Seriously...

Much of an astronaut’s leisure time is spent staring back at Earth, they just can’t stop looking back at home. Major Tim Peake journeys into the misunderstood phenomenon of homesickness.

Tim had never experienced it until he found himself looking through the copula window of the space craft, which orbited earth several times before reaching the International Space Station. The British astronaut spent 185 days, 22 hours and 11 minutes in space and during that time, developed a deep longing for home, particularly fresh air, nature and the colour green.

But what is this powerful desire for home? Is homesickness a psychological illness? A cultural phenomenon? Or something else? Psychotherapist Sarah Temple-Smith who works for the Refugee Council believes the condition is widely misunderstood and its impact critically under-appreciated. She believes it’s a deep-rooted condition with existential consequences.

Speaking to those who suffer from it, and those who study it Tim attempts to understand exactly what homesickness is: how it manifests, what it feels like, and the psychological triggers that underpin it.

Produced by Kate Bissell and Gail Tolley

Situated 75-miles off the west coast of Shetland, the future of Cambo, a prospective new oil field in the North Sea, has big implications for Shetland. Cambo has become emblematic of the debate about fossil fuels.

In 2001, an oil exploration license for the site was granted. In 2021, when public sentiment towards fossil fuels cooled, the project was shelved. But now, Cambo is being reconsidered once again... The war in Ukraine and fears over energy security have changed how we feel about oil and gas. But what's the problem that Cambo is providing a solution to? Will it give us better energy security? Will it enrich the lives of local people?

Turns out, the answer is more complex than that... Shetland has directly benefitted from its relationship with North Sea oil. Unlike in the rest of the UK, the local council established something akin to a sovereign wealth fund. They made a proceed from every barrel of oil processed at Sullum Voe Oil Terminal. It's really positively impacted the local population, and as the cost of living crisis bites, the chance of a renewed boost to the local economy is hard to entirely reject, even in the face of growing environmental awareness. In this one-off doc, journalist Jen Stout assesses how the potential end of oil looks from Shetland's perspective.

With contributions from historian Ewan Gibbs, energy researcher Miriam Brett, environmental lawyer Tessa Khan, energy transition expert Daniel Gear, former oil worker and councillor Billy Fox, and energy and climate change researcher James Price.

Producer: Victoria McArthur

The word “controversy” almost always accompanies any reference to ECT or electroconvulsive therapy. It has a dark history and remains a deeply contentious practice.

For many, ECT is seen as outdated, forever linked with frightening images of medical abuse, cruelty and even punishment. But when Professor Sally Marlow met Dr Tania Gergel at King’s College London, she was forced to acknowledge and then reassess everything she thought she knew about ECT. Her friend Tania told Sally that ECT had saved her life on numerous occasions and that ECT is, in fact, the only treatment that can bring her back to health after episodes of severe depression, psychosis and mania.

Tania is Director of Research at Bipolar UK. She’s a philosopher and an internationally respected medical ethicist. She also lives with a serious mental illness; an unusual mixed type of bipolar disorder, and during her last period of illness a year ago, Tania kept an audio diary.

In this programme, Sally wants to test her own preconceptions about ECT and to find out about the group of people who describe ECT as having "given them back their lives". She delves into her own family history and talks to her mum, Kath, about the secrecy and shame around the mental illness of her Auntie Joyce, who received ECT in the 1960s. And she joins Tania in the ECT suite at Northwick Park Hospital with nurses Anjali and Kathy to understand how modern ECT is given, with anaesthetic, muscle relaxants and, as Tania says, much kindness.

Retired social worker, Sue, tells Sally about the dramatic impact on her acute illness of ECT and clinician and researcher Professor of Psychiatry George Kirov, ECT lead for the Cardiff area, describes the group of patients for whom this treatment works. And Sally talks to the grandfather of American ECT, Professor Max Fink, now 100 years old, about the origins of electroconvulsive therapy. Throughout, Tania shares extracts of her audio diary in order to break down stigma around both mental illness and ECT.

Producer: Fiona Hill

Matthew Syed traces the history of a term that's synonymous with our era of angry debate.

Historian Phil Tinline explores why, 37 years ago, the Thatcher government privatised British Gas, how what followed has shaped today's energy price crisis - and what should happen next.

Contributors: Professor Michael Bradshaw, Derek Davis, Dr Amy Edwards, Mathew Lawrence, Tim Lefroy, Sir John Redwood

It seems like an impossible conundrum. Ukraine is valiantly defending itself against the man Boris Johnson called "a blood-stained aggressor" and fighting for survival in a war that is currently deadlocked.

President Zelensky has warned that attempts at talks with The Russian Federation will fail, because Vladimir Putin cannot be trusted. So in the absence of a decisive victory or a negotiated settlement - what happens? James Naughtie investigates how other conflicts have come to a conclusion, in a bid to shed light on a war which has so far defied predictions.

He will talk to key figures who have been in the room as peace deals are ground out - and visit the law makers in Washington DC who are the key source of defence funding for Ukraine. History may have lessons when it comes to a conflict for which there seems no end in sight.

Presented by James Naughtie

Taiwan is one of the world's youngest democracies. The first fully democratic presidential election was held as recently as 1996. But it's now being heralded as a place where digital technology is giving citizens a sense of direct engagement with political systems and law creation.They have a Minister of Digital Affairs, Audrey Tang, who has brought his computer software programming expertise learned in Silicon Valley to bear on the way in which ideas, petitions and suggested law reforms can be promoted by way of a website which boasts millions of users.

The BBC's former Taiwan Correspondent Cindy Sui revisits the Island to try and measure the success of the website called 'Join' at a time when Taiwan faces very direct international pressures. But she also explores more established systems of local democracy, including the system of community chiefs or Li Zhangs and the 24-hour hotlines with their promise of a speedy response to any inquiry or report about issues closer to home.

Western democracies have faced harsh criticism in recent years about sections of their populations feeling that their voices aren't being heard. Does Taiwan have lessons for its more established Democratic colleagues, and if it does, are they in the field of high tech or grass roots representation?

Producer: Tom Alban

Recently, in both Europe and the United States, there have been serious attempts to overthrow elected governments by force.

History is full of examples of coups d'etat succeeding, going all the way back to Ancient Rome. But these latest coup attempts failed. And they left a strange impression: of events that were part-horrific, part-absurd.

In this programme, the novelist and classicist Natalie Haynes takes three examples of power grabs from Ancient Rome - one by the military, one by senators, and one conducted by stealth - and uses them to try to make sense of recent events in France, Germany and America.

With the help of leading scholars of the dark art of the coup, she probes why these assaults on power flopped, and what all this tells us about where power now lies. And she asks where the subtler threats to democracy are lurking, against which we now need to be on guard.

Contributors include: Ruth Ben-Ghiat, Alexander Clarkson, Rory Cormac. Producer: Phil Tinline