Seriously...

In 2013, broadcaster and journalist Krupa Padhy, one of the presenters for BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour, lost her first child because of medical negligence in a London Hospital. Legal action was taken. Midwives and doctors were given extra training. Lessons were, apparently, learned. But Krupa's life has been changed forever. Over the last few years, systemic failures at multiple maternity units have been uncovered: at Morecambe Bay, Shrewsbury and Telford and East Kent. An investigation is currently underway in Nottingham and there are calls for a review in Leicester. Krupa wants to know what is happening in our maternity wards and how we make them safer.

Producer: Caitlin Smith

Ex-offender Ricky Gleeson has set up HoodEx, a new sustainable clothing charity in South Shields, Tyne and Wear. Ricky has a remarkable back story – a deeply troubled, chequered past. His mother was in her teens when she had him, a single parent who struggled to cope with life. She became addicted to drugs and alcohol and had a series of difficult relationships.

As a child, Ricky was moved from domestic abuse shelters to foster homes and eventually to children’s homes and hostels. He ended up homeless, at times living rough and turning to petty crime. Somehow, he managed to turn his life around. He joined the Royal Navy, took up boxing, became a husband and father and found his way to a new life. And now in his 40s, he wants to help others who are in the same place as he was in. As he struggles to find suitable premises for his charity venture, he revisits some of the keys places in his past life.

Producer: Mohini Patel

Mysterious plants appear on the Isle of Rum. Do they prove the island miraculously escaped the Ice Age? And what extraordinary lengths would one scientist go to in order to prove that it did? Dr Tori Herridge investigates.

Produced for BBC Audio Bristol by Beth Sagar-Fenton

The Great Replacement is an idea fueling far-right recruitment around the world - the idea that white communities and culture are being purposely replaced by non-white migrants.

Many far-right terrorists have referenced this theory as the driving force behind their murderous actions - but where does this idea originate from, and how seriously should we be taking its proliferation here in the UK?

Terrorism expert Raffaello Pantucci explores the roots of the Great Replacement and asks if this is just a far-right conspiracy theory as some critics claim, or is there a kernel of truth reflected in the UK's changing demography?

If so, how are communities - and the government - managing this change? Immigration is often a difficult topic of public debate, with many people concerned that any questioning of immigration policy will label them as racist.

But if we can’t talk more openly, without fear of judgement, are we at risk of handing control of the immigration narrative to extremists?

Reporter: Raffaello Pantucci, Senior Fellow at the Royal United Service Institute, Senior Fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore

Historian Catherine Merridale witnessed the birth of Memorial in 1989 as the Soviet Union died. An organisation devoted to recovering the past of the Soviet Gulag and soon documenting the new transgressions of the Russian state and its imperial wars. Even as Russia wnet to war against Ukraine it sought to close Memorial down, silence its voice and reshape history. But months after the invasion Memorial shared in the Nobel Peace Prize, only adding to the Russian government's ire. It has closed its archives and offices and pursued leading figures in Russian Memorial through the courts, declaring them responsible for 'rehabilitating Nazism'.

Merridale tells a personal story of the opening of history that Memorial was essential to and the tragedy of its closing and the closing of the past. The Kremlin's current occupants are no more willing to consider the victims of state repression - largely Stalin's repression - than their Soviet predecessors were. The story of Memorial, the association, established in 1989, that set out to find, investigate and discuss the Soviet Union's record of political violence against its own citizens, is one of real heroism. From its initial aim of creating a physical memorial to Stalin's victims it became a focus for research and advocacy, a living witness to the intellectual freedom that comes after the past is faced.

The state argues that what it does - harping on about Stalin's crimes - dilutes great Russian patriotism. Some of its critics have gone as far as to say that Memorial's work helps to justify Nazism. But branches of Memorial in Ukraine and elsewhere in Europe do what they can to keep memory alive.

Producer: Mark Burman

In 1997 a freak wave washed 62 containers into the sea off a cargo ship near the coast of Cornwall. Inside one were five million pieces of Lego. By a strange quirk of fate, many of the Lego pieces had a sea theme. This is the story of the community of beachcombers trying to track down the miniature octopuses, scuba tanks, life rafts, flippers, sharks and some very rare green dragons still washing ashore today.

Beachcomber Tracey Williams set up the social media account Lego Lost At Sea, allowing people to share their finds. She leads BBC reporter Robin Markwell on a journey around the Cornish coastline looking for the tiny toys.

On the way they meet fishermen still bringing up Lego in their nets, families brought together by dragon-hunting and an artist making sculptures out of millions of pieces of microplastic. Lego Overboard is a tale about the joys of treasure-hunting with a serious message about the long-lasting legacy of plastic pollution in our seas.

Producer: Robin Markwell for BBC Audio in Bristol