On this week’s episode, on what would have been Margaret Thatcher’s hundredth birthday, Peter and Sarah tussle over the former PM’s legacy, charisma and what she did or did not do for this country. Elsewhere, Sarah asks why should King Charles solve the problem that is Prince Andrew when the King’s brother should admit he’s a liability and retire from the public eye? 

Plus, where do our hosts like to holiday (Peter is not a beach bum for those who were curious)? What was Peter doing with the paparazzi staring at Princess Di? And why we should think long and hard about the repeal of the Corn Laws.

On our reading and watch list this week: 

·      Donna Leon – Death at La Fenice

·      Don’t Look Now – Director: Nicolas Roeg

·      Robert Browning – A Toccata of Galuppi’s  

·      Not for Turning, and Everything She Wants - Charles Moore

Please do get in touch, email: alas@mailonline.co.uk, 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 Hitchens

Producer: Philip Wilding

Editor: Chelsey Moore

Production Manager: Vittoria Cecchini

Executive Producer: Jamie East

A Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On this week’s episode, Peter and Sarah ask why parks shit down at the first sign of inclement weather? Why do under twenty-five-year-olds feel the need to rail against something, but not bother to read up on it first (we’ve all been there)? Elsewhere, Peter recalls chasing a bicycle thief while hitting him about the head with a bag of dirty laundry. Not to be outdone, Sarah admits to punching her brother in the face with her car keys, which should teach them both something about bringing up politics at a restaurant table. 

On our reading and watch list this week: 

·      Anshel Pfeffer - Bibi: The Turbulent Life and Times of Benjamin Netanyahu

·      E.H. Gombrich - A Little History of the World

·      Roy Strong – The Story Of Britain

·      Henrietta Elizabeth Marshall - Our Island Story: A History of Britain for Boys and Girls from the Romans to Queen Victoria

Please do get in touch, email: alas@mailonline.co.uk, 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 Hitchens

Producer: Philip Wilding

Editor: Chelsey Moore

Production Manager: Vittoria Cecchini

Executive Producer: Jamie East

A Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On this week’s episode, Peter and Sarah debate the idea of Digital ID cards, wonder at the minutiae we’re obsessed with as a nation, also, what did Sarah make of Michael Gove’s admission of his drug taking past? And sticking with history, where would our intrepid pair travel to if they could go anywhere in time and what one artifact or memento would they bring back with them? 

On our reading and watch list this week: 

·      The Lost World – Arthur Conan Doyle

·      Sneakers – Director: Phil Alden Robinson

·      Time Of Hope – C.P. Snow

·      The Cameron Delusion – Peter Hitchens

Please do get in touch, email: alas@mailonline.co.uk, 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 Hitchens

Producer: Philip Wilding

Editor: Alex Graham

Production Manager: Vittoria Cecchini

Executive Producer: Jamie East

A Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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 Patterson

Please do get in touch, email: alas@mailonline.co.uk, 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 Hitchens

Producer: Philip Wilding

Editor: Chelsey Moore

Production Manager: Vittoria Cecchini

Executive Producer: Jamie East

A 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 Haarr

Please do get in touch, email: alas@mailonline.co.uk, 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 Hitchens

Producer: Philip Wilding

Editor: Chelsey Moore

Production Manager: Vittoria Cecchini

Executive Producer: Jamie East

A 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 Jones

Please do get in touch, email: alas@mailonline.co.uk, 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 Hitchens

Producer: Philip Wilding

Editor: Chelsey Moore

Production Manager: Vittoria Cecchini

Executive Producer: Jamie East

A 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: alas@mailonline.co.uk, 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 Hitchens

Guest: Nadine Dorries

Producer: Philip Wilding

Editor: Chelsey Moore

Production Manager: Vittoria Cecchini

Executive Producer: Jamie East

A 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 Willans

Please do get in touch, email: alas@mailonline.co.uk, 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 Hitchens

Producer: Philip Wilding

Editor: Chelsey Moore

Production Manager: Vittoria Cecchini

Executive Producer: Jamie East

A 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: alas@mailonline.co.uk, 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 Hitchens

Producer: Philip Wilding

Editor: Chelsey Moore

Production Manager: Vittoria Cecchini

Executive Producer: Jamie East

A 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 TV

Please do get in touch, email: alas@mailonline.co.uk, 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 Hitchens

Producer: Philip Wilding

Editor: Chelsey Moore

Production Manager: Vittoria Cecchini

Executive Producer: Jamie East

A 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 Melville

Please do get in touch, email: alas@mailonline.co.uk, 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 Hitchens

Producer: Philip Wilding

Editor: Chelsey Moore

Production Manager: Vittoria Cecchini

Executive Producer: Jamie East

A 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 Management

Please do get in touch, email: alas@mailonline.co.uk, 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 Hitchens

Producer: Philip Wilding

Editor: Chelsey Moore

Production Manager: Vittoria Cecchini

Executive Producer: Jamie East

A 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 Neather

Please do get in touch, email: alas@mailonline.co.uk, 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 Hitchens

Producer: Philip Wilding

Editor: Chelsey Moore

Production Manager: Vittoria Cecchini

Executive Producer: Jamie East

A 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 - Various

Please do get in touch, email: alas@mailonline.co.uk, 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 Hitchens

Producer: Philip Wilding

Editor: Chelsey Moore

Production Manager: Vittoria Cecchini

Executive Producer: Jamie East

A 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 Norman

Please do get in touch, email: alas@mailonline.co.uk, 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 Hitchens

Producer: Philip Wilding

Editor: Chelsey Moore

Production Manager: Vittoria Cecchini

Executive Producer: Jamie East

A 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 Pawlikowski

Please do get in touch, email: alas@mailonline.co.uk, 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 Hitchens

Producer: Philip Wilding

Editor: Chelsey Moore

Production Manager: Vittoria Cecchini

Executive Producer: Jamie East

A 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 Auden

Please do get in touch, email: alas@mailonline.co.uk, 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 Hitchens

Producer: Philip Wilding

Editor: Alex Graham

Production Manager: Vittoria Cecchini

Executive Producer: Jamie East

A 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: alas@mailonline.co.uk, 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 Hitchens

Producer: Philip Wilding

Editor: Chelsey Moore

Production Manager: Vittoria Cecchini

Executive Producer: Jamie East

A 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 Hitchens

Please do get in touch, email: alas@mailonline.co.uk, 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 Hitchens

Producer: Philip Wilding

Editor: Alex Graham

Production Manager: Vittoria Cecchini

Executive Producer: Jamie East

A 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 Vine

Please do get in touch, email: alas@mailonline.co.uk, 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 Hitchens

Producer: Philip Wilding

Editor: Chelsey Moore

Production Manager: Vittoria Cecchini

Executive Producer: Jamie East

A Daily Mail production. Seriously Popular

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.