and why Peter will never enter the House of Lords - though he will take tea there – and why you’ll never find letters after his name. Sarah asks why Labour are pushing for a new deal with China at the risk of human rights violation and why did Margaret Thatcher think you could drive the 5 plus miles from Downing Street to Dulwich – turns out, outriders on motorbikes help. And both wonder when did the honours system become such an ‘inverted pyramid of piffle’? Word for word.On our reading list this week: · HMS Ulysses – Alistair MacLean· The Iron Lady: Margaret Thatcher: From Grocer’s Daughter to Iron Lady – John Campbell· The People’s Trilogy - Frank DikötterTo get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’. Take our show survey at:https://ex-plorsurvey.com/survey/selfserve/550/g517/250305?list=9 Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie East A Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

To paraphrase Edwin Starr; work, what is it good for, absolutely nothing… At least according to Gen Z. Reports suggest that a whole generation might be ready to give up work, which, coincidentally, is how Peter felt every day as a younger man when he was mucking out pigs on the farm, while Sarah’s eighteen-hour days in Hobbs only finally relented when she found herself talking to a drunken sub editor in a pub who was baffled by his new mac at work, just as Sarah had learnt how to use one…Elsewhere, we take to the seas as Peter asks why our submariners are spending over 200 days underwater at a time and why do we cling to the notion that we need a cold war superweapon like the atomic bomb and what really happens when you try to launch a Trident missile at sea? Nothing good, apparently.And what tests do you have to pass if, God forbid, you have to stand in for the PM one day? On our reading list this week: · Simple Subs Book – Leslie Sellers· The Silent Deep: The Royal Navy Submarine Service Since 1945 – James Jinks & Peter Hennessy· The Hunt For Red October - Tom ClancyTo get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’. Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie East A Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Lockdown saw Peter Hitchens riding through Hyde Park in a Polish gas mask hissing the word ‘virus’ at strangers.Sarah Vine spent hers in Waitrose checking produce until an outraged fellow shopper saw her return over ripe veg to the shelves and accuse her of spreading ‘covid tomatoes!’. Whatever they are.Both struggled with lockdown – especially as Sarah was sharing a home with Michael Gove, who was very much behind his Party’s policy to close things down – but, five years later, what did they make of the seismic period when Britain turned out the lights?Also, Peter asks why the hell can’t the west stay out of other country’s business, unless those despots or dictators can make life easier for us? It’s enough to make cynics of us all.On our reading list this week: · Lockdown Secrets – Eleanor Tattersfield· Catch Your Breath – Ed Patrick· The Great War For Civilisation – Robert FiskTo get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’. Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie East A Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Peter Hitchens is so anti-drugs, and so engaged with his moral compass he won't even consider taking the fictional recreationals, while Sarah Vine has been on antidepressants for over a decade and swears by her 'fat jab’.This, while Peter dreams of a Dutch like utopia where cars are rarely seen and children are safe to walk to school. Shall the twain ever meet? Occasionally. Join them for a conversation that begins by asking is society, sleepwalking into a delirium of self-medication and can end just about anywhere... On our reading list this week:The Road To Wigan Pier – George OrwellBrave New World – Aldous HuxleyCracked: Why Psychiatry is Doing More Harm Than Good - James DaviesTo get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’.Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie East A Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

When viewed from above the North Pole, the Earth rotates from left to right and now some of its inhabitants appear to be headed the same way. From Giorgia Meloni’s Brothers of Italy through Geert Wilders’ far-right Freedom Party in the Netherlands to Germany’s AfD party and the ever-encroaching Chega (Enough) party in Portugal, the boots on the ground appear to be facing one way, so are we looking at a new world order that’s suddenly leaning towards the right? Plus, is war finally over for Ukraine? What is NATO really for? What is the true meaning of power and how do we grab it? And did we finally answer all the questions Sarah Vine’s mum asked of us?On our reading list this week: · Frontline Ukraine: Crisis in the Borderlands – Richard Sakwa· How the West Brought War to Ukraine: Understanding How U.S. and NATO Policies Led to Crisis, War, and the Risk of Nuclear Catastrophe – Benjamin Abelow· A Certain Idea of France: The Life of Charles de Gaulle – Julian JacksonTo get in touch, email: [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on Whatsapp – on 07796 657512, start your message with the word ‘alas’. Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Philip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie East A Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

What's the Big Idea?Finally, Sarah Vine (once memorably described as being ‘like and loathed in equal measure, divisive, but never indecisive’) and Peter Hitchens (a man whose writing a critic was called to compare to a Guardsman’s boot: ‘as highly polished and potentially lethal’) meet once a week to look at the world and mutter, alas… Acclaimed columnist and journalist Sarah Vine and best-selling author and broadcaster Peter Hitchens discuss and dissect social, economic, and pop cultural flotsam and jetsam that have risen out of the dark waters of that week’s news. Taking one big idea each episode and pulling it apart with élan, imagine Vine and Hitchens respective columns brought to life and then skewered, scoffed at, debated, and given the full weight of Vine and Hitchens impenetrable gaze. Though an accord might not always be reached, it’s the journey that matters. Whether it’s the tech bros gone rogue – Meta tearing up its own rule book on fact checking, Musk attempting to influence governmental policy, or the knotty subject on society’s ever-increasing reliance on anti-depressants to treat what might just be the modern malaise and not depression at all. Or, evil, nature or nurture? Does evil actually exist or is it an idea that hangs over us, or do we just sometime embody it and the actions themselves are evil, not the individual? All this and more are to be pored over, one towering topic each week discussed with humour, insight, and real understanding.To get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas' Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesTo get in touch email [email protected], you can leave a comment on Spotify or even send us a voice note on WhatsApp - on 07796 657512 start your message with the word 'alas'Presenters: Sarah Vine & Peter HitchensProducer: Phillip WildingEditor: Chelsey MooreProduction Manager: Vittoria CecchiniExecutive Producer: Jamie EastA Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.