PODCAST OF IDEAS: We're closing in on week two of lockdown in the UK, with life on pause for many of us cooped up at home. But thinking outside of our own four walls, it has often been hard to get a sense of what's happening across Europe, where cases of the virus seem to be skyrocketing. Some countries, like Italy, have forced their citizens into weeks of house arrest. Others have taken a more liberal approach - and have often been criticised for it.

This week, in the latest of a new series of the Podcast of Ideas, Alastair Donald talks to friends and speakers from our annual festival: the Battle of Ideas. You'll hear Fraser Myers, spiked's staff writer in London; Anne-Élisabeth Moutet, Telegraph journalist in Paris; Sean O'Halloran, freelance journalist in Fabriano in Eastern Italy and Lamprini Thoma, writer and podcaster in Thessaloniki.