Profile

Star of hit TV sitcoms Motherland, Mandy and most recently Ann Droid, but Diane Morgan is probably best known for her portrayal of the ill-informed, fictional TV presenter Philomena Cunk, who returns to our screens this coming week for a series about cinema.
Born in 1975, Diane grew up in Farnworth, just outside of Bolton, with her parents and brother. Comedy was central to family life and Diane is described as being a comedy-fanatic from a young age, with an encyclopedic knowledge of the history of comedy and favouring posters of Morecambe and Wise on her wall.
Following drama school, Diane worked in a fish and chip shop, a worming tablet factory, as a dental nurse and at a call centre, where her boss suggested she try stand-up comedy.
After getting noticed in the stand-up comedy scene, Diane auditioned for Charlie Brooker’s Weekly Wipe, where the now much-loved character Philomena Cunk was first created. Diane went on to star in hit series such as After Life, Motherland and Cunk On Earth.
Charlie Brooker, Ricky Gervais and Maxine Peake are among the guests who speak to Mark Coles for this week’s Profile.
Production
Producer: Ben Crighton
Researcher: Helena Warwick-Cross
Sound mix: Hal Haines
Production Co-ordinator: Lewis Yates
Editor: Justine Lang
Archive
Cunk on Cinema/Pacesetter Production
Who Do You Think You Are/Wall to Wall
Charlie Brooker’s Weekly Wipe/BBC
Hancock’s Half Hour/BBC

Labour veteran John Healey has delivered his first budget speech as Chancellor of the Exchequer, declaring that his was a “budget for the working people of Britain.”

The Yorkshireman studied at Cambridge and became a disability rights campaigner and trade union official before entering Parliament in 1997. He served in the Treasury under Tony Blair and Gordon Brown before spending years in opposition, including as Shadow Defence Secretary.

He kept the defence brief once Labour were returned to government under Sir Keir Starmer, leading Britain’s response to the war in Ukraine and growing international instability. Having served under every Labour leader since Tony Blair, Healey shocked the political establishment earlier this year by resigning over military spending, saying that the government had failed to "commit the resources that the nation needs to defend the country at this time of rising threats".

On 20 July 2026, he was appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer by Starmer’s successor Prime Minister Andy Burnham, opening yet another new chapter in his political career.

Stephen Smith talks to friends and colleagues about Healey’s loyalty to the Labour Party, staying true to his Yorkshire roots and his passion for HP sauce.
Production:
Presenter: Stephen Smith
Producers: Tom Gillett
Production Coordinator: Maria Ogundele
Technical Producer: Neil Churchill
Editor: Justine Lang
Archive:
Dolly Parton/ITVX
Sky News

Israelis are about to vote in the country's first general election since the Hamas-led attacks of 7 October 2023. According to the polls, Israel's longest-serving prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and his Likud Party face their steepest competition yet from Gadi Eisenkot and his relatively new party, Yashar!
Gadi Eisenkot was born in Tiberias to working-class parents from Morocco. If he wins, it would make him Israel's first Mizrahi prime minister, meaning that, like around half the country's population, he has Middle Eastern and North African Jewish heritage rather than a European, or Ashkenazi, background.
Joining the Israel Defense Forces' Golani Brigade for national service in 1978, Eisenkot ascended through the ranks, becoming commander of the brigade in 1997. He went on to become Chief of the General Staff of the IDF in 2015.
After retiring from the military, he won a seat in the Israeli parliament and joined Netanyahu's war cabinet in the immediate aftermath of the 7 October 2023 attacks. The war with Hamas took its toll on his personal life: his son, Gal, was killed in Gaza in December 2023. He subsequently lost two nephews in the conflict.
Eisenkot formed his centrist poltiical party Yashar! - which is Hebrew for ‘straight’, ‘true’ or ‘honest’ - as recently as September 2025. He has vowed to destroy Hamas's military wing and dismantle its leadership within 18 months of taking office should he win. He has also said that he will end the surge in settler violence against Palestinians in the West Bank.
Production:
Presenter: Mark Coles
Producers: Tom Gillett and Beth Ashmead
Researcher and Production Coordinator: Maria Ogundele
Technical Producer: Neil Churchill
Editor: Justine Lang

Navanetham 'Navi' Pillay has been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for 2026. The 85 year old South African jurist and former UN Human Rights chief initially thought the news was a joke.

Born in Durban, South Africa, to a Tamil family, her grandparents had come to South Africa as indentured labourers to work in the sugarcane fields. Born under apartheid rule neither of her parents were educated and her mother fought for her daughters to attend school where Navi's teachers saw her potential. The community then raised money enabling her to attend university.
In 1967 she was the first woman to establish a law practice in Natal Province defending apartheid activists and political prisoners. She made international news in 1973 when she secured greater legal rights for the prisoners on Robben island including future president, Nelson Mandela.
Once president, Mandela appointed Pillay the first non white woman judge in the South African High Court. Soon after she was made a judge on the UN’s International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda. She became UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and then in 2021 she chaired a UN Commission which accused Israel of genocide in Gaza.
Israel has said awarding Pillay the Nobel Prize legitimised "anti-Israel hatred" and and both the US and Israel have since issued sanctions on the International Criminal Court. But elsewhere she has received congratulations from across the human rights community. Nobel Committee chair Jorgen Watne Frydnes, said she had been instrumental in ensuring that war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide are prosecuted.
Production:
Presenter: Becky Milligan
Producers: Tom Gillett, Bethan Ashmead Latham
Production Coordinator: Maria Ogundele
Technical Producer: Neil Churchill
Editor: Justine Lang

This week’s Conservative Party conference saw Kemi Badenoch further cement her position at the helm of her party. But can her increased personal popularity help a party that is still lagging behind Reform UK in the polls?
The daughter of a GP and a professor of physiology, Kemi Badenoch was born in Wimbledon but grew up in Lagos, Nigeria. At the age of 16, she moved to London where she worked various jobs including at McDonalds. She studied at Sussex University and it was an introduction to identity politics there that she credits with confirming her conservatism.
After graduating, she worked as a software engineer, a systems analyst before embarking on a career in finance. In 2015 she became digital director at the Spectator magazine.
In 2005, aged 25, she joined the Conservative Party and in 2015 she became a member of the London Assembly. At the 2017 snap general election she successfully ran to be Conservative MP for Saffron Waldon in Essex.
After landing a number of ministerial roles under Boris Johnson she unexpectedly stood for Party Leader when he stood down as Prime Minister in 2022. She came fourth in that contest but ultimately won the leadership contest after the Labour landslide General Election result of 2024.
This week she promised to scrap inheritance tax on family homes, proposed a new ‘Britannia Shield’ missile defence system and ruled out a pact with Nigel Farage’s Reform UK. But can she overcome the odds and return the Conservative Party to power?
Production:
Presenter: Mark Coles
Producers: Tom Gillett, Bethan Ashmead Latham
Production Coordinator: Maria Ogundele, Sabine Schereck
Technical Producer: James Beard
Editor: Justine Lang