About our audio
Slow news stories designed for listening
Tortoise’s podcasts are focused on untold stories. In the face of information overload, incremental news-gathering and perishable scoops, we take time to investigate human stories that we think offer a deeper, longer-lasting understanding of what’s happening in the world.
The Slow Newscast
Our biggest stories, given voice
Inside Unite
The union, Liverpool and the £100m hotel
21 November 2022
58 minutes
One of Britain’s biggest trade unions has built a hotel in Birmingham at vast cost. Following the threads which explain why it became so wildly expensive leads inevitably to a surprising place: to Liverpool. And to questions which could hurt the Labour party
More episodes
Inside Unite: the union, Liverpool and the £100m hotel
One of Britain’s biggest trade unions has built a hotel in Birmingham at vast cost. Following the threads which explain why it became so wildly expensive leads inevitably to a surprising place: to Liverpool. And to questions which could hurt the Labour party
Egypt’s bad cop
The story of one man, fighting to his last breath, to reveal the darkness that lies behind this year’s UN Climate Change Conference
Mutiny: The undoing of Liz Truss
The inside story of how the shortest premiership in British history came to an end
The missing male pill
More than 60 years after the development of the contraceptive pill for women, we still don’t have an equivalent for men. Why?
Multi-part series
Pitch us a story
If you have an idea for a podcast, we’d love to hear from you.
New podcasts for 2022
The Backstory
with Andrew Neil
A series of in-depth conversations with people in power and those trying to influence them, hosted by the UK’s most formidable interviewer.
Visible Women
with Caroline Criado Perez
How can we fix the gender data gap – and build a world that works for everyone?
The Second Elizabethan Age
with Richard Lambert
A reflection on the 70-year reign of Queen Elizabeth II and how society changed under her rule.
Slow Politics
What’s driving the agenda in Westminster each week.
Inside the energy transition
Is a fair transition to 100 per cent clean energy the stuff of dreams, or a genuine possibility?
Life, changing
Early childhood in the UK is radically different to how it used to be. Across three cities, we’re speaking to parents and children about their lives, worries, and dreams, and – with the help of the Nuffield Foundation – uncovering the hidden stories behind these seismic changes.
Editor’s Voicemail
What’s on Tortoise editor James Harding’s mind.
The Responsibility100 Index: A case for optimism and urgency
Our latest ranking of the FTSE100 companies based on their social, environmental and ethical credentials has found that every company is doing something to improve their standing. It’s just not happening fast enough
What is Labour’s plan for growth?
A recession is on its way, inflation is biting, and more and more people are going on strike. The UK has been the worst-performing economy of the G7 countries over the past three years and is forecast to grow by next to nothing in 2023. As attention shifts away from the Conservatives, many are wondering, does Labour have a plan for growth?
Hague’s lessons for fixing our democracy
The former Conservative leader has shown how to acknowledge when something’s not working – and how to fix it
Why this leadership contest is even less democratic than the last
The election of Liz Truss was a terrible way to choose a prime minister. The election of her successor will be even worse
Sensemaker Daily
One story every day to make sense of the world.
tHINKIN WITH JAMES HARDING
The China Problem
“What we’re going to do in this series of podcasts is take a big idea and look for the moments that shine a light on it.”
TikTok: The China Problem
Taiwan: The China Problem
Wuhan: The China problem
Hong Kong: The China problem
Audio essays
Matthew d’Ancona investigates
Over the last two years, Tortoise editor Matthew d’Ancona has been investigating the UK government and, among other things, its management – and mismanagement – of the pandemic.
Downfall: twenty days that did for Rishi Sunak
How did Rishi Sunak go from one of the most popular members of the government to one of the least in a matter of days? Matthew d’Ancona pieces together what happened
Retreat from Kabul: 11 days in August – Part I
As the Taliban closed in on Kabul, and Western troops and desperate Afghans scrambled to leave, Britain found itself frozen out of decision making and incapable of influencing events. It was a stark illustration of the UK’s status, made worse by catastrophic misjudgements at the top of government
The second couple
After Boris Johnson and Carrie Symonds’ wedding, there are now two powerful married couples in Number 10. Meet the other: Munira and Dougie
March of the Mutants
Covid may be losing the vaccine battle. But, as the virus evolves fast to form new variants, the war is most definitely not over
The people vs Harvey Proctor
Pariah
What lessons does the story of Harvey Proctor – the twice-disgraced former Conservative MP with extreme anti-immigration views – hold about the way society deems it acceptable to treat those who we cast as hate figures?
Intolerance
Harvey Proctor’s political star burned brightly in the 1980s. He was the anti-immigrant heir-apparent to Enoch Powell, until a tabloid sting exposed him as a gay man who paid for sex
Incredible
To suffer one shattering public scandal in a lifetime is hard enough. Harvey Proctor has endured two. In the second episode of Pariah, one of the highest profile police investigations of the past decade – Operation Midland – comes knocking on his door
The high wire
For the second time in his life, Harvey Proctor was being battered by a storm of dreadful allegations. His lawyers advised a safety-first approach. He had other ideas
Mixing and merging
It seems important for all of us to understand the meaning of what’s happened to Harvey Proctor. What was it which liberated the media and the police to behave as they did; to create or fuel the two scandals which wrecked his life?
a four-part podcast series
Hidden homicides
How many women are killed – but not counted?
Left to die
When Islamist insurgents attacked a town in Mozambique in March, civilians and foreign contractors raced to a local hotel for safety. Over three agonising days, they waited for a rescue. But no one came.
My Mother’s murder
An investigation by Paul Caruana Galizia into the life and killing of his mother, the Maltese journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia.
