The Bunker – News without the nonsense

The Afghan Government’s sudden collapse and the return of Taliban rule have both shocked the international community. What happens next? What can Afghan civilians and women especially expect from their new rulers? And just how big a catastrophe is this for the Biden administration? Arthur Snell, who has spent time in Helmand Province himself, lays out the consequences of a day of brutal reverse for the West – and shame for Britain. Presented and produced by Andrew Harrison. Assistant producers Jelena Sofronijevic and Jacob Archbold. Music by Kenny Dickinson. Audio production by Alex Rees. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Will it take a satirist to fix Britain’s busted politics? Armando Iannucci – writer of The Thick Of It, The Day Today and Veep – is looking for emergency fixes in the new podcast series Westminster Reimagined. He and producer Anoosh Chakelian talk to former SPAD Ayesha Hazarika about the forces that are breaking our politics. Why are things so bad? What will it take to fix them? And does Malcolm Tucker seem like an idealist by today’s standards? https://www.patreon.com/bunkercast “The Thick Of It charted the rise of the SPAD – now it’s all about the rise of the NEDs, the Non-Executive Director” “Malcolm Tucker was the control freak at the centre of Government… but at least he had a plan.” “Cummings proclaimed that the Civil Service were idiots and had to be replaced by freaks and weirdoes… But all he can do it tear things down.” “All the mockery is inside politics now. The fake news, the lies… In The Thick Of It we show rules being bent. But what if there are no rules?” Presented by Ayesha Hazarika. Produced by Andrew Harrison. Assistant producers: Jacob Archbold and Jelena Sofronijevic. Audio production by Alex Rees. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Aegean neighbours Greece and Turkey have been rivals for centuries – and both countries are prone to forgetting the “unfortunate episodes” in their relations with the other. Can they ever get past their infamous regional enmity? Alex Andreou talks to Turkish author and columnist Defne Suman – whose latest novel, The Silence of Scheherazade, looks at a flashpoint of the Greek-Turkish relationship, the Great Fire of Smyrna – about historical silences, lost cultures and the way forward.  “It's hard to remove the word ‘invasion’ from the heads of Turkish people.”  “I talk about the Greek ‘administration’, not the Greek invasion.” “Turkey today is actually not as cosmopolitan as it was during the Ottoman period.”  “Nationalism is the disease of our century.” “If you don't talk about the past, that wound will kill you.”  “Turkey needs a lot of healing. And culture and storytelling lets us heal ourselves from the wounds of the past.”  Presented by Alex Andreou. Produced by Andrew Harrison. Assistant producers: Jelena Sofronijevic and Jacob Archbold. Music by Kenny Dickinson. Audio production by Alex Rees. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For many of us, the warm light of the fridge was one of the few consolations of lockdown. But now we’re living in a harsh new reality of intermittently empty supermarket shelves and farms that are struggling to adapt to Brexit, COVID, and climate change. So how do we make our food supply chains healthier and more secure? Sarah K Mock, agriculture journalist and author of Farm: And Other F Words, and Cambridge University researcher Dolly Theis join Ros Taylor to chew on the myth of conscious consumerism, why climate change means less healthy crops, and how to sweeten the deal of cutting sugar and meat. •  “The whole idea of conscious consumerism has been boiled down to a marketing ploy.” – Sarah K Mock.•  “It's code red for humanity right now…our crops are less nutritious because of climate change.” – Sarah K Mock.•  “We live in a world where being healthy is hard.” – Dolly Theis.•  “The pandemic has showed how vulnerable having poor food has made our country.” – Dolly Theis.•  “The fact that food is making us sick should serious alarm bells.” – Dolly Theis. Presented by Ros Taylor. Produced by Andrew Harrison. Assistant producers: Jelena Sofronijevic and Jacob Archbold. Music by Kenny Dickinson. Audio production by Robin Leeburn. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

As pandemic politics start to ebb away, Johnson’s ratings are down among the Tory faithful and his MPs are growing restive. Is this a time to pick a fight with Rishi Sunak? Plus, will Apple’s photo-scanning tech trap more than child abusers? Spain makes glorifying Franco a crime. And why do we let polls lead politics? Adam Payne, Westminster and Brexit reporter for PoliticsHome, is our guest.  “We have a Government which is absolutely obsessed with public opinion, and a PM obsessed with being popular ” – Adam Payne “The problem with polls is that the people who don’t answer them in the first place.” – Yasmeen Serhan “Liz Truss has this incredible ability to block out grim reality and tell everyone it’s all fine.” – Justin Quirk https://www.patreon.com/bunkercastPresented by Andrew Harrison with Yasmeen Serhan and Justin Quirk. Produced by Andrew Harrison. Assistant producers: Jacob Archbold and Jelena Sofronijevic. Music by Kenny Dickinson. Audio production by Robin Leeburn. Produced by Andrew Harrison. The Bunker is a Podmasters Production Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report could signal our last chance to stop the global climate running out of control. Will the world take it? Plus: vaccine passports continue to go round in circles. We try to talk about GCSE and A-level results without saying “grade inflation”. And Labour starts its traditional pre-conference programme of beating itself up. Alex Andreou flags up the big issues in the week ahead.  “In what world are The Telegraph defending working class northerners?”  “The person tipped to replace Sunak is – Lord help us – Liz Truss.”  “The reason we don't have enough HGV drivers is because we’ve spent six years sending them back home.” Presented and produced by Andrew Harrison. Assistant producers Jelena Sofronijevic and Jacob Archbold. Music by Kenny Dickinson. Audio production by Robin Leeburn. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Recorded at 11pm on Saturday night and already our GB medals toll is out of date… At the end of the most controversial Olympics in almost a century, Financial Times Sports Editor MURAD AHMED calls us from Tokyo to lift the curtain on what it all means. Is the International Olympics Committee finally getting the message on athletes’ mental health and political commitments? Did the “Russian Olympic Committee” successfully pull a fast one on the anti-dopers? Is Britain’s commitment to medals all it seems? And did the Japanese people learn to love the games they wanted to cancel?https://www.patreon.com/bunkercast “The sport has been fantastic, but the pandemic has taken away the Olympics atmosphere” “People would wave at me on the bus thinking I was an athlete” “For me, Simone Biles choosing to focus on her mental health was the biggest moment of the games” “If you think you’ve been watching clean sport, then you haven’t watched the Olympics. This goes well beyond Russia” Presented and produced by Andrew Harrison. Assistant producers: Jacob Archbold and Jelena Sofronijevic. Audio production by Robin Leeburn. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

From Modi’s India to Bolsonaro’s Brazil and Erdogan’s Turkey, the far right is on the rise around the world. Are we really on the brink of resurgent fascism? And if so, how do we fight it? Political journalist Paul Mason tells Dorian Lynskey about his radical blueprint for defeating the extreme right, outlined in his new book How to Stop Fascism. Why is trust in democracy collapsing around the world, and can what progressives do to win it back? “People like Trump and Bolsonaro don’t want to play the globalisation game and they don’t want to play the democracy game either” “We’re not dealing with a tribute band to Nazism. We’re dealing with a new form of Nazism” “Fascism is always violent. It’s now become obsessed with ethnicity rather than nation” “One in five people serving jail for terrorism in the UK are from the far-right. Soon that could be one in two” “Very little is taught about how the Nazis came to power. That is something we need to get our head around” Presented by Dorian Lynskey. Produced by Andrew Harrison. Assistant producers: Jelena Sofronijevic and Jacob Archbold. Music by Kenny Dickinson. Audio production by Alex Rees. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Cameron and Osborne’s “Golden Era” of cosying up to China turned out to be a golden error, as Beijing dug deep into British life, politics, and technology. Investigative journalist Sam Dunning tells Arthur Snell how the Conservatives’ strings-free get-rich-quick strategy turned into a trap for British business and academia. While the Tories trumpet free speech on campus, students who want talk about the Uyghurs are being silenced at Jesus College Cambridge. Is it too late to curb China’s disturbing influence at the highest levels of British life? “For Osborne, the Golden Era was seen a problem-free get-rich-quick-scheme for Britain after the economic crash.”  “How can a Chinese student in the UK contest what’s happening in Hong Kong when Chinese ambassadors are attending university events?” “Huawei is creating surveillance in China that’s beyond Orwellian. Jesus College just received money from them to publish a paper on global governance.” “Even if Johnson did have a roadmap for our relations with China, he’d probably steer off and crash into a tree.” Presented by Arthur Snell. Produced by Andrew Harrison. Assistant producers: Jacob Archbold and Jelena Sofronijevic. Music by Kenny Dickinson. Audio production by Alex Rees. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Now that the pandemic may be abating, the Government decides that the best people to pay the bill are… those pesky, hard-up young people. Climate change and student activist Phoebe Hanson joins us to explain what it’s like to be mis-sold the student experience by universities that act like businesses but won’t treat you like a customer. Plus, how the planned changes to the Official Secrets Act will treat journalists like spies. And the truth behind those supply chain nightmares.  “It's hard to feel like part of your university when it is constantly working against you… ” – Phoebe Hanson “My lectures now are like glorified podcasts” – Phoebe Hanson “There’s a big difference between what young people think and what older people THINK they think.” – Phoebe Hanson https://www.patreon.com/bunkercastPresented by Andrew Harrison with Arthur Snell and Ahir Shah. Produced by Andrew Harrison. Assistant producers: Jacob Archbold and Jelena Sofronijevic . Music by Kenny Dickinson. Audio production by Alex Rees. Produced by Andrew Harrison. The Bunker is a Podmasters Production Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices