radio programme

Public sector employment (Radio 4 series: Thinking Allowed)

In this episode of Radio 4's Thinking Allowed series, following the interview with Sociologist James Stockinger in September 2004, Professor Peter Nolan talks to Laurie Taylor on the uniqueness of the British the public sector ethos and finds out why its employees, despite being the most motivated, are the most demoralised sector of the workforce. This segment is second of three discussions in the audio clip.

Young runaways (Radio 4 series: Woman's Hour)

This episode of Radio 4's Woman's Hour series looks at the 100,000 children under 16 living in the UK who run away from home. We hear from a woman whose twelve year old daughter persistently ran away and was frequently returned to the family home by the police. Jill Colbert from the Safe in the City project in Salford - who works with young runaways - and John Wheeler from Childline will be joining Jenni Murray to discuss the difficulties that parents of runaways can face in accessing help.

Catch them young (BBC Radio 4 series: Analysis)

Policy makers are becoming increasingly concerned with the long term consequences of childhood experiences. This concern is fuelled by the belief that the early years of life are crucial in shaping later life. Catch them young and save society trouble later on, runs the argument. Kenan Malik asks whether policies towards young children are based on reliable scientific evidence or on political claims.

Mind changers : Programme 2 : Jean Piaget (Radio 4 series: Landmark experiments in psychology)

The second programme in the series looks at the work of child psychologist Jean Piaget who believed children learned through play. Subsequent experiments allowing children to imagine different social, rather than spatial, situations have had very different results. Claudia Hammond asks how far we should rely on Piaget's findings today.

Gay bullying (Radio 4 series: Woman's Hour)

How can homophobic bullying be stopped? It is estimated that there are 60,000 lesbians and gay teenagers subjected to homophobic bullying at any one time. Gay rights charity, Stonewall, has launched a campaign called Education for All which highlights the problems of this type of bullying in schools. Jenni hears from a lesbian who endured bullying at school for many years.

She also finds out what is being done to eradicate this neglected aspect of bullying and why despite government guidelines, schools still don't seem to know how to deal with this problem.

Life in old age (Radio 4 series: The seven ages of humanity)

Four Radio 4 programmes in a series about the health and wellbeing of the seven ages of humanity. These four programmes explore life experiences and issues for people in their sixties and seventies.

The first programme looks at memory loss, the second discusses chronic conditions such as osteo-arthritis and the inability to hear, the third examines retirement, and the final programme looks at how medicine can fix some of the physical problems of old age.