Today Ciaran and Jim nominate two of their heroes for dissection. The very different characters of Aneurin Bevan founder of the British National Health Service and Bob Dylan the founder of contemporary popular music. Didnt see them coming did you?

Jim and Ciaran tease out the question of whether Irish Neutrality, born out of a need to establish Irish Independence in world affairs, is still a force for good in the light of Russian expansionism.

Apologies to those early risers who may have listened to an early unedited version of this episode but we’ve put it right now.

In this episode Ciaran and Jim discuss whether the far Left and Far Right, or even just left and right, are useful in modern politics. As our discussion ranges across British and Irish and very personal experiences we try to reach across the bridge to a new version of our multi-facetted political geography.

This is the second part of our recent health conversation. In this podcast Ciaran and I concentrate on potential solutions to the ills of the Health Services we identified last week. We discuss reforms, revisions and changes which might bring about the provision of first class patient controlled public healthcare.

This is the first part of a long and complex conversation between Ciaran and I about the root causes of the failures of State Health Services in Britain and Ireland. Both Countries seem to be suffering from similar ailments.

Ciaran and Jim both have experience of working in the media and the public service. In this podcast they review the scandal which has hit RTE over the ‘hidden’ fees paid to a major presenter and need to change the funding model of the BBC.