August 28, 2025 • 36 mins
After 10 years and 150 episodes, Adam, Helen and Andy have finally got around to recording an actual introductory episode for Page 94, including a guide to the podcast and Private Eye magazine - including some of the best bits of the podcast’s archive. Welcome!
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Maisie (00:00):
Page 94, the Priva Eye Podcast.
Andy (00:03):
Hello, and welcome to another episode of Page 94.
My name's Andrew Hunter Murray, andI'm here in the Private Eye office
with Helen Lewis and Adam MacQueen.
This is your 'welcome' episode to Page 94.
That's right after 150 episodes, we havedecided to, record a show explaining
basically what the podcast is, we'regonna be hearing little selected cuts.
(00:23):
We're gonna be finding out whatthis private eye magazine we
keep talking about actually is.
As the summer holidays end and weall get back to school, we need
some good reading to do, basically.
And that's what Private Eye provides.
um,
Adam (00:34):
way like when American comedies just do a lazy clip show, 'cause it's
summer and everyone's on holiday.
It's not that, definitely not.
Andy (00:39):
it's absolutely not
Helen (00:41):
Can I ask you, the obvious question about why it's called
Page 94, which is why isn't itjust called the Private I Podcast?
Why was that tossed out so early?
Andy (00:48):
Because in Private Eye Magazine that all the jokes, no, not all of
the jokes, but a good few of them,each issue end with continued page 94.
Adam (00:56):
but actually it was just a very easy way of, finishing off a joke when
you don't really have a punchline for it.
and it started way, way back.
I can remember, because, I wrote the,50th anniversary history of the magazine
turned up all sorts of correspondence,one of which was the original letter
from Richard Ingram's, who was then theeditor inviting, young Whippersnapper
Ian Hislop to start contributing.
And one of the bits of advice hegave was like, if you think the
(01:18):
jokes are going too long, just put,continue, page 94, and that's fine.
It's always been a part of it.
Andy (01:23):
So second question, Adam, why is Private Eye called Private Eye?
Adam (01:27):
Similar reasons, slightly lost, lost to history.
There were a lot ofnames, considered for it.
So Private Eye has beengoing since October, 1961.
it was always going to be fortnightly,because at that point they didn't
think, the, founders of it who were,some guys called, Christopher Booker,
Willie Rushton and Richard Ingram's,didn't think they would make enough.
Money off it to be able tomake a living out of it.
So they had to proper jobs in,in, in one of the two weeks.
(01:48):
And basically that is how it's continued.
we do one week off and then weall go off and do other things
in, in, in the rest of the time.
So that put pay to one of the ideas,for a title which they came up with,
which was the flesh is weekly, so spiritis willing, but the flesh is weekly.
It's a slightly weak pun.
And it didn't work 'cause it wasfortnightly anyway, the British letter
that was considered the Yellow press.
which was partly 'cause the yellow presswas an old, very old, early 20th century
(02:12):
phrase for kind of like tabloidy trashyjournalism, but also mostly because the
first business manager, Peter Osbornehad, ordered a load of yellow paper
and it was gonna be printed on that.
So it was a very basic idea for that.
And then of course it'sbeen going for 64 years now.
nearly 40 of them under the, leadershipof Ian Hislop who took over as editor as
a, an incredibly young age of, I think26, in 1986 on the 25th anniversary.
Andy (02:35):
So what we're gonna do at this point in the episode is we're gonna play
in some of those clips of old episodesthat you can discover for yourself,
but that we wanted to bring rightback to the topsoil, to the surface.
Adam, this is one which features you,it is you and Maisie talking about the
eyes, famous fortnightly lunches, andwhat sort of shenanigans go on at them.
(02:57):
Adam, here's you.
Adam (02:58):
I asked Richard Ingrams, who was the editor before in Hislop, what the
thinking was behind starting up the reallunches, and what he said, we didn't
know anyone and we didn't know anything,and it was a way of getting people along
just to talk to them and tell them stuff.
And people have this weird idea thatjournalism happens by a sort of process
of osmosis that you just learn things andplug them from the air and put them in.
(03:20):
But of course you don't.
you, do need insidery type people tocome along and, and tell you stuff.
And it's not quite a case of kindof official secrets being swapped
over the cheeseboard or anything.
It's really a case of, building up akind of network of people, who might
not necessarily, come along with fiveperfectly formed stories for you, but
might know a bit of gossip from withinthe BBC or the House of Commons or
(03:41):
the Labor Party or wherever people.
Turn out and they're, abit nervous sometimes.
And I say to, what's thepurpose of these lunches?
And and he says, alright, it's not anetworking opportunity or anything.
It's not anything really terrifying.
Basically, we are gonna get you drunkand you are gonna tell us stuff and
we're gonna put it in the magazine.
at which point they, they lookeven more nervous and you've
got them exactly where you want
Andy (04:02):
them.
It's an essential journalist activityfor the magazine is what we're saying.
Adam (04:06):
Eating lunch and drinking enormous amounts of booze is an
essential journalistic activityfor any magazine or newspaper.
I can't
Andy (04:12):
think of many other places which do it quite as religiously.
Adam (04:14):
Newspapers do tend to do lunches, but they tend to be for
a sort of select crowd of people.
famously it was a an A Mirrornewspaper lunch that, Piers Morgan,
invited the eclectic guest list ofOrica Johnson and Jeremy Paxman,
and as recalled by Jeremy Paxman.
at the Levison inquiry, you cango and look up the transcripts.
He told the boss of Vodafone that thesecurity measures on his network were
(04:36):
not good enough, and it was very easyfor people to hack into, mobile phones,
which is curious because it turned outlater on he didn't actually know that.
Andy (04:43):
The person charged with booking the right mix of guests
for these boozy affairs is
the, is Maisie Glasebrook.
And as you'll
hear the phrase, boozy affairs can have more than one meaning.
Maisie (04:53):
it's a difficult balance.
you wanna make sure that you don't gettoo many people from the same newspaper
for one thing, which has happenedbefore when it turns out that all,
12 guests come from the same paper.
Hillary, who used to organize the lunchesbefore me and did a very, good job, she
used to say you needed to have a lawyer.
You need to have an actor, youneed to have a comedian, I think
(05:15):
she used to say, and obviouslythe balance between men and women.
You want to try and get that?
I'm always pretty paranoid.
I'm gonna invite two people who've eitherhad an affair with each other and it's
ended very badly, or who hate each other.
Andy (05:26):
You surely can't be expected to know who hates everyone else in journalism,
which is such a massive list of people.
I
Maisie (05:31):
know.
I know that's true.
I can't put all the blame on myself,but sooner or later it's gonna happen.
There's gonna be some kind ofterrible scene and a punch out.
Andy (05:40):
Is your own basically to stop there being a punch up at a private eye lunch?
Maisie (05:44):
a punch up would be pretty good.
I think Ian would call thata successful lunch probably.
Adam (05:49):
actually we were very proud because last year, after 40 something
years of lunches, we had our first shag.
That we know of.
Maisie (05:58):
I got a call, so I organized the lunch and it all seemed to go fine
and everyone came back and said they'dhad a great time and I was very happy.
And then, the next day I got acall from the person who we deal
with at the restaurant where thelunches held, and she said that she
just needed to flag up somethingthat had happened for my attention.
And I obviously started panickingand it something had gone
seriously wrong and she said, no.
I just think it's good that youknow that this is what happened.
(06:20):
Two of your guests were discovered afterthe lunch in the toilet together, and
I then burst out laughing so loud andran up the stairs to tell everybody I
could think of, burst into Ian's strokemeeting, told everyone, and Ian said it
was the best lunch that had ever happened.
There we
Sarah (06:36):
go.
Maisie (06:37):
And better than that, they were discovered in the toilet and
then thrown out from the toilet.
And then half an hour later,they were discovered in there
again and thrown out again.
Andy (06:45):
Clearly the message hadn't got through the first time.
Maisie (06:47):
no, Through the waves of alcohol or love, obviously
Andy (06:52):
Now, that makes the eye lunches sound very Debo.
We'd like to correct that impression.
It is not all like that.
It is not all Ugandan discussions.
over the years we have had someextremely professional politicians
and some very serious stories.
That have come out of the lunches.
Adam (07:05):
Politicians are really interesting actually, 'cause sometimes you'll get
sat next to someone and Maisie doesa little potted biography beforehand
and they all tend to say what selectcommittees they sit on and what questions
they've asked in the house recently.
And you think, oh God, thisis gonna be really, hard work.
I'm gonna have to talk alot about housing policy.
And actually they turn out to be justfantastic gossips and really good fun.
Andy (07:26):
Adam, that was you Ma g Gladbrook back in 2016 when
this podcast was barely a
year old.
Helen (07:31):
Can I ask you, Adam?
'cause one of the things I'm interestedin is that, and, it's lovely about reading
a magazine, a print magazine is, it hasa particular architecture and structure
and private eye is a very distinctive one.
So it starts with street of shame.
Then there's HB source, which is politics,and various other bits and pieces.
Then you get to a big chunky section ofjokes, and then the back is the sort of
serious investigative journalism bit.
(07:52):
has that been there since the beginning?
Has it always had thatparticular kind of grammar
to It
Adam (07:56):
It grew organically.
So when it started it, the intentionwas always, I remember talking to
Christopher Booker about this, thelate Christopher Booker, and he said
the intention was always that theywould do investigative journalism.
In fact, in the very, very firstedition back in 1961, they had a
big thing saying, coming next week,the K scandal, the inside story
of this, This terrible scandal.
And actually they didn't knowenough to actually have any of that.
So the investigative journalismreally kicks in, mid, to late sixties.
(08:18):
when Paul Foot, who's the ian ofinvestigative journalists, he's ev any
miscarriage of justice that you wanna namefrom the sixties, seventies, eighties,
so the Birmingham six, Guilford four, theCarl Bridge Water case, things like that.
He was heavily involved with bothin his work at Private Eye and and
at The Daily Mirror, which was aproper newspaper in those days.
he got involved and Michael Gillard,who is still with us, who is slicker.
Who does the city coverage and theback got involved at that point.
(08:40):
but it didn't really get that weirdsandwich effect until a bit later
on, which is, it is an odd structure.
The only real explanation I canthink of for that is that you give
'em about sort of 18 pages of grimcorruption and mps being on the take
and councilors being dodgy and stuff.
And then it's oh God, please can we justhave some jokes and cartoons for a bit?
And then you hit them with the kind ofinvestig, the, miscarriages of justice
(09:02):
and the people dying in prison atthe end just to really cheer up their
Andy (09:05):
So Helen, you joined the I so properly only a couple of years ago.
Really?
What is it like coming into aninstitution which has all of these
layers of, in jokes and historyand, it takes a, while to click in.
even as a reader, letalone as a writer for
Helen (09:20):
it.
Yeah.
I had read Private Eye for years beforethen, and I think probably having worked
in the media, I particularly bought itfor Street of Shame because I worked at
the mail and then the New States menu.
So it, it was about people that I. Iwas working with or knew about, but I
always used to think of it like, andmaybe I said this before, like Willy
Wonka's, Chocolate Factory, no oneever goes in, no one ever goes out.
(09:42):
Like it just, it emerges and somepeople do have bylines in there,
Craig, for example, Craig Brown.
But you just is a kind oflike it was made by elves.
That's my, or, lumps
Adam (09:54):
God to me must have been such a disappointment when you met us.
Helen (09:57):
I know there was no singing, there was no chocolate river, but I
think that's part of the mystique, andit's actually one of the reasons I think
lots of people enjoy writing for it.
I really love reviews and there'sbeen a lot of discussion really about
the fact that criticism is dying.
that book sections innewspapers have been shrinking.
It's hard to get advertisingfor them, and actually because
of the economics of journalism.
(10:18):
Now, freelancers particularly don't wantto write rude reviews about mega artists
because, sometimes those mega artistswill their fan bases will go after them.
And so Private Eye is one ofthe last bastions of the truly.
Brutal hatchet job.
and because those are anonymous in thebook section, I think people have got
free reign to say what they actuallythink, not what you know, is gonna
ingratiate them with the publisheror their agent, or, do they want to
(10:41):
make an enemy of somebody who's avery big beast in the literary space.
So I think the anonymity is.
Is really key to it.
And it's also, it is a bit like maybeChina and CHOC Factory isn't the right
sense, but being inducted into a kindof weird secret society in a sense.
there is a private eyevoice, isn't there, Adam?
Like when you end up writingstories, you do end up writing
(11:02):
them in a certain kind of uniform
voice.
Adam (11:05):
there's a sort of house style.
you have to know things like wealways spell Andrew Neil was named
with two Ls 'cause he complainedabout it once we'd spel it wrong.
So we've done it ever since.
'cause they're incredibly petty or,that the king has referred to as
Brian, whereas his mother was Brenda.
Andy (11:16):
There's another thing about the Eye stories, which they all have in common,
and which is close to a house style.
and it's more upfront in the sectionsthat you especially work on, Adam,
things like street of shame, whichis that they're all upside down.
So the traditional newspaper storystructure, you put a headline in.
Which contains the absolute mostimportant bit of information.
(11:36):
Oh, and then you have the, yourfirst sentence, which gives that
a tiny bit more fleshing out.
And then you put in the reallyboring stuff like the, we spoke to
the people involved and they said,this is all rubbish actually, and
we've got the wrong end of the stick.
You put that in right at theend, A Private Eye, piece.
It works like a joke.
you have a. a curious headlineat the top, which doesn't really
(11:57):
tell you very much at all.
Then you start off with the kind ofsetup to it, and then the most important
piece of information goes right atthe end because it's serving as the
punchline, which kind of unlocks the whole
rest of the
piece.
I was talking to, I think, some ofour work experience, people a couple
of weeks ago and I said, look,just put the article the other way
up and it's, and that's perfect.
and
Adam (12:17):
That is absolutely what I always do, Andy, I've learned over the 30 odd
years that I've been working here thatthe, if a story isn't working, you
literally just turn it upside down.
You start with what you had as the ending,and almost always that sorts it out.
Helen (12:28):
And I think one of the things that, Ian has said before, which
is also very true to the magazine,is he lets the writers follow their
obsessions.
And that's the kind of eclectic mixof stuff that, private eye covers,
but essentially is what are particularwriters energized about and they
particularly find interesting, whichis quite an interesting way of working.
It's, actually oddly a bitsimilar to the other magazine
(12:49):
where I work the Atlantic, right?
Which is the idea that you hiregood people and then you let them
drive the coverage because they'regonna do their best work when
they're completely engaged with it.
for example, MD Phil Hammond has beenreally fascinated by the Le be case,
and he's been given a lot of space tokeep coming back to that and follow
the developments in a way that I, don'tthink anyone else really has been able,
(13:09):
like there's no other place in the mediathat has the structure in place for
someone to do
Adam (13:13):
Yes.
And the same with T Side and Ben Houchin,which is Richard's particular obsession.
But God, what a source of stories.
and I'll think a lot of editors willsay, we've, we've done this, haven't we?
And really we haven't, there is new stuffcoming out all, the time on that front.
that's the other thing is theymight be short stories, but
God, they run for a long time.
there is.
There is a court case, pending atthe moment, a criminal court case,
which involves some people thatwere written about in Private Eye in
(13:35):
1984 and some of the stuff that wasgoing on in that particular story.
we were advised when, when we were goingthrough doing the best of stories for the,
60 year book in, 2021 by the lawyer, thatwe needed to black all of that one and
another story out because, there was stillongoing court things coming out of it and
we were in, in risk of contempt of court.
So that's not really a bad record.
1984 to, 2021.
Andy (13:56):
So you've got Richard Brooks on T side, or the Post
Office scandal, or PFI, or
Helen (14:03):
think of it as Richard Brooks on
numbers.
Andy (14:04):
Richard Brooks on
Numbers
Adam (14:06):
the key to it
is Richard Brooks wasn'ttrained in journalism.
Richard Brooks was a tax inspector,so unlike almost anyone else on Fleet
Street or what used to be Fleet Street,he knows his way around a balance sheet
and he can read numbers and he answer.
the number of times I've gone up to his,office in the attic at the top of private
and said, Richard, can you tell me whatthis means with a, with some, accounts
from, from companies house or something.
He, that is in itself a brilliant skill.
Andy (14:27):
so you've got Richard on that.
You've got, Solomon onthe probation service.
You've got Jane McKenzie on thingslike architecture or conservation
or, military housing, or
a dozen other
Adam (14:35):
Phil Hammond, who is a working doctor,
Andy (14:37):
all of these people have been writing about particular things
for a long time, a big chunk ofthe early episodes of this podcast.
You can go back and listen to them.
If you want to know about the Deep Cutscandal, the shootings of Young Service
men and women at the Deep Cut Barracks.
Heather Mills book on thatstory for over two decades.
For a new reader to privateeye, that might feel like
quite an intimidating thing.
Like I'm not completely sure of this,whereas if you can distill it to a 20,
(15:02):
25 minute chat with a genuinely a worldexpert, I don't think anyone knows more
about all of these stories than variouseye writers who have been Banging on about
them for a long time and updating readers.
that was part of the founding ethosof the podcast is to say, look, these
stories are a roll call of how Britaindoesn't work in various different ways,
all big scandals that have happened.
(15:23):
And here's your potted
guide to
Adam (15:25):
I had a conversation with our colleague Robbie the other week
where I said to him, what are weactually doing when we put in I 1432
or I pass, or anything like that.
is anyone literally going, puttingdown that copy of the, and going into
their vast library of back issues andlooking up everything else we've written
about the thing, but I think in a way.
signaling to people that thishas got some depth to it.
That this is something we've beenfollowing for an awful long time.
(15:45):
and in future, if they wanna be on thingsearly, they're gonna get onto that.
But also I think that is what the podcastdoes, gives us an opportunity to do.
But, not everyone is gonnago and hardly anyone.
You would be mad to go backinto your entire archive and
read through the whole thing.
so yeah, no, being able to summarizethem and, give the background is an
absolutely brilliant opportunity.
Andy (16:02):
actually, while we're on the subject of anonymity and assumed names here is
Ian Hislop talking about exactly whythat is the case and why it's so useful.
Ian Hislop (16:10):
There comes a point in, people's career when they write for the
eye, when they either get sufficientlyestablished that they can't be fired
in their professions anymore, or theyjust give up and don't care anymore and
develop a skin so thick, they don't care.
Who knows?
But quite a lot of our columnsare written by people inside
the industry's professions.
(16:31):
Businesses they write about andwere it to be known who they
were, they would be sacked.
So it's difficult for me to say,why didn't you interview them?
Because that would be the end, not onlyof their career, but also of the column.
'cause then we wouldn'thave the insiders anymore.
I did think about trying to get youto interview people with an actor.
(16:51):
pretending to be Jerry Adams orwhatever, but it never really works that.
So I'm afraid for obvious, obvious to me,reasons they have to remain anonymous.
Andy (17:02):
It is surprising who's secret and who's not.
'cause you would've thought, for example,last, time we had Paul Vickers, who does
Square Bashers military correspondent.
You would've thought, oh, Army.
Very secret.
One of the most secretive people, isDr. B Ching, who writes about trains.
Ian Hislop (17:16):
Yes.
compared to the Army, railways is areally dangerous business and people
are very, serious about trains ina way they probably aren't about
destroyers or aircraft carriers.
Paul is, happy to be a defensecorrespondent, as it were.
But, Dr. B Ching is, he's there inthe middle of the action, so I'm
afraid, from getting lynched bycommuters or targeted by the rail
(17:41):
industry, you just can't talk to him.
Andy (17:43):
Are there any people who.
Have one name, but actually they'rea conglomerate of different people.
I can't tell you that.
Damnit.
alright.
How did it start?
'cause the whole magazine anonymous, howdid that get going in the first place?
that's not an obvious thing formagazines to do necessarily.
Ian Hislop (18:01):
No, I believe it was a mixture of safety and the original contributors
not wanting to give each other any credit.
So I think it was a, curious mix.
And it was the sixties, so there wasa sort of collective feeling about,
but one of the first people to benamed was Paul Foote, and he was clear
(18:21):
that doing his sort of journalism,you had to be a focus, a funnel.
We still have people, whowrites the business, you know
who writes that, but there are.
I still maintain that it is acceptableto have certain people who are
in the midst of it, who you just,you can't reveal who they are.
Andy (18:38):
Has anyone ever started secret and then decided.
Actually, it doesn't matter anymore.
Ian Hislop (18:44):
A lot of people start secret.
I'm found saying I'm terriblysorry, I can't say who they are.
And they say, oh really?
'cause they've just done aninterview in the paper claiming
all the credit, for some piece.
So it's quite tempting.
if people are any good to startsaying, it was me actually.
Andy (19:01):
Do people get to choose their own nicknames?
'cause you've got.
Bio waste spreader.
Who does pharma?
You've got old Sparky who doesenergy and power remote controller.
Who does tele?
Are these names that they assumelike superhero costumes or are
they names that you impose onthem, like superhero costumes?
Ian Hislop (19:19):
No, they are self-defining and in television there's remote
controller most of the time.
Then occasionally there's someone calledyouth who takes over when perhaps the
older remote controller isn't there.
Though he, she may well be younger.
I'm not giving that away.
And we used to have a farming was doneby Old Muck spreader and the new person
(19:39):
doing it felt that was out of date.
So he became new bio waste spreader.
So the nicknames changeas do the contributors.
Andy (19:47):
Is it helpful from a legal point of view as well as in, I think I heard
something about the magazine gets suedrather than the individual writer.
Ian Hislop (19:54):
It makes it more difficult for vindictive, liable actions, or
privacy actions or confidentiality.
You can't say, that person has betrayed aconfidence 'cause you dunno who they are.
So you just have to see the magazine.
So it's helpful in one sense,but it's unhelpful in the sense
that the other side can then say,you don't even have the courage.
(20:14):
To come out, and admit who you are.
I remember some barrister saying,that a contributor had displayed
all the bravery of a rubber chicken.
So the jury may well think,this anonymity's a bit cowardly.
Is there
Andy (20:31):
anything in that, do you think?
Ian Hislop (20:32):
I would say not, but I can see why they say it, but I would
say in certain types of journalism itis, it's pretty important not to know.
Andy (20:41):
Have you selected your own secret name?
Ian Hislop (20:45):
I use Ian Hislop.
which fools a lot of people.
Andy (20:53):
we heard Ian earlier talking about anonymity of people, and
Adam, as you said, there are a fewpeople who don't mind their names
being public, like Phil Hammond, md.anyone who's appeared on this podcast
obviously has been happy to be named.
but, one of the only actual names thatappears in the magazine is that of
Craig Brown, which is a really peculiarquirk, but it, I think he's the only.
(21:17):
Named writer most
Adam (21:18):
think it's just down to the fact that if you've got Craig Brown working for
you, you want everyone to know about it.
Andy (21:25):
So Greg does the, diary column.
every week it's, he takes on a differentvoice or a collection of voices and
just produces an absolutely bananasthousand words of surreal comedy
that kind of are the bridge between.
The jokes and the books pages, butthey don't really fit in either.
But it's, it's too good not to have.
(21:45):
Craig is really good at that kind ofparody version of satire, which does
crop up a lot in the jokes pages, buthe does it in a very specific way.
One of the voices he does, especiallywell alongside thousands of
others, is that of Donald Trump.
And we, spoke to him in 2016about how to do Donald Trump.
So this was during Trump 1.0.
(22:05):
but it's about how to get a comedic voice.
Basically, it's about how to communicate,a really strange character and make
it really, funny at the same time.
Here's Craig.
Craig Brown (22:14):
It is rather hard now that everyone's doing it.
He's, it's almost like you nationalized.
comedy, and so I wastrying to think of that.
I did one Melania, a lot ofTrumps, which were all right.
It's hard to gauge her cha.
you can gauge her character, oddlyenough, through her tweets, Donald
Trump's, you read her tweets and theywere very, Bland, but what was I suddenly
(22:38):
realized was striking about them thatshe hardly ever mentioned other people.
She would tweet views out of Trump,towers of Central Park and pictures of
herself or something she'd just bought.
But it was though you realizedit's very kind of lonely life.
I then thought of doing Donald Junior'stweets or something, and I'm sure that
(23:00):
would be a good angle in a bit, like.
Dear Bill, that was a rather good wayinto Mrs. Atch 'cause she was so done
by satis and jokesters everywhere thatactually, if you did it via Dennis
it, it became a fresh joke becauseyou haven't really been doing Twitter.
Diaries for very long.
No, Twitter.
Twitter is a real godsendbecause it just boils down.
(23:21):
Everyone's vanity and hisparanoia and everyone just
becomes more of what they are.
Andy (23:27):
this is the thing, because it seems a bit like they were,
you were more extreme in yourTrump tweets in your early ones.
So more than a year before the election.
Yeah, it was things like, Nodisrespect to Pope Francis on his
US tour, but the guy looks like afruit in his frilly white dress.
Fire.
Your Taylor Frank, right?
Yes.
I don't like a loser, don't get me wrong.
(23:47):
Jesus was a remarkable guy.
A genius at publicity, but clingingon with your hands to a cross that
sends out all the wrong messages.
But actually they're not too much lessextreme than the ones that you do now.
And maybe that's 'cause he really
Craig Brown (23:59):
hasn't changed, as you say.
No, he can't.
Change and he gets fixated now onfake news and that kind of thing.
Andy (24:07):
a lot of what you do, I know that you study your form quite well,
so whenever you do anyone, not justTrump, you get as many samples of their
writing and their speaking as you can.
Craig Brown (24:17):
Yeah.
That is one, that's away of work avoidance.
'cause you think, if I'm, ifI, it's easier to read tweets
rather than create them.
It's also a kind of laziness becauseespecially with Trump, you can use.
95% of what he writes and just changethe name or that, that kind of thing.
But also I think that, with parodymistake people make when they're trying
(24:38):
to do parodies, he's just doing toomuch of themselves and you should just
let, it's like jujitsu or something.
You should let the person'sweight he wants creates the fall.
Andy (24:49):
actually on that note, I have a little game that I
thought might be useful to play.
I have got some.
Trauma tweets and I've gotsome of your trauma tweets.
And so I
Craig Brown (24:57):
guess I'll be able to do them just because I think you probably will.
because usually, if I can't, and it'sa, it doesn't say much for my tweets.
'cause I think there's, the thingabout parody is you are, not just
trying to recreate someone, youare trying to edge them into comedy
whilst retaining their essence.
And so I think if I can't get it,it means my joke isn't good enough.
Andy (25:20):
Okay, we'll see.
so this is basically areferendum on your jokes, right?
yeah.
Who it is, yeah.
Yeah.
Lightweight bands, Stars, refuseto play at my inauguration.
Poor work ethic, unfair.
Craig Brown (25:33):
I guess that was Trump.
Yeah.
That's you.
That was,
yeah.
I should have put some specific rockreference or that someone he was hoping
to get who would be a very naff person.
Andy (25:48):
Okay.
Next up.
Yeah.
It's freezing.
It's freezing and snowing in New York.
We need global warming.
I'd say that's Trump.
It.
Is Trump good?
Yeah.
Yeah.
So it's one all so far.
the cheap 12 inch square marble tilesbehind speaker at UN always bothered me.
(26:10):
I will replace with beautifullarge marble slabs if they ask me.
Craig Brown (26:14):
Oh, that would be, I would be quite pleased if I'd done that.
But I can't remember doingit, so I guess that's Trump.
It is Trump, yeah.
Good.
Oh man, you've got
Andy (26:24):
so many of them so far.
one last one.
Happy New Year to all, includingto my many enemies and those
who have fought me and lost sobadly, they just dunno what to do.
Craig Brown (26:34):
I've seen he, he's done tweets which say, happy Father's
Day, even to the losers and haters.
And and he does a wholeseries of that usually.
So in a way his areusually stronger than that.
I'd say That's Trump, I'm afraid.
It is Trump.
Oh, good, Yeah.
Oh, you've done very well.
Andy (26:54):
There's Craig Brown in 2016 on donald
Adam (26:57):
I remember years ago having a conversation with one of Craig's.
Victims, I suppose you shouldcall them someone who was
parody in the diary section.
Not Donald Trump, I have to say, but Iwill spare their blushes and not say who.
But they just said, they thoughtit was hilarious, but also they
were slightly devastated by it.
'cause they realized that one of thephrases he used was just something that
they used all the time in their writing.
And from that moment on, that was it.
(27:17):
They could never, ever use it again.
Andy (27:19):
Craig actually has recent form with Donald Trump, so he
wrote a book about, the Queen,called a Avoid Around the Queen.
Really good book.
And, in it, he just mentioned in passing,the claim that Trump had made that he was.
Of all the presidents she'd met overthe last 70 years, he was her favorite
president and he said, a lot of peoplehave told me that, I was her favorite.
(27:41):
And we're talking back to the days of,Eisenhower here and we're going back a
really long way.
Yeah.
anyway, Craig simply mentioned thisin his book and, might've raised an
eyebrow and said, recollections may vary.
At which point Trump was then asked aboutthis at a press conference and called
Craig a
Adam (27:59):
Oh, the glory.
Andy (28:01):
And of all the words you'd use to describe Craig,
as you've heard from that clip
Adam (28:04):
That's why he deserves his byline.
Andy (28:08):
I think we should have another of these.
There are so many different smallsections of the eye, which have
been going for such a long time.
So one of which.
is Dumb Britain, which is this tinybox of the eye, which has been going
for decades now, and it's real answersgiven on British quiz shows, by
real contestants to real questions.
And it's compiled every fortnight byMarcus Berkman, who gets through an
(28:30):
enormous amount of quizzing and quizzes.
and here's him giving a littleguide to that section and
how it arose and what's in
Marcus (28:39):
They're not there to illustrate that the world is full of thickies.
Although obviously if you do watch asmany quiz shows as I do, you realize that
the world is indeed full of thickies,but it's not specifically supposed to do
that is supposed to be, make you laugh.
Andy (28:51):
A lot of the answers are chosen because.
They're very apt, or they'reinapt in exactly the right way.
So for example, who formulated thelaws of gravity after watching an apple
fall from a tree at his linker home?
Contestant answers Einstein.
Marcus (29:04):
Yes.
Andy (29:05):
Yeah.
Marcus (29:05):
and the point is, some of these questions you have to really
think about how anyone is actuallygonna come up with any of these things.
So for example,
Andy (29:13):
yeah,
Marcus (29:13):
that one of my favorites, and this is from the, I think the seventies
or the eighties, and we put this on thecover of a Dumb Britain book and the, it
was on Radio Mercy side, and the presentersaid, what was Hitler's first name?
And the caller said, Hyle.
It's the imaginative process that comesup with, with these amazing answers.
Yeah.
That is what we, that what we love.
Andy (29:35):
So you presumably reject the idea.
This is just a, snobbish exercise.
'cause the name Dumb Britain,it, does imply a certain.
from, it does,
Marcus (29:45):
but, I inherited the, column name and I've never particularly liked it.
And I've, I actually spent 20years trying to justify it.
And because people do get cross aboutit, and I get letters regularly from
people saying, dumb Britain, sneeringat, people getting things wrong.
yes and no.
Andy (30:02):
Have you suffered a catastrophic collapse on a quiz show?
Because you do a lot of quizzes.
I don't think the readers may know this.
No, they
Marcus (30:09):
don't.
And, I have a sideline and I'm a quizmaster, so I do lots and lots of quiz
mastering all over the, southeast,of England all the time and do about.
Probably one a week, 50 a year, roughly.
But I've been on a couple of quizshows, and I went on, 15 to one, which
I was completely obsessed with in the,nineties, totally obsessed with, and
(30:30):
I think it was on two or three timesdifferent, on different occasions.
Two of the times I came up withthe most catastrophic errors.
the first time I was on it was,who was the Sun King of France.
Okay.
And I came up with the wrong louisie,although I, my, my brain knew
which louisie it was, but my mouthdefinitely said the wrong louisie.
and there was another one Iwas on and, I needed to answer
(30:52):
one question to win the show.
And William G. Stewart read out thedictionary definition of a stenographer.
Andy (31:00):
Okay.
Marcus (31:01):
He could have said, what are those two things on the end of
your legs with five toes on each?
But, and, I wouldn't have known theanswer 'cause my brain had gone.
So I'm sympathetic to people who,who go on these chin things and
make complete fools of themselves.
Andy (31:15):
I think we can all.
Empathize.
There are times in all of ourlives, and I still think of
questions I've got wrong in quizzes.
Marcus (31:21):
absolutely.
All the time.
you did you know that in 2005, Ian, hisop and Christopher Booker and Francis
Ween and I went on university, challengedthe professionals as the prior I team.
I did not know that there were 10 showsand the top four scoring teams went
onto the semifinals and ours was thelast of the main 10 to be recorded,
(31:43):
and we had to get 210 points to.
To go on, which is a lot of points.
And we started, amazingly, we were playingtores and we started like a train and, his
lot Booker and Ween, they're brilliant.
They're, they know everything.
And they were fantastic.
And I got one or two things andwe were working really well.
And then we started ballsing things up andwe were leading, I think 1, 3, 5 to 15.
(32:08):
And in the end, I think we onlyscored 150 points and we didn't
go through and we all fell away.
And one of.
The bonus rounds was Ian's specialsubject in finals at university
and he got none of them right.
And he said afterwards he says, I've done,have I got news for you for 15 years?
And that was much morestressful than any of those.
(32:29):
It's, it happens to everybody.
Andy (32:31):
Marcus Bergman.
The thing that Marcus was really keento get across in that interview is,
firstly, it happens to everybody.
This phenomenon of giving acomically wrong answer, an answer
that's al almost not even wrong,it's so wrong, is a universal one.
And that's the kind ofglorious, joyful thing.
And sometimes the connections thatpeople make in their minds, is wonderful.
Like his frank, the someone who gavean answer to, who painted the girl with
(32:55):
a pearl earring, the, famous portrait,and the contestant answered Frank Bth.
Now what,
Adam (33:01):
I've been known best for presenting breakfast telly in the 1980s with
Selena Scott wearing nice jumpers, notknown as a painter as far as I know.
Andy (33:07):
Exactly.
But what had happened was thecontestant had thought, famous portrait.
Okay, I need a famous painter, Van Goff.
But in the process of saying VanGogh had just, their brain had
just garbled it to Frank Boff.
And that's, those are the kindof glorious bits of dumb Britain.
Those are the really fun ones.
I suppose one final question tofinish off, Helen and Adam, if
you could send listeners back tolisten to one bit of the podcast.
(33:28):
One thing that you think sums up notonly page 94, but also private eye.
Where would you send people back to?
Helen (33:34):
I would pick Jane Mackenzie, talking about RAAC, which is a very
strange, bubbly form of concrete.
And I remember her coming on to talkabout the fact that it had been used in
schools and lots of official buildingsand it was not to put too fine a point
on it, breaking in a way that, thatyou don't really want concrete that
you've made schools outta to break.
And I remember thinking it wasone of those moments in pri
like classic private eye moment,But Jane, this sounds terrible.
(33:56):
Why is no one talking about this?
and sure enough, I think aboutit was like you set your watch
by it about two months later.
There was a huge scandal about it, aboutschool, the fact that the government
was now on the hook for lots of moneyto rebuild schools that were built
with this particular type of concrete.
But it was a really good exampleof a story that on the surface
looks really unglamorous, but justhad a huge amount of depth to it.
And I think Jane was very prescientin picking it up and also.
(34:19):
I've again, the private eye way ofwriting and the podcasting made a
story about concrete, somehow gripping,which is a great achievement, I think.
Adam (34:29):
Sexy concrete.
Yeah.
Andy (34:30):
Yeah,
Adam.
Adam (34:32):
I would go back.
there was one that you and I didtogether where we just, we were
talking about that way of explainingall the backstory to something.
We basically did the entire mirrorphone hacking scandal in kind of 20
minutes and, laid that one out foreveryone, which I enjoyed a lot.
but also, in terms of the, sort of thehistory of the eye, there was one that
you did with, Ian Hislop and, Francis Weennow sadly retired, where they just talked.
(34:52):
It was that strange point.
to everyone's surprise, suddenly theMaxwell family erupted back into public
consciousness, with Ghislaine, Maxwell'sinvolvement in the Jeffrey Epstein
scandal, and they basically did thebackstory of, Robert Maxwell, her father,
who had attempted to sue the eye out ofexistence repeatedly and failed before
dropping off the back of his yacht andturning out to have stolen millions and
millions of pounds from his company.
(35:12):
just in terms of kinda explainingbackstories, those two I would think
were particular highlights for me.
Helen (35:16):
do you have a favorite, Andy?
Andy (35:18):
I've got 150 favorites, Helen,
Adam (35:20):
It's like choosing one of your children, isn't it?
Andy (35:24):
I would say.
That if you look for Richard Brookstalking about the post office
scandal, it's just sucha thorough explainer.
If that's a story that you wereinterested in, if you saw Mr.
Bates versus the post office, Richardand his colleague Nick Wallace,
who, both worked on the story agreat deal for many years, did an
absolutely terrific job exposing.
(35:46):
Just what went wrong andhow and what comes next.
And I think that's alwaysreally interesting.
And when, I do one of theselong interviews with an
expert, I try and say, what?
What can be done about it?
And sometimes the answer isoptimistic and sometimes it's not.
But it's always fascinatingto hear people say, how we got
here and what, can be done.
okay, so there you have it.
(36:07):
There's your guide to,not only this podcast.
Thank you for listening.
there are 150 episodes.
Go back and listen to all of them.
Each one containing amazing stories aboutwhat is going right and more frequently
wrong around Britain and the world today.
if we've peaked your interest,if you are, I curious, the first
thing to do is go into your local.
Just go with it guys.
The
first
thing to do
(36:28):
is
walk into your local newsagent and pick up a copy.
You cannot miss it.
It is the only magazine with a photobubble cover in this day and age, And
for those of you who have picked upyour first copy of Private Eye, the
next thing to do is go to the websiteand get, a fortnightly subscription.
. we'll be back again with another threeunlikely subjects yoked together in
the podcast format, a fortnight's time.
(36:49):
Until then, thanks forlistening to page 94.
Thanks to Helen and Adam, allof our contributors today.
And as always do MattHill of Rethink audio.
Bye for now.
Page 94, the Priva Eye Podcast.
Andy (00:03):
Hello, and welcome to another episode of Page 94.
My name's Andrew Hunter Murray, andI'm here in the Private Eye office
with Helen Lewis and Adam MacQueen.
This is your 'welcome' episode to Page 94.
That's right after 150 episodes, we havedecided to, record a show explaining
basically what the podcast is, we'regonna be hearing little selected cuts.
(00:23):
We're gonna be finding out whatthis private eye magazine we
keep talking about actually is.
As the summer holidays end and weall get back to school, we need
some good reading to do, basically.
And that's what Private Eye provides.
um,
Adam (00:34):
way like when American comedies just do a lazy clip show, 'cause it's
summer and everyone's on holiday.
It's not that, definitely not.
Andy (00:39):
it's absolutely not
Helen (00:41):
Can I ask you, the obvious question about why it's called
Page 94, which is why isn't itjust called the Private I Podcast?
Why was that tossed out so early?
Andy (00:48):
Because in Private Eye Magazine that all the jokes, no, not all of
the jokes, but a good few of them,each issue end with continued page 94.
Adam (00:56):
but actually it was just a very easy way of, finishing off a joke when
you don't really have a punchline for it.
and it started way, way back.
I can remember, because, I wrote the,50th anniversary history of the magazine
turned up all sorts of correspondence,one of which was the original letter
from Richard Ingram's, who was then theeditor inviting, young Whippersnapper
Ian Hislop to start contributing.
And one of the bits of advice hegave was like, if you think the
(01:18):
jokes are going too long, just put,continue, page 94, and that's fine.
It's always been a part of it.
Andy (01:23):
So second question, Adam, why is Private Eye called Private Eye?
Adam (01:27):
Similar reasons, slightly lost, lost to history.
There were a lot ofnames, considered for it.
So Private Eye has beengoing since October, 1961.
it was always going to be fortnightly,because at that point they didn't
think, the, founders of it who were,some guys called, Christopher Booker,
Willie Rushton and Richard Ingram's,didn't think they would make enough.
Money off it to be able tomake a living out of it.
So they had to proper jobs in,in, in one of the two weeks.
(01:48):
And basically that is how it's continued.
we do one week off and then weall go off and do other things
in, in, in the rest of the time.
So that put pay to one of the ideas,for a title which they came up with,
which was the flesh is weekly, so spiritis willing, but the flesh is weekly.
It's a slightly weak pun.
And it didn't work 'cause it wasfortnightly anyway, the British letter
that was considered the Yellow press.
which was partly 'cause the yellow presswas an old, very old, early 20th century
(02:12):
phrase for kind of like tabloidy trashyjournalism, but also mostly because the
first business manager, Peter Osbornehad, ordered a load of yellow paper
and it was gonna be printed on that.
So it was a very basic idea for that.
And then of course it'sbeen going for 64 years now.
nearly 40 of them under the, leadershipof Ian Hislop who took over as editor as
a, an incredibly young age of, I think26, in 1986 on the 25th anniversary.
Andy (02:35):
So what we're gonna do at this point in the episode is we're gonna play
in some of those clips of old episodesthat you can discover for yourself,
but that we wanted to bring rightback to the topsoil, to the surface.
Adam, this is one which features you,it is you and Maisie talking about the
eyes, famous fortnightly lunches, andwhat sort of shenanigans go on at them.
(02:57):
Adam, here's you.
Adam (02:58):
I asked Richard Ingrams, who was the editor before in Hislop, what the
thinking was behind starting up the reallunches, and what he said, we didn't
know anyone and we didn't know anything,and it was a way of getting people along
just to talk to them and tell them stuff.
And people have this weird idea thatjournalism happens by a sort of process
of osmosis that you just learn things andplug them from the air and put them in.
(03:20):
But of course you don't.
you, do need insidery type people tocome along and, and tell you stuff.
And it's not quite a case of kindof official secrets being swapped
over the cheeseboard or anything.
It's really a case of, building up akind of network of people, who might
not necessarily, come along with fiveperfectly formed stories for you, but
might know a bit of gossip from withinthe BBC or the House of Commons or
(03:41):
the Labor Party or wherever people.
Turn out and they're, abit nervous sometimes.
And I say to, what's thepurpose of these lunches?
And and he says, alright, it's not anetworking opportunity or anything.
It's not anything really terrifying.
Basically, we are gonna get you drunkand you are gonna tell us stuff and
we're gonna put it in the magazine.
at which point they, they lookeven more nervous and you've
got them exactly where you want
Andy (04:02):
them.
It's an essential journalist activityfor the magazine is what we're saying.
Adam (04:06):
Eating lunch and drinking enormous amounts of booze is an
essential journalistic activityfor any magazine or newspaper.
I can't
Andy (04:12):
think of many other places which do it quite as religiously.
Adam (04:14):
Newspapers do tend to do lunches, but they tend to be for
a sort of select crowd of people.
famously it was a an A Mirrornewspaper lunch that, Piers Morgan,
invited the eclectic guest list ofOrica Johnson and Jeremy Paxman,
and as recalled by Jeremy Paxman.
at the Levison inquiry, you cango and look up the transcripts.
He told the boss of Vodafone that thesecurity measures on his network were
(04:36):
not good enough, and it was very easyfor people to hack into, mobile phones,
which is curious because it turned outlater on he didn't actually know that.
Andy (04:43):
The person charged with booking the right mix of guests
for these boozy affairs is
the, is Maisie Glasebrook.
And as you'll
hear the phrase, boozy affairs can have more than one meaning.
Maisie (04:53):
it's a difficult balance.
you wanna make sure that you don't gettoo many people from the same newspaper
for one thing, which has happenedbefore when it turns out that all,
12 guests come from the same paper.
Hillary, who used to organize the lunchesbefore me and did a very, good job, she
used to say you needed to have a lawyer.
You need to have an actor, youneed to have a comedian, I think
(05:15):
she used to say, and obviouslythe balance between men and women.
You want to try and get that?
I'm always pretty paranoid.
I'm gonna invite two people who've eitherhad an affair with each other and it's
ended very badly, or who hate each other.
Andy (05:26):
You surely can't be expected to know who hates everyone else in journalism,
which is such a massive list of people.
I
Maisie (05:31):
know.
I know that's true.
I can't put all the blame on myself,but sooner or later it's gonna happen.
There's gonna be some kind ofterrible scene and a punch out.
Andy (05:40):
Is your own basically to stop there being a punch up at a private eye lunch?
Maisie (05:44):
a punch up would be pretty good.
I think Ian would call thata successful lunch probably.
Adam (05:49):
actually we were very proud because last year, after 40 something
years of lunches, we had our first shag.
That we know of.
Maisie (05:58):
I got a call, so I organized the lunch and it all seemed to go fine
and everyone came back and said they'dhad a great time and I was very happy.
And then, the next day I got acall from the person who we deal
with at the restaurant where thelunches held, and she said that she
just needed to flag up somethingthat had happened for my attention.
And I obviously started panickingand it something had gone
seriously wrong and she said, no.
I just think it's good that youknow that this is what happened.
(06:20):
Two of your guests were discovered afterthe lunch in the toilet together, and
I then burst out laughing so loud andran up the stairs to tell everybody I
could think of, burst into Ian's strokemeeting, told everyone, and Ian said it
was the best lunch that had ever happened.
There we
Sarah (06:36):
go.
Maisie (06:37):
And better than that, they were discovered in the toilet and
then thrown out from the toilet.
And then half an hour later,they were discovered in there
again and thrown out again.
Andy (06:45):
Clearly the message hadn't got through the first time.
Maisie (06:47):
no, Through the waves of alcohol or love, obviously
Andy (06:52):
Now, that makes the eye lunches sound very Debo.
We'd like to correct that impression.
It is not all like that.
It is not all Ugandan discussions.
over the years we have had someextremely professional politicians
and some very serious stories.
That have come out of the lunches.
Adam (07:05):
Politicians are really interesting actually, 'cause sometimes you'll get
sat next to someone and Maisie doesa little potted biography beforehand
and they all tend to say what selectcommittees they sit on and what questions
they've asked in the house recently.
And you think, oh God, thisis gonna be really, hard work.
I'm gonna have to talk alot about housing policy.
And actually they turn out to be justfantastic gossips and really good fun.
Andy (07:26):
Adam, that was you Ma g Gladbrook back in 2016 when
this podcast was barely a
year old.
Helen (07:31):
Can I ask you, Adam?
'cause one of the things I'm interestedin is that, and, it's lovely about reading
a magazine, a print magazine is, it hasa particular architecture and structure
and private eye is a very distinctive one.
So it starts with street of shame.
Then there's HB source, which is politics,and various other bits and pieces.
Then you get to a big chunky section ofjokes, and then the back is the sort of
serious investigative journalism bit.
(07:52):
has that been there since the beginning?
Has it always had thatparticular kind of grammar
to It
Adam (07:56):
It grew organically.
So when it started it, the intentionwas always, I remember talking to
Christopher Booker about this, thelate Christopher Booker, and he said
the intention was always that theywould do investigative journalism.
In fact, in the very, very firstedition back in 1961, they had a
big thing saying, coming next week,the K scandal, the inside story
of this, This terrible scandal.
And actually they didn't knowenough to actually have any of that.
So the investigative journalismreally kicks in, mid, to late sixties.
(08:18):
when Paul Foot, who's the ian ofinvestigative journalists, he's ev any
miscarriage of justice that you wanna namefrom the sixties, seventies, eighties,
so the Birmingham six, Guilford four, theCarl Bridge Water case, things like that.
He was heavily involved with bothin his work at Private Eye and and
at The Daily Mirror, which was aproper newspaper in those days.
he got involved and Michael Gillard,who is still with us, who is slicker.
Who does the city coverage and theback got involved at that point.
(08:40):
but it didn't really get that weirdsandwich effect until a bit later
on, which is, it is an odd structure.
The only real explanation I canthink of for that is that you give
'em about sort of 18 pages of grimcorruption and mps being on the take
and councilors being dodgy and stuff.
And then it's oh God, please can we justhave some jokes and cartoons for a bit?
And then you hit them with the kind ofinvestig, the, miscarriages of justice
(09:02):
and the people dying in prison atthe end just to really cheer up their
Andy (09:05):
So Helen, you joined the I so properly only a couple of years ago.
Really?
What is it like coming into aninstitution which has all of these
layers of, in jokes and historyand, it takes a, while to click in.
even as a reader, letalone as a writer for
Helen (09:20):
it.
Yeah.
I had read Private Eye for years beforethen, and I think probably having worked
in the media, I particularly bought itfor Street of Shame because I worked at
the mail and then the New States menu.
So it, it was about people that I. Iwas working with or knew about, but I
always used to think of it like, andmaybe I said this before, like Willy
Wonka's, Chocolate Factory, no oneever goes in, no one ever goes out.
(09:42):
Like it just, it emerges and somepeople do have bylines in there,
Craig, for example, Craig Brown.
But you just is a kind oflike it was made by elves.
That's my, or, lumps
Adam (09:54):
God to me must have been such a disappointment when you met us.
Helen (09:57):
I know there was no singing, there was no chocolate river, but I
think that's part of the mystique, andit's actually one of the reasons I think
lots of people enjoy writing for it.
I really love reviews and there'sbeen a lot of discussion really about
the fact that criticism is dying.
that book sections innewspapers have been shrinking.
It's hard to get advertisingfor them, and actually because
of the economics of journalism.
(10:18):
Now, freelancers particularly don't wantto write rude reviews about mega artists
because, sometimes those mega artistswill their fan bases will go after them.
And so Private Eye is one ofthe last bastions of the truly.
Brutal hatchet job.
and because those are anonymous in thebook section, I think people have got
free reign to say what they actuallythink, not what you know, is gonna
ingratiate them with the publisheror their agent, or, do they want to
(10:41):
make an enemy of somebody who's avery big beast in the literary space.
So I think the anonymity is.
Is really key to it.
And it's also, it is a bit like maybeChina and CHOC Factory isn't the right
sense, but being inducted into a kindof weird secret society in a sense.
there is a private eyevoice, isn't there, Adam?
Like when you end up writingstories, you do end up writing
(11:02):
them in a certain kind of uniform
voice.
Adam (11:05):
there's a sort of house style.
you have to know things like wealways spell Andrew Neil was named
with two Ls 'cause he complainedabout it once we'd spel it wrong.
So we've done it ever since.
'cause they're incredibly petty or,that the king has referred to as
Brian, whereas his mother was Brenda.
Andy (11:16):
There's another thing about the Eye stories, which they all have in common,
and which is close to a house style.
and it's more upfront in the sectionsthat you especially work on, Adam,
things like street of shame, whichis that they're all upside down.
So the traditional newspaper storystructure, you put a headline in.
Which contains the absolute mostimportant bit of information.
(11:36):
Oh, and then you have the, yourfirst sentence, which gives that
a tiny bit more fleshing out.
And then you put in the reallyboring stuff like the, we spoke to
the people involved and they said,this is all rubbish actually, and
we've got the wrong end of the stick.
You put that in right at theend, A Private Eye, piece.
It works like a joke.
you have a. a curious headlineat the top, which doesn't really
(11:57):
tell you very much at all.
Then you start off with the kind ofsetup to it, and then the most important
piece of information goes right atthe end because it's serving as the
punchline, which kind of unlocks the whole
rest of the
piece.
I was talking to, I think, some ofour work experience, people a couple
of weeks ago and I said, look,just put the article the other way
up and it's, and that's perfect.
and
Adam (12:17):
That is absolutely what I always do, Andy, I've learned over the 30 odd
years that I've been working here thatthe, if a story isn't working, you
literally just turn it upside down.
You start with what you had as the ending,and almost always that sorts it out.
Helen (12:28):
And I think one of the things that, Ian has said before, which
is also very true to the magazine,is he lets the writers follow their
obsessions.
And that's the kind of eclectic mixof stuff that, private eye covers,
but essentially is what are particularwriters energized about and they
particularly find interesting, whichis quite an interesting way of working.
It's, actually oddly a bitsimilar to the other magazine
(12:49):
where I work the Atlantic, right?
Which is the idea that you hiregood people and then you let them
drive the coverage because they'regonna do their best work when
they're completely engaged with it.
for example, MD Phil Hammond has beenreally fascinated by the Le be case,
and he's been given a lot of space tokeep coming back to that and follow
the developments in a way that I, don'tthink anyone else really has been able,
(13:09):
like there's no other place in the mediathat has the structure in place for
someone to do
Adam (13:13):
Yes.
And the same with T Side and Ben Houchin,which is Richard's particular obsession.
But God, what a source of stories.
and I'll think a lot of editors willsay, we've, we've done this, haven't we?
And really we haven't, there is new stuffcoming out all, the time on that front.
that's the other thing is theymight be short stories, but
God, they run for a long time.
there is.
There is a court case, pending atthe moment, a criminal court case,
which involves some people thatwere written about in Private Eye in
(13:35):
1984 and some of the stuff that wasgoing on in that particular story.
we were advised when, when we were goingthrough doing the best of stories for the,
60 year book in, 2021 by the lawyer, thatwe needed to black all of that one and
another story out because, there was stillongoing court things coming out of it and
we were in, in risk of contempt of court.
So that's not really a bad record.
1984 to, 2021.
Andy (13:56):
So you've got Richard Brooks on T side, or the Post
Office scandal, or PFI, or
Helen (14:03):
think of it as Richard Brooks on
numbers.
Andy (14:04):
Richard Brooks on
Numbers
Adam (14:06):
the key to it
is Richard Brooks wasn'ttrained in journalism.
Richard Brooks was a tax inspector,so unlike almost anyone else on Fleet
Street or what used to be Fleet Street,he knows his way around a balance sheet
and he can read numbers and he answer.
the number of times I've gone up to his,office in the attic at the top of private
and said, Richard, can you tell me whatthis means with a, with some, accounts
from, from companies house or something.
He, that is in itself a brilliant skill.
Andy (14:27):
so you've got Richard on that.
You've got, Solomon onthe probation service.
You've got Jane McKenzie on thingslike architecture or conservation
or, military housing, or
a dozen other
Adam (14:35):
Phil Hammond, who is a working doctor,
Andy (14:37):
all of these people have been writing about particular things
for a long time, a big chunk ofthe early episodes of this podcast.
You can go back and listen to them.
If you want to know about the Deep Cutscandal, the shootings of Young Service
men and women at the Deep Cut Barracks.
Heather Mills book on thatstory for over two decades.
For a new reader to privateeye, that might feel like
quite an intimidating thing.
Like I'm not completely sure of this,whereas if you can distill it to a 20,
(15:02):
25 minute chat with a genuinely a worldexpert, I don't think anyone knows more
about all of these stories than variouseye writers who have been Banging on about
them for a long time and updating readers.
that was part of the founding ethosof the podcast is to say, look, these
stories are a roll call of how Britaindoesn't work in various different ways,
all big scandals that have happened.
(15:23):
And here's your potted
guide to
Adam (15:25):
I had a conversation with our colleague Robbie the other week
where I said to him, what are weactually doing when we put in I 1432
or I pass, or anything like that.
is anyone literally going, puttingdown that copy of the, and going into
their vast library of back issues andlooking up everything else we've written
about the thing, but I think in a way.
signaling to people that thishas got some depth to it.
That this is something we've beenfollowing for an awful long time.
(15:45):
and in future, if they wanna be on thingsearly, they're gonna get onto that.
But also I think that is what the podcastdoes, gives us an opportunity to do.
But, not everyone is gonnago and hardly anyone.
You would be mad to go backinto your entire archive and
read through the whole thing.
so yeah, no, being able to summarizethem and, give the background is an
absolutely brilliant opportunity.
Andy (16:02):
actually, while we're on the subject of anonymity and assumed names here is
Ian Hislop talking about exactly whythat is the case and why it's so useful.
Ian Hislop (16:10):
There comes a point in, people's career when they write for the
eye, when they either get sufficientlyestablished that they can't be fired
in their professions anymore, or theyjust give up and don't care anymore and
develop a skin so thick, they don't care.
Who knows?
But quite a lot of our columnsare written by people inside
the industry's professions.
(16:31):
Businesses they write about andwere it to be known who they
were, they would be sacked.
So it's difficult for me to say,why didn't you interview them?
Because that would be the end, not onlyof their career, but also of the column.
'cause then we wouldn'thave the insiders anymore.
I did think about trying to get youto interview people with an actor.
(16:51):
pretending to be Jerry Adams orwhatever, but it never really works that.
So I'm afraid for obvious, obvious to me,reasons they have to remain anonymous.
Andy (17:02):
It is surprising who's secret and who's not.
'cause you would've thought, for example,last, time we had Paul Vickers, who does
Square Bashers military correspondent.
You would've thought, oh, Army.
Very secret.
One of the most secretive people, isDr. B Ching, who writes about trains.
Ian Hislop (17:16):
Yes.
compared to the Army, railways is areally dangerous business and people
are very, serious about trains ina way they probably aren't about
destroyers or aircraft carriers.
Paul is, happy to be a defensecorrespondent, as it were.
But, Dr. B Ching is, he's there inthe middle of the action, so I'm
afraid, from getting lynched bycommuters or targeted by the rail
(17:41):
industry, you just can't talk to him.
Andy (17:43):
Are there any people who.
Have one name, but actually they'rea conglomerate of different people.
I can't tell you that.
Damnit.
alright.
How did it start?
'cause the whole magazine anonymous, howdid that get going in the first place?
that's not an obvious thing formagazines to do necessarily.
Ian Hislop (18:01):
No, I believe it was a mixture of safety and the original contributors
not wanting to give each other any credit.
So I think it was a, curious mix.
And it was the sixties, so there wasa sort of collective feeling about,
but one of the first people to benamed was Paul Foote, and he was clear
(18:21):
that doing his sort of journalism,you had to be a focus, a funnel.
We still have people, whowrites the business, you know
who writes that, but there are.
I still maintain that it is acceptableto have certain people who are
in the midst of it, who you just,you can't reveal who they are.
Andy (18:38):
Has anyone ever started secret and then decided.
Actually, it doesn't matter anymore.
Ian Hislop (18:44):
A lot of people start secret.
I'm found saying I'm terriblysorry, I can't say who they are.
And they say, oh really?
'cause they've just done aninterview in the paper claiming
all the credit, for some piece.
So it's quite tempting.
if people are any good to startsaying, it was me actually.
Andy (19:01):
Do people get to choose their own nicknames?
'cause you've got.
Bio waste spreader.
Who does pharma?
You've got old Sparky who doesenergy and power remote controller.
Who does tele?
Are these names that they assumelike superhero costumes or are
they names that you impose onthem, like superhero costumes?
Ian Hislop (19:19):
No, they are self-defining and in television there's remote
controller most of the time.
Then occasionally there's someone calledyouth who takes over when perhaps the
older remote controller isn't there.
Though he, she may well be younger.
I'm not giving that away.
And we used to have a farming was doneby Old Muck spreader and the new person
(19:39):
doing it felt that was out of date.
So he became new bio waste spreader.
So the nicknames changeas do the contributors.
Andy (19:47):
Is it helpful from a legal point of view as well as in, I think I heard
something about the magazine gets suedrather than the individual writer.
Ian Hislop (19:54):
It makes it more difficult for vindictive, liable actions, or
privacy actions or confidentiality.
You can't say, that person has betrayed aconfidence 'cause you dunno who they are.
So you just have to see the magazine.
So it's helpful in one sense,but it's unhelpful in the sense
that the other side can then say,you don't even have the courage.
(20:14):
To come out, and admit who you are.
I remember some barrister saying,that a contributor had displayed
all the bravery of a rubber chicken.
So the jury may well think,this anonymity's a bit cowardly.
Is there
Andy (20:31):
anything in that, do you think?
Ian Hislop (20:32):
I would say not, but I can see why they say it, but I would
say in certain types of journalism itis, it's pretty important not to know.
Andy (20:41):
Have you selected your own secret name?
Ian Hislop (20:45):
I use Ian Hislop.
which fools a lot of people.
Andy (20:53):
we heard Ian earlier talking about anonymity of people, and
Adam, as you said, there are a fewpeople who don't mind their names
being public, like Phil Hammond, md.anyone who's appeared on this podcast
obviously has been happy to be named.
but, one of the only actual names thatappears in the magazine is that of
Craig Brown, which is a really peculiarquirk, but it, I think he's the only.
(21:17):
Named writer most
Adam (21:18):
think it's just down to the fact that if you've got Craig Brown working for
you, you want everyone to know about it.
Andy (21:25):
So Greg does the, diary column.
every week it's, he takes on a differentvoice or a collection of voices and
just produces an absolutely bananasthousand words of surreal comedy
that kind of are the bridge between.
The jokes and the books pages, butthey don't really fit in either.
But it's, it's too good not to have.
(21:45):
Craig is really good at that kind ofparody version of satire, which does
crop up a lot in the jokes pages, buthe does it in a very specific way.
One of the voices he does, especiallywell alongside thousands of
others, is that of Donald Trump.
And we, spoke to him in 2016about how to do Donald Trump.
So this was during Trump 1.0.
(22:05):
but it's about how to get a comedic voice.
Basically, it's about how to communicate,a really strange character and make
it really, funny at the same time.
Here's Craig.
Craig Brown (22:14):
It is rather hard now that everyone's doing it.
He's, it's almost like you nationalized.
comedy, and so I wastrying to think of that.
I did one Melania, a lot ofTrumps, which were all right.
It's hard to gauge her cha.
you can gauge her character, oddlyenough, through her tweets, Donald
Trump's, you read her tweets and theywere very, Bland, but what was I suddenly
(22:38):
realized was striking about them thatshe hardly ever mentioned other people.
She would tweet views out of Trump,towers of Central Park and pictures of
herself or something she'd just bought.
But it was though you realizedit's very kind of lonely life.
I then thought of doing Donald Junior'stweets or something, and I'm sure that
(23:00):
would be a good angle in a bit, like.
Dear Bill, that was a rather good wayinto Mrs. Atch 'cause she was so done
by satis and jokesters everywhere thatactually, if you did it via Dennis
it, it became a fresh joke becauseyou haven't really been doing Twitter.
Diaries for very long.
No, Twitter.
Twitter is a real godsendbecause it just boils down.
(23:21):
Everyone's vanity and hisparanoia and everyone just
becomes more of what they are.
Andy (23:27):
this is the thing, because it seems a bit like they were,
you were more extreme in yourTrump tweets in your early ones.
So more than a year before the election.
Yeah, it was things like, Nodisrespect to Pope Francis on his
US tour, but the guy looks like afruit in his frilly white dress.
Fire.
Your Taylor Frank, right?
Yes.
I don't like a loser, don't get me wrong.
(23:47):
Jesus was a remarkable guy.
A genius at publicity, but clingingon with your hands to a cross that
sends out all the wrong messages.
But actually they're not too much lessextreme than the ones that you do now.
And maybe that's 'cause he really
Craig Brown (23:59):
hasn't changed, as you say.
No, he can't.
Change and he gets fixated now onfake news and that kind of thing.
Andy (24:07):
a lot of what you do, I know that you study your form quite well,
so whenever you do anyone, not justTrump, you get as many samples of their
writing and their speaking as you can.
Craig Brown (24:17):
Yeah.
That is one, that's away of work avoidance.
'cause you think, if I'm, ifI, it's easier to read tweets
rather than create them.
It's also a kind of laziness becauseespecially with Trump, you can use.
95% of what he writes and just changethe name or that, that kind of thing.
But also I think that, with parodymistake people make when they're trying
(24:38):
to do parodies, he's just doing toomuch of themselves and you should just
let, it's like jujitsu or something.
You should let the person'sweight he wants creates the fall.
Andy (24:49):
actually on that note, I have a little game that I
thought might be useful to play.
I have got some.
Trauma tweets and I've gotsome of your trauma tweets.
And so I
Craig Brown (24:57):
guess I'll be able to do them just because I think you probably will.
because usually, if I can't, and it'sa, it doesn't say much for my tweets.
'cause I think there's, the thingabout parody is you are, not just
trying to recreate someone, youare trying to edge them into comedy
whilst retaining their essence.
And so I think if I can't get it,it means my joke isn't good enough.
Andy (25:20):
Okay, we'll see.
so this is basically areferendum on your jokes, right?
yeah.
Who it is, yeah.
Yeah.
Lightweight bands, Stars, refuseto play at my inauguration.
Poor work ethic, unfair.
Craig Brown (25:33):
I guess that was Trump.
Yeah.
That's you.
That was,
yeah.
I should have put some specific rockreference or that someone he was hoping
to get who would be a very naff person.
Andy (25:48):
Okay.
Next up.
Yeah.
It's freezing.
It's freezing and snowing in New York.
We need global warming.
I'd say that's Trump.
It.
Is Trump good?
Yeah.
Yeah.
So it's one all so far.
the cheap 12 inch square marble tilesbehind speaker at UN always bothered me.
(26:10):
I will replace with beautifullarge marble slabs if they ask me.
Craig Brown (26:14):
Oh, that would be, I would be quite pleased if I'd done that.
But I can't remember doingit, so I guess that's Trump.
It is Trump, yeah.
Good.
Oh man, you've got
Andy (26:24):
so many of them so far.
one last one.
Happy New Year to all, includingto my many enemies and those
who have fought me and lost sobadly, they just dunno what to do.
Craig Brown (26:34):
I've seen he, he's done tweets which say, happy Father's
Day, even to the losers and haters.
And and he does a wholeseries of that usually.
So in a way his areusually stronger than that.
I'd say That's Trump, I'm afraid.
It is Trump.
Oh, good, Yeah.
Oh, you've done very well.
Andy (26:54):
There's Craig Brown in 2016 on donald
Adam (26:57):
I remember years ago having a conversation with one of Craig's.
Victims, I suppose you shouldcall them someone who was
parody in the diary section.
Not Donald Trump, I have to say, but Iwill spare their blushes and not say who.
But they just said, they thoughtit was hilarious, but also they
were slightly devastated by it.
'cause they realized that one of thephrases he used was just something that
they used all the time in their writing.
And from that moment on, that was it.
(27:17):
They could never, ever use it again.
Andy (27:19):
Craig actually has recent form with Donald Trump, so he
wrote a book about, the Queen,called a Avoid Around the Queen.
Really good book.
And, in it, he just mentioned in passing,the claim that Trump had made that he was.
Of all the presidents she'd met overthe last 70 years, he was her favorite
president and he said, a lot of peoplehave told me that, I was her favorite.
(27:41):
And we're talking back to the days of,Eisenhower here and we're going back a
really long way.
Yeah.
anyway, Craig simply mentioned thisin his book and, might've raised an
eyebrow and said, recollections may vary.
At which point Trump was then asked aboutthis at a press conference and called
Craig a
Adam (27:59):
Oh, the glory.
Andy (28:01):
And of all the words you'd use to describe Craig,
as you've heard from that clip
Adam (28:04):
That's why he deserves his byline.
Andy (28:08):
I think we should have another of these.
There are so many different smallsections of the eye, which have
been going for such a long time.
So one of which.
is Dumb Britain, which is this tinybox of the eye, which has been going
for decades now, and it's real answersgiven on British quiz shows, by
real contestants to real questions.
And it's compiled every fortnight byMarcus Berkman, who gets through an
(28:30):
enormous amount of quizzing and quizzes.
and here's him giving a littleguide to that section and
how it arose and what's in
Marcus (28:39):
They're not there to illustrate that the world is full of thickies.
Although obviously if you do watch asmany quiz shows as I do, you realize that
the world is indeed full of thickies,but it's not specifically supposed to do
that is supposed to be, make you laugh.
Andy (28:51):
A lot of the answers are chosen because.
They're very apt, or they'reinapt in exactly the right way.
So for example, who formulated thelaws of gravity after watching an apple
fall from a tree at his linker home?
Contestant answers Einstein.
Marcus (29:04):
Yes.
Andy (29:05):
Yeah.
Marcus (29:05):
and the point is, some of these questions you have to really
think about how anyone is actuallygonna come up with any of these things.
So for example,
Andy (29:13):
yeah,
Marcus (29:13):
that one of my favorites, and this is from the, I think the seventies
or the eighties, and we put this on thecover of a Dumb Britain book and the, it
was on Radio Mercy side, and the presentersaid, what was Hitler's first name?
And the caller said, Hyle.
It's the imaginative process that comesup with, with these amazing answers.
Yeah.
That is what we, that what we love.
Andy (29:35):
So you presumably reject the idea.
This is just a, snobbish exercise.
'cause the name Dumb Britain,it, does imply a certain.
from, it does,
Marcus (29:45):
but, I inherited the, column name and I've never particularly liked it.
And I've, I actually spent 20years trying to justify it.
And because people do get cross aboutit, and I get letters regularly from
people saying, dumb Britain, sneeringat, people getting things wrong.
yes and no.
Andy (30:02):
Have you suffered a catastrophic collapse on a quiz show?
Because you do a lot of quizzes.
I don't think the readers may know this.
No, they
Marcus (30:09):
don't.
And, I have a sideline and I'm a quizmaster, so I do lots and lots of quiz
mastering all over the, southeast,of England all the time and do about.
Probably one a week, 50 a year, roughly.
But I've been on a couple of quizshows, and I went on, 15 to one, which
I was completely obsessed with in the,nineties, totally obsessed with, and
(30:30):
I think it was on two or three timesdifferent, on different occasions.
Two of the times I came up withthe most catastrophic errors.
the first time I was on it was,who was the Sun King of France.
Okay.
And I came up with the wrong louisie,although I, my, my brain knew
which louisie it was, but my mouthdefinitely said the wrong louisie.
and there was another one Iwas on and, I needed to answer
(30:52):
one question to win the show.
And William G. Stewart read out thedictionary definition of a stenographer.
Andy (31:00):
Okay.
Marcus (31:01):
He could have said, what are those two things on the end of
your legs with five toes on each?
But, and, I wouldn't have known theanswer 'cause my brain had gone.
So I'm sympathetic to people who,who go on these chin things and
make complete fools of themselves.
Andy (31:15):
I think we can all.
Empathize.
There are times in all of ourlives, and I still think of
questions I've got wrong in quizzes.
Marcus (31:21):
absolutely.
All the time.
you did you know that in 2005, Ian, hisop and Christopher Booker and Francis
Ween and I went on university, challengedthe professionals as the prior I team.
I did not know that there were 10 showsand the top four scoring teams went
onto the semifinals and ours was thelast of the main 10 to be recorded,
(31:43):
and we had to get 210 points to.
To go on, which is a lot of points.
And we started, amazingly, we were playingtores and we started like a train and, his
lot Booker and Ween, they're brilliant.
They're, they know everything.
And they were fantastic.
And I got one or two things andwe were working really well.
And then we started ballsing things up andwe were leading, I think 1, 3, 5 to 15.
(32:08):
And in the end, I think we onlyscored 150 points and we didn't
go through and we all fell away.
And one of.
The bonus rounds was Ian's specialsubject in finals at university
and he got none of them right.
And he said afterwards he says, I've done,have I got news for you for 15 years?
And that was much morestressful than any of those.
(32:29):
It's, it happens to everybody.
Andy (32:31):
Marcus Bergman.
The thing that Marcus was really keento get across in that interview is,
firstly, it happens to everybody.
This phenomenon of giving acomically wrong answer, an answer
that's al almost not even wrong,it's so wrong, is a universal one.
And that's the kind ofglorious, joyful thing.
And sometimes the connections thatpeople make in their minds, is wonderful.
Like his frank, the someone who gavean answer to, who painted the girl with
(32:55):
a pearl earring, the, famous portrait,and the contestant answered Frank Bth.
Now what,
Adam (33:01):
I've been known best for presenting breakfast telly in the 1980s with
Selena Scott wearing nice jumpers, notknown as a painter as far as I know.
Andy (33:07):
Exactly.
But what had happened was thecontestant had thought, famous portrait.
Okay, I need a famous painter, Van Goff.
But in the process of saying VanGogh had just, their brain had
just garbled it to Frank Boff.
And that's, those are the kindof glorious bits of dumb Britain.
Those are the really fun ones.
I suppose one final question tofinish off, Helen and Adam, if
you could send listeners back tolisten to one bit of the podcast.
(33:28):
One thing that you think sums up notonly page 94, but also private eye.
Where would you send people back to?
Helen (33:34):
I would pick Jane Mackenzie, talking about RAAC, which is a very
strange, bubbly form of concrete.
And I remember her coming on to talkabout the fact that it had been used in
schools and lots of official buildingsand it was not to put too fine a point
on it, breaking in a way that, thatyou don't really want concrete that
you've made schools outta to break.
And I remember thinking it wasone of those moments in pri
like classic private eye moment,But Jane, this sounds terrible.
(33:56):
Why is no one talking about this?
and sure enough, I think aboutit was like you set your watch
by it about two months later.
There was a huge scandal about it, aboutschool, the fact that the government
was now on the hook for lots of moneyto rebuild schools that were built
with this particular type of concrete.
But it was a really good exampleof a story that on the surface
looks really unglamorous, but justhad a huge amount of depth to it.
And I think Jane was very prescientin picking it up and also.
(34:19):
I've again, the private eye way ofwriting and the podcasting made a
story about concrete, somehow gripping,which is a great achievement, I think.
Adam (34:29):
Sexy concrete.
Yeah.
Andy (34:30):
Yeah,
Adam.
Adam (34:32):
I would go back.
there was one that you and I didtogether where we just, we were
talking about that way of explainingall the backstory to something.
We basically did the entire mirrorphone hacking scandal in kind of 20
minutes and, laid that one out foreveryone, which I enjoyed a lot.
but also, in terms of the, sort of thehistory of the eye, there was one that
you did with, Ian Hislop and, Francis Weennow sadly retired, where they just talked.
(34:52):
It was that strange point.
to everyone's surprise, suddenly theMaxwell family erupted back into public
consciousness, with Ghislaine, Maxwell'sinvolvement in the Jeffrey Epstein
scandal, and they basically did thebackstory of, Robert Maxwell, her father,
who had attempted to sue the eye out ofexistence repeatedly and failed before
dropping off the back of his yacht andturning out to have stolen millions and
millions of pounds from his company.
(35:12):
just in terms of kinda explainingbackstories, those two I would think
were particular highlights for me.
Helen (35:16):
do you have a favorite, Andy?
Andy (35:18):
I've got 150 favorites, Helen,
Adam (35:20):
It's like choosing one of your children, isn't it?
Andy (35:24):
I would say.
That if you look for Richard Brookstalking about the post office
scandal, it's just sucha thorough explainer.
If that's a story that you wereinterested in, if you saw Mr.
Bates versus the post office, Richardand his colleague Nick Wallace,
who, both worked on the story agreat deal for many years, did an
absolutely terrific job exposing.
(35:46):
Just what went wrong andhow and what comes next.
And I think that's alwaysreally interesting.
And when, I do one of theselong interviews with an
expert, I try and say, what?
What can be done about it?
And sometimes the answer isoptimistic and sometimes it's not.
But it's always fascinatingto hear people say, how we got
here and what, can be done.
okay, so there you have it.
(36:07):
There's your guide to,not only this podcast.
Thank you for listening.
there are 150 episodes.
Go back and listen to all of them.
Each one containing amazing stories aboutwhat is going right and more frequently
wrong around Britain and the world today.
if we've peaked your interest,if you are, I curious, the first
thing to do is go into your local.
Just go with it guys.
The
first
thing to do
(36:28):
is
walk into your local newsagent and pick up a copy.
You cannot miss it.
It is the only magazine with a photobubble cover in this day and age, And
for those of you who have picked upyour first copy of Private Eye, the
next thing to do is go to the websiteand get, a fortnightly subscription.
. we'll be back again with another threeunlikely subjects yoked together in
the podcast format, a fortnight's time.
(36:49):
Until then, thanks forlistening to page 94.
Thanks to Helen and Adam, allof our contributors today.
And as always do MattHill of Rethink audio.
Bye for now.
Popular Podcasts
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Law & Order: Criminal Justice System - Season 1 & Season 2
Season Two Out Now! Law & Order: Criminal Justice System tells the real stories behind the landmark cases that have shaped how the most dangerous and influential criminals in America are prosecuted. In its second season, the series tackles the threat of terrorism in the United States. From the rise of extremist political groups in the 60s to domestic lone wolves in the modern day, we explore how organizations like the FBI and Joint Terrorism Take Force have evolved to fight back against a multitude of terrorist threats.