During the Falklands War in 1982, in the aftermath of the sinking of the Argentinian ship the Belgrano, and the resulting death of 323 members of its crew, the BBC’s Director of News and Current Affairs, Dick Francis, expressed his sympathy for the family of the dead.

He said that “the widow of Portsmouth is no different from the widow of Buenos Aires”.
A good Christian sentiment, you might feel.

Some in Mrs Thatcher’s entourage thought differently and indeed expressed their outrage. What was the BRITISH Broadcasting Corporation doing? It should be supporting “our boys” and not giving solace to the enemy.

Mrs Thatcher commented that, “The case for our British forces is not being put over fully and effectively. I understand there are times when it would seem that we and the Argentines are almost being treated as equal”.

It was around this time that the Newsnight presenter, Peter Snow, was called a “traitor” by the Sun newspaper - and some Tories - for saying that “We cannot demonstrate that the British have lied to us but the Argentinians clearly have”.

It is always difficult to see wars in the round and not primarily through one’s own national perspective.
Certainly when I was at school I was taught little or nothing about the Soviets role in World War 2, and their appalling losses. (They lost over 13 and a half million in total, including famine and forced labour; we lost 449, 700 including civilians).

Few issues, however, remain as controversial as the Allied bombing of German cities, and in particular the firestorm which consumed Dresden in 1945, a few months before the end of the war.

Families and friends of those who served in Bomber Command had to campaign for decades to get its contribution to the war against the Nazis properly recognised. They argued that for much of the war bombing was the only way we could significantly damage the German war effort, and they pointed to the appalling loss of life that resulted for those aircrews. A staggering 44% (55,573) of them died in the conflict. The average age of crewmen was 22.

Critics of the campaign against cities and Dresden in particular, use terms like “war crime” and at a recent commemorative ceremony in Germany the Archbishop of Canterbury, a relative of Viscount Portal who devised the bombing strategy, expressed his “profound feeling of regret and deep sorrow” and said the bombing “diminished all our humanity”.

The Today programme discussed the issue and was accused by some listeners of not providing sufficient context.

In Feedback this week I talked to the Editor of Today, Jamie Angus, and to Dr Peter Bush, a German who is Senior Lecturer in War and Media at Kings College London.

You can hear this week's programme here.

In another item this week I talked to the BBC’s deputy news editor about using shocking audio of the shootings in Copenhagen. Do let me know what you think about that and anything else of course.

Roger Bolton

 

Roger Bolton is the presenter of Feedback

 

On Feedback this week I interviewed Richard Ayre, Chairman of the BBC Trust’s Editorial Standards Committee. We discussed his committee’s highly critical report on an interview with a member of Isis on Radio 1’s Newsbeat. The issue was not so much about whether interviews with representatives of such organisations should be broadcast but how they should be conducted and what context is needed.

These issues are familiar ones to Mr Ayre since he worked for BBC News in Northern Ireland in the 1970s, and later occupied senior editorial positions in the Corporation.

Indeed it was he who found a solution to the problem facing broadcasters in the late 1980’s when Mrs Thatcher’s government banned the broadcasting of the voices of terrorists, or those associated with terrorist organisations eg Gerry Adams and Martin McGuiness of Sinn Fein.

Even if those interviewed were also elected representatives, the broadcasters could only show the interviews taking place and report the content, not transmit the actual soundtrack. This meant, of course, that long, tough interviews, holding these people to account, were impossible. Richard Ayre’s ingenious solution was to get actors to read the words and “lip synch” them so that the audience could see and hear exactly what was being said. It was a second best, but a good one, greatly appreciated by Northern Irish actors for whom this was an unexpected source of employment.

The Government eventually gave in and such interviews were allowed once more. We could all then concentrate on whether they were rigorous enough and had sufficient context, and that the number of such interviews were proportionate.

Some newspapers, the Daily Telegraph for example, condemn what they call “anti-British” interviews, on the basis that their content is offensive, but those who favour them say we should know about offensive views and to broadcast them is not to condone them.

I got into lots of trouble in the late 70s and 80s trying to report on the IRA, exploring their actions and political beliefs in some detail. My justification was that the British electorate needed to know what was being done in their name and why the Troubles in Northern Ireland were continuing for so long. My colleagues and I were called “traitors” and Marxists, and Paul Johnson, the fiery columnist , wrote that “The BBC not only rapes, it rapes for the Revolution”.

In such a heated atmosphere it is difficult to keep a cool head. Judge if Richard Ayre has done that in his Feedback interview.You can hear it and the rest of this week’s Feedback.

Do let us know what you think.

Roger Bolton

Roger Bolton presents Feedback on Radio 4

You may be surprised to learn this but until now there have been two distinct homepages for the Today Programme. One sat within BBC News Online and another exists on the Radio 4 website.

Because of technical changes on News Online, from now on there will be only one homepage for Today – this one.

It will be your one-stop shop for all things Today Programme related: listening live and hearing the most recent seven programmes, downloading the podcast, Thought for the Day, contacting the team, seeing photographs,  and finding the best clips.

We also plan to make the running order a more compelling online destination by including more links and comments from listeners that we receive via email and social media.  We will also have more links to further information about the various stories featured on the programme.  This is an example of Monday’s running order.

I hope you enjoy these changes even though we recognise that for some people they will mean a change of habit.  We will be trying out a few different things in the coming weeks so do let us know what you think.

Nigel Smith is the Interactive Editor of Radio 4 and Radio 4 Extra

 

Editor's note: You can leave your questions for Roger to put to the Radio 4 Controller on next week's Feedback in the comments on this blog post - PM.

Just after 4am in the Today office at BBC Television Centre in west London.

The programme team has been working since eight the previous evening. The journalists have five hours to go and coffee cups litter the tables fighting for space with every conceivable newspaper and magazine. Arguably the last three hours are the most important, when they are dog tired but have to be at the top of their game for the programme's transmission.

Each three-hour Today programme has around 100 items, some of which will bite the dust if there is a breaking or developing story. Producers soon learn the art of standing down an interviewee, and of phoning up another at some unearthly hour.

This morning's presenters, Sarah Montague and John Humphrys slip into the office, the latter having parked his bike outside.

I am slightly astonished that the BBC is happy for such a central figure to be cycling in the dark in west London at such an early hour, but JH is overflowing with energy as if he has consumed half-a-dozen espressos already.

Enter stage left a Feedback listener, Francesca Fenn, an avid Today listener , who has been given an access all areas pass to find out what goes on behind the scenes. I would like to tell you that she is accompanied by Feedback's presenter as well as its producer, but I'm afraid I didn't get there until after six am, for budgetary reasons of course.

The vast majority of the audience, and there are more than seven million of them , are a pretty vociferous lot, so I was not short of questions to put to the Today editor when I interviewed him a couple of days later.

First, here is a snapshot of what goes on behind the scenes at the apparently smooth running show.

Our thanks to listener Francesca Fenn who has gone back to bed.

Two days later when I talked to the Editor of Today, Ceri Thomas, the News International hacking scandal was beginning to quieten down.

Our thanks to everyone at the Today programme for placing no restrictions whatever on where we could go.

Next week I'll be talking to the Controller of Radio 4 about the schedule changes she has made, one of which is to move this programme from its Friday slot at 1.30 to 4.30pm in the afternoon.

Do let me know what you want me to ask her. You can leave a comment below.

Roger Bolton presents Feedback

• Listen again to this week's Feedback, produced by Karen Pirie, get in touch with the programme, find out how to join the listener panel or subscribe to the podcast on the Feedback web page.
• Read all of Roger's Feedback blog posts.
• Feedback is on Twitter. Follow @BBCR4Feedback.
• All posts on "Radio 4 and 4 Extra Blog" in the category: Feedback
• Picture shows John Humphrys (L) and James Naughtie during the Today programme on Radio 4 from 2007. Copyright BBC / Jeff Overs
• There are some more archive pictures you might like from the Today programme in the post The Today programme: The "radio show that one in eight of us now tune in to"

Editor's update: There are some great pictures and a summary of the discussions from the first programme in this series of Leader Conference on the website - PM.

Tonight Andrew Rawnsley chairs the first of four live studio debates called Leader Conference. The programmes will follow the format of the main daily editorial meeting that takes places at many of Britain's leading newspapers, known as the leader conference. It's where the senior journalists get together to argue about the editorials which the paper will publish the next day are going to say - whether it's a Times leader or what The Sun Says.

Leading articles are one of the most important features of any newspaper's pages. Yet how they come to be written remains essentially a mystery to all but the participants.

We aim to cast light on that process over the coming weeks. But this is also debate to a purpose. As with most newspapers, we're going to talk about three subjects in the news which we think are important. Often - but not always - one topic will be domestic, one international and one will look at the news in a lighter vein. At the end of each discussion one of the journalists will be invited by Andrew, in his role as editor of what we might call The Daily Rawnsley - to summarise what the leading article will say―and why.

Over the coming weeks, Andrew will be joined by top figures from across Britain's newspaper industry. These will include writers from the tabloids and the broadsheet papers, from London titles and those based in other parts of the UK, from those with a right-of-centre political perspective and those with a left-of-centre one.

The Daily Rawnsley has no allegiances. Its readership is the Radio 4 audience and what matters in Leader Conference is the persuasiveness of the arguments that are made not the force with which they are put. That is the essence of live discussion - but here there is a premium on resolution of the debate to reach a settled view on the issues.

One thing this series won't be is a dour survey of tired old opinions. Andrew Rawnsley will present an entertaining, often amusing and always lively programme - helped, we hope, by Radio 4 listeners. We'd like your views on what our leaders should be saying. You can e-mail us at: leader@bbc.co.uk or join us on Twitter at #Radio4.

So, let the debate commence...

Hugh Levinson is an editor in BBC Radio Current Affairs

• Leader Conference starts on Wednesday 6th July at 8pm on Radio 4 and runs for four weeks.
• You'll be able to listen to it online on the Radio 4 website shortly after broadcast and for seven days after that.
• To join in on Twitter use the hashtag #Radio4 or you can email the programme at leader@bbc.co.uk
• Find more Radio 4 factual programmes to listen to online

Rarely if ever can BBC Radio 4's Reith Lectures have caused such a stir as they have this year. What is more, this year the conversation has started before a word of Aung San Suu Kyi's lectures has been broadcast. (On Radio 4 at 9.00am on Tuesday 28 June.) On the Radio 4 website there will be full coverage of this year's series but in addition we have a significant new offer. To coincide with this year's series we have added hundreds of the lectures from the last 60 years.

You can now listen to or download more than 240 previous Reith lectures from the site. The collection includes every lecture from 1976 to 2010 and, apart from 1949 and 1950, there is at least one lecture for every year from the first in 1948. That is not all. We are building the collection of transcripts of the lectures, with only some from the late 1970s and 1980s left to add.

The archive is a journey through the great names and thinkers of the last 60 years. It includes Bertrand Russell, Robert Oppenheimer, Richard Hoggart, AH Halsey and JK Galbraith. At Radio 4 it is always slightly daunting to commission people to follow in such footsteps but in recent years the likes of Onora O'Neill and Daniel Barenboim have maintained the Reiths as one of the UK's most significant intellectual stages. Their work is online too.

There are sadly some lectures for which we have been unable to unearth the recordings. We know occasionally listeners have their own copies. So if you have a dusty tape somewhere do get in touch.

This archive release is an important stage of the plan to give listeners much more of Radio 4 by offering archive programmes online forever. We know how much it is appreciated. The In Our Time archive is one of the BBC's most highly rated sites. Desert Island Discs has already seen over three million programmes downloaded in two months. In addition to these headline strands, every week programmes are added to programme sites or to our collections. One of my favourites is the full set of Bookclubs from the start of the series in 1998. You can also now hear every edition of Great Lives.

We don't intend to stop at this, so look out for more collections in the coming months. You have also told us that you want to be able to take these programmes with you wherever you go so we will gradually be making more archive programmes available as downloads and podcast feeds as we have with the Reiths and Desert Island Discs. Do comment below to let us know what you would like to hear and we will bear your requests in mind as we plan the future.

Aung San Suu Kyi's first Reith Lecture will broadcast at 9.00am BST on BBC Radio 4 on Tuesday, 28 June and will be repeated at 10.15pm BST on Saturday, 2 July. The second lecture will first broadcast at 9.00am BST on Tuesday, 5 July and will repeated at 10.15pm BST on Saturday, 9 July. During both broadcasts you will be able to join other listeners in a live blog, here on the Radio 4 Blog.

Andrew Caspari is Head of Speech Radio and Classical Music, Interactive at the BBC

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006slnx

All radio presenters who are worth their salt want to go where the action is, but are they all really needed when they get there? After all the BBC has an extensive number of foreign correspondents distributed around the world's troublespots, as well as having foreign affairs specialists such as John Simpson and Lyse Doucet who can be parachuted in.

This week on Feedback some of our correspondents allege that the Corporation went over the top with the number of journalists it dispatched to Cairo. Listener Richard Burridge came up with this list. John Simpson, Tim Wilcox, Jim Muir, John Sudworth, Lyse Doucet, Wyre Davies, Rupert Wingfield-Hayes, James Naughtie, Kevin Connolly and Ian Pannell. Several listeners thought Jim Naughtie's presence in Tahrir Square was especially unnecessary.

So was there a cosmetic element to it? That was one of the questions I put to the BBC's Head of Newsgathering Fran Unsworth, who has the immense task of anticipating where, when and how events will develop all around the world, and ensuring that she gets everyone back safe and well, having spent as little money as possible.

BBC News can hardly refuse to cover a major foreign event for lack of money but it's a fair bet that when this year's budget was set for the BBC news department, no-one anticipated the extraordinary events of the last few weeks in the Middle East.

On Tuesday, when she took a short break from deciding who should go where in Libya, and whether it was safe to deploy journalists there at all, Fran Unsworth talked to me about what must be one of the BBC's most demanding jobs, and in particular about the number of journalists she sent to cover events in Egypt.

Let me know what you think about BBC radio's coverage of fast-changing events in the Middle East. Leave a comment here or get in touch via the Feedback web site.

Roger Bolton is presenter of Feedback

• Listen again to this week's Feedback, produced by Karen Pirie, get in touch with Feedback, find out how to join the listener panel or subscribe to the podcast on the Feedback web page.
• Feedback is on Twitter. Follow @BBCR4Feedback.
• The picture shows protesters in Tahrir Square in the days before the fall of Hosni Mubarak. It was taken by Radio 4 reporter Hugh Sykes. We published more of his photographs from Cairo here on the blog last week.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006slnx

There was once a head of BBC News, called Tahu Hole, who implemented a regime of extreme caution. In his, much resented, view it was the job of his staff only to report what others had found out rather than what they had uncovered for themselves. Each story would only be broadcast if there were already at least two other outside sources. The BBC did not break news.

Even 25 years ago, when I was editor of Panorama and then Nationwide, I found there was a tendency to believe news was what was written in the papers, rather than what my own journalists had discovered. Mind you, if we did have a good story, we were pretty ruthless in keeping it to ourselves and not letting our colleagues in News know about it until after transmission.

All that has now changed. For example, when File on 4 has a good story the reporter will often be interviewed about it on the Today programme and play clips from the programme, before the original report has actually been transmitted. In the last few days the Today programme, and other BBC news outlets, have given considerable space to a Panorama investigation into corruption among Fifa officials who would be deciding, as it turns out, that England would not be hosting the 2018 World Cup. Some of our listeners were worried that the report could damage England's chances, others note how many stories about the BBC are on the BBC.

The Corporation is often in the headlines, whether it be over a controversial play, like the recent one about the army in Afghanistan by Jimmy McGovern, or because of executive salaries, or because of a radio presenter's lapse of taste. So how should the BBC report stories its journalists have originated and controversies in which it is embroiled?

I discussed those questions with the Deputy Director of BBC News, Steve Mitchell, who is, among other things, responsible for both Panorama and the Today programme.

This week's Feedback is the last of this series. We are back on air on the 28th January, but please keep in contact. We read everything you send us and our agenda is decided by you the listener.

Also if you fancy doing a report for Feedback (for love not money), investigating an issue that concerns you, then do let us know. Even I am getting bored with the sound of my voice, so yours would provide a welcome relief!

Roger Bolton is presenter of Feedback

• Listen again to this week's Feedback, produced by Karen Pirie, get in touch with Feedback, find out how to join the listener panel or subscribe to the podcast on the Feedback web page.
• Watch Panorama: Fifa's Dirty Secrets, on iPlayer.
• Feedback is now on Twitter. Follow @BBCFeedback.
• In the press: ESPN (a US sports network) blogger Mark Young says England's humiliation had nothing to do with the media. Alan Cochrane in The Telegraph says: "The BBC was absolutely correct." Ian Wright in The Sun disagrees: it was "Brainless, betraying, cretinous". HR Magazine says that the loss of the World Cup is a disaster for British business.
• The picture is a still from the Panorama programme.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006slnx

This week sees the last of Feedback until the autumn and probably the last ever appearance on it of Mark Damazer, as Controller of Radio 4 anyway. He is soon off to Oxford to become Head of St Peter's College. Judged by audience numbers he is going out on the crest of a wave. Listening figures for his network have never been higher, though a hotly-contested general election campaign probably had something to do with that.

There has also been wide critical acclaim for series like The Complete Smiley and A History of the World in 100 Objects. But the seas have not always been smooth. Soon after Mr Damazer started his tenure, some six years ago, he decided to axe the UK theme. There was uproar, many listeners wanted to axe him instead, and even today we receive email demanding the theme's return.

Then there was the, shall we say, inelegant way Edward Stourton was replaced on the Today programme, though BBC News management should, at the least, accept part of the responsibility for that.

However, rather than have us summarise the hits and misses of his Controllership we thought we would ask Mark Damazer himself to compile his own, short, Desert Island list ,of favourite programmes, to be replayed late at night in his Oxford eyrie when he gets withdrawal symptoms.

We suggested he exclude the 100 Objects from the shortlist since we had featured the series heavily recently, and of course, out of modesty, Feedback itself, a less likely choice. I started by asking him how he'd made his choice:

On a personal note can I just say that Mark Damazer has been unfailingly supportive of Feedback, has never tried to censor us, and has always been willing to come and be interviewed - which cannot be said of all BBC executives. Other interviewees may have given us shorter answers but noone gave fuller ones.

Please keep writing and emailing while we are off air. A new Controller, Gwyneth Williams, awaits your scrutiny.

Roger Bolton presents Feedback on BBC Radio 4

• Listen again to the whole programme, get in touch with Feedback, find out how to join the listener panel or subscribe to the podcast on the Feedback web page.
• Mark selected The Wenner Tapes, Charles Wheeler's Coming Home, The Spy Who Came in From the Cold from The Complete Smiley season and John Humphrys' interview with Abu Izadeen from Today on 22 September 2006.

Editor's note: this week's item from Feedback, Radio 4's accountability programme, concerns the redesign of one of the BBC's biggest web sites - SB.

Most of the comments - OK, complaints - we get on Feedback are about programmes (and of course trails, and grammar and pronunciation and presenters like Jonathan Ross and the attempted execution of 6 Music, and management pay, and travel expenses!).

Before the beginning of this month I would have said that I couldn't remember when we last had a complaint about the BBC News website. Like so many of you, I've been a great fan, and my family, and particularly my student daughters, have found the site invaluable not least for the context it provides to foreign news stories.

Now all seems to have changed utterly with what Steve Hermann the editor of the BBC News website calls "the biggest rethink of the design of the site since 2003."

As Mr Hermann said on the News Editors blog "Most of you commenting here... have been critical." Well here at Feedback all the correspondence we have received has been critical. The concerns range from alleged difficulties of navigation, wastage of space, the new banner which is "immoveable", "ridiculous classification" and unwanted ads. Faced with this barrage of criticism we asked Steve Herrmann to come onto Feedback and I began our interview by asking him why he believed such a major revamp was necessary:

So please keep letting Mr Hermann and Feedback know what you think about the redesign and any tweaks that may be made. By the way next week on Feedback I'll be talking to Kirsty Young about how she prepares for her Desert Island Discs interviews and trying to discover if she dislikes any of the guests, and we hope someone from the Today programme will be coming on to talk about the ever-shortening weather forecasts at 3 minutes to 8. No, make that 2 minutes to 8. No...

Roger Bolton presents Feedback on BBC Radio 4

• Listen again to the whole programme, get in touch with Feedback, find out how to join the listener panel or subscribe to the podcast on the Feedback web page.
• Visit the BBC News web site and see the new design for yourself.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00sn68s

Editor's note: the five day sprint from idea to completed drama is over and tomorrow afternoon you'll be able to hear the results of the 'From Fact to Fiction' team's labours - a topical play inspired by the news. Today Matilda James finishes the story - SB

So our third actor did say yes - and we were cast by Thursday lunchtime. Final drafts came in mid-afternoon and scripts were emailed out to the cast ready for an early start this morning.

We're recording in studio S6, Bush House, kicking off with a readthrough at 9am. Doon Mackichan and Eliza Caitlin Parkes are our freelance actors, to play Jessica (part-time PR officer for a charity) and Kerry (her cleaner) respectively.

Sam Dale, who is playing Felix, Jessica's husband, is a member of the BBC Radio Drama Company and his acrobatic gymnastic ability will be called upon later on as we realise we need to recreate the half-time commentary at a football match.

First of all though, the readthrough goes really well - the actors' understandings of the characters match each other and those of Gurpreet and Abigail, and the duration is pretty spot on - once it's all edited, with music, scene transitions, annos etc, we've got an absolute maximum of 13-and-a-half minutes duration to fit the Radio 4 slot.

And we've got 3 hours to record it all - it's always a bit tight for time recording From Fact to Fiction, as there's a World Service programme that uses the studio at 1pm for a live transmission. And Eliza's got to learn the words to Lady Gaga, and we've got to record some rowdy nightclub drunkards (involving willing volunteers from the office upstairs) so things need to go to plan.

The SMs (Studio Managers) have been searching for paving stones for a scene on the doorstep (not that easy to find in a news studio) and we've got a selection of bottles (lots of bottles), crockery and cutlery to make up our spot effects. We start recording, and it sounds great - lots of drinking and bottle clinking and trying to get the perfect wine-bottle glug. Gurpreet, Abigail and the actors talk over small line amendments, and I mock up some commentary for the scene where they're watching the England v USA match for Sam to voice up in his best Alan Shearer voice - can't be too specific or refer to any match results, as none have happened yet! We decide we don't need any extra recording of people being drunk as there's plenty on Grams (the sound effects library) - apparently bars are favourite places to go hang out and record, who knows why.

Yesterday, Thursday, was the day of the debate in the Scottish Parliament. We've kept an eye on the developments during the week - the opposition added a wrecking amendment on the subject of minimum pricing, but this will now get debated again before anything gets ratified into law. There are links to more information on the news story on the programme's web page.

And so this afternoon, producer Abigail and Pete, the SM, are editing. When they're done, it'll be checked for compliance, then I'll listen through to it, and send it over to Radio 4. And it'll go out tomorrow evening, and again on Sunday. Lovely. All in a week's work... Now, as soon as those last boxes are ticked, we're all going for a drink!

Matilda James is Broadcast Assistant on From Fact to Fiction

• Gurpreet's From Fact to Fiction is on Radio 4 at 1900 on Saturday 12 June.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00sn68s

Following our initial meeting on Monday, writer Gurpreet Bhatti delivered a first draft this morning. It's amazing what the From Fact to Fiction writers do in the time we give them. Gurpreet's already found her characters and the shape of the play.

She's stayed with her original choice of news story as inspiration - minimum pricing for alcohol, which is being voted on by the Scottish parliament this week. In the spirit of the series, her play uses the emotions and issues at the heart of the news story as its motor - it's about a woman who becomes unhealthily involved in the life of the student who cleans for her.

I discussed the team's notes on the script with Gurpreet this afternoon, and now she's hunkered down producing draft two, while we cast and get hold of the right music. It's a three-hander, of whom we currently have two confirmed - crossing fingers for the third!

I've also gone through the first draft with our SMs (studio managers). There'll be two of them working on it on the day - one 'panel' SM, who records the actors, and one 'spot' SM, who makes sure all the right props are there making all the right sort of noises and the right times. We record most of our dramas in a lovely studio in Broadcasting House, full of wonders: not just stairs, but stairs that lead somewhere! A working kitchen with running water! A spot FX store full of everything you can imagine that makes a noise!

We record FFTF in a much less glamorous room in the bowels of Bush House, so we need to be careful the scripts are actually achievable with our resources here. My last FFTF featured stairs in a big way, a mistake I won't be repeating!

Roll on tomorrow morning, with draft two and (hopefully) a 'yes' from the third member of our cast...

Abigail le Fleming is producer of From Fact to Fiction

• Gurpreet's From Fact to Fiction is on Radio 4 at 1900 on Saturday 12 June.
• Picture by Mikey. Used under licence.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00sn68s

Editor's note: From Fact to Fiction is Radio 4's topical drama series. Each play is written, recorded and broadcast in a week, in response to the news. Producer Abigail le Fleming takes us through the process, starting on Monday morning. We'll publish further snapshots from the process between now and transmission on Saturday - SB

In the hot seat this week is award-winning writer Gurpreet Kaur Bhatti. She came in to Bush House on Monday to pore over the newspapers with us as we picked up and rejected various stories. David Cameron's speech warning of drastic changes to Life As We Know It was on all the front pages. Gurpreet thought perhaps she might spin off this story with a play about a young couple with a child on the way, anxious about the future. I was struck by a story in Saturday's Guardian about covert surveillance cameras in Birmingham, to which Gurpreet responded with a lovely idea for a comedy about a man who installs CCTV in his house to monitor his family. But the cuts/pregnancy story was feeling a bit general, and we didn't think the CCTV story would still be running by the time we go out on Saturday.

Lucy Proctor from News stepped in with a very useful run-down of the news diary for this week. We discussed and rejected Gaza (too huge), Cumbria (too intrusive), Bhopal (not really current enough, despite the recent convictions). We knew we couldn't touch the World Cup, as that's being well-covered already. We talked for a while about the Labour leadership contest - could we satirise this by dramatising it as a tale of principle vs ambition in a less rarefied context than Westminster? Perhaps a charity where the employees are all scrabbling for that golden promotion?

Lucy was clearly taken with the fact that this week marks the end of the International Year of the Priest, but that was just such a delightful thing in itself we didn't think it necessarily needed to spin off into drama.

What really interested Gurpreet from Lucy's list was the issue of minimum pricing of alcohol, which is being debated by the Scottish parliament on Thursday. As we talked about this question, it seemed to chime with other stories this week: people being paid to recycle in Windsor, people being paid to lose weight/give up smoking elsewhere. And it poses some questions - can you really control people through financial incentives and disincentives? Is the new government really striving for less of a 'nanny state' than the old one? The issues of power and control here really fired Gurpreet's imagination, and she's gone away to cook up a first draft.

Abigail le Fleming is producer of From Fact to Fiction

• Gurpreet's From Fact to Fiction is on Radio 4 at 1900 on Saturday 12 June.
• The pictures were taken in the radio drama offices in Bush House.