Start the new year with a special podcast episode recorded from the Blue Drawing Room at Buckingham Palace. In this episode Gyles and Aphra Brandreth meet the young winners from across the Commonwealth of the Queen’s Commonwealth Essay Competition. With special guest appearances from three of the ambassadors of the Royal Commonwealth Society: Geri Horner, Alexandra Burke and Ayesha Dharker.  

In this episode the young competition winners share poems they wrote in 60 seconds! And we hear the winning poems: Catalina by Madeleine Wood, Junior Winner, aged 14 From Australia; and Nursing Homes by Amaal Fawzi, Senior Runner-up aged 17 from UK