Please switch your bookmark to the PM blog, as the mothballs will set in soon.
Please switch your bookmark to the PM blog, as the mothballs will set in soon.
We asked how feminism has influenced your life and listeners from across the generations got in touch.
Three of them came into the studio. Listen to 80 year-old Ruth Atkin, 56 year-old Mary Robson and 26 year-old Sharon Jacobs talk about how the women's movement has shaped their life. It's Ruth's voice that begins...
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Also this is fascinating
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"What can the government do for us? How about making children happier?" writes listener Barbara Schofield.
So how about it? As part of our Election Question Service, we ask the three largest political parties what policy ideas they're putting forward at the general election to improve the happiness and well-being of children.
You can listen to the full programme featuring John Craven reading the news in a very nice woollen jumper.
Comment below or drop us a line if you've something to say on it.
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We know it's bad. We know it kills. And yet, many people carry on smoking. iPM wanted to hear WHY.
This weeks programme was, of course, inspired by a listener, Mo Hutchison. We read out her story and asked for yours.
Mo told Eddie her tales of smoking, we invited actors to read some of yours and the Scottish playwright John Byrne got in touch, so we asked if he'd write a personal story about the joy of smoking.
You can listen again or download the podcast.
If you would like details of organisations that can offer support and advice on how to stop smoking call the Radio 4 Action Line on 0800 044 044. All calls are confidential and free from a landline.
Or you might find these links helpful
NHS Smokefree: information about the free NHS support services
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We're offering listeners the chance to get answers to the questions they want asked ahead of the General Election.
We've responded to questions on helping the long-term disabled, whether it's worth voting if you live in a safe seat and whether the railways should be renationalised
Next week, we'll look at a question from listener Des Moore,
"Chemical castration is a reversible process and is chosen by many convicted rapists in countries where it is available. Do you think some rapists should be chemically castrated?"
If you've an election question you'd like us to try answer - on whatever subject is of most concern to you - comment below, email us or tweet. Keep it to a single sentence if you can.
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The news that the government aims to halve the number of people smoking in England by 2020 prompted listener Mo Hutchinson to write:
"In the mid-70s I was admitted to hospital for 3 weeks bed-rest. As I was escorted to my bed an anxious-to-please nurse asked if there was anything she could get me. I said I'd like an ashtray if it wasn't too much trouble.
Back she duly came with said ashtray and I got through 20 fags a day while lying on the bed - no mean feat. Now I am off to get up close and personal with a group of strangers huddling around a patio heater in the lashing rain and storm force gales - that will probably do for me."
Mmm. Things were different back then Mo... but we like the idea of making a programme about your smoking stories.
Is the ritual of smoking an essential part of your day. Did you meet the love of your life because of cigarettes? Is there one smoke you remember above all the others? Comment below, email us or tweet
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Figures out yesterday showed that a record number of people in England and Wales were declared personally insolvent during 2009.
But it's not just individuals, more than 19,000 businesses collapsed too - the highest figure for 16 years.
On iPM this week we spoke to a listener, Steve Hunt, who knows about the knock-on effects of insolvency. He says that sometimes people who are bankrupt break the rules and funnel funds away to effectively cheat their creditors, leaving them out of pocket. It's Steve's job as an 'insolvency practitioner' to get that money back.
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The second listener we spoke to was Keith Terry. His business has recently been declared insolvent. But he says his priority has been to do the best for his creditors
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If you've an experience you want to tell us about comment below or email us - all thoughts welcome.
...foot bone, in case you don't remember the song.
iPM is interested in hearing from you if your bones (leg or otherwise) are broken.
A few weeks ago, when Britain was frozen solid, we covered stories about the snow and grit and increasingly - about broken bones from people slipping on the ice.
On PM, Eddie spoke to the president of the College of Emergency Medicine, Dr John Hayworth. He said hospitals were seeing an increased number of people with fractures and this would have effects on patients and the NHS for many months to come
We're wondering if Dr Hayworth has been proved right? Are you a physiotherapist or a health professional who's been treating people with fractures? Are you managing to cope with the demand? Or are you waiting for your fracture to be treated? Has a small slip had a rather big impact on your life?
If there's an experience you'd like to share with us email us
]]>But there is a connection. This week, the iPM Election Question service is trying to answer this question from David Sterratt:
"British Rail was cheaper for taxpayers and for passengers than the current privatised system. So why not renationalise the railways?"
UPDATE:
We invited David into the studio to listen to what the political parties had to say and talk to Professor Stuart Cole of Glamorgan University. Listen to the piece, David began by explaining his concerns...
If you'd like to send us an Election Question drop us a line
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Between now and the general election, we at iPM are offering a new service to you called Election Questions (if you have a better title, let us know...).
We tried to come up with some answers to Jean Buckton's question on disability last week.
This week, we try to answer David Anstey's poser:
"I live in a constituency that has returned the same MP since the constituency was formed nearly 40 years ago.
My younger son will be able to vote for the first time this year. I've already told him that there's no point him voting because the result in this constituency is a foregone conclusion.
What plans do the political parties have to make it worth both him and me voting in the future?"
And David wasn't the only one, this question has come up time and again. So
1. We asked the three main UK parties to provide us with a single sentence as to why David and his son should vote.
2. We asked Peter Barratt what he thought. He gives talks about his great-grandmother suffragette Alice Hawkins, pictured above, and her fight for the right to vote.
3. We invited the Director of the Power 2010 campaign, Pam Giddy, to put her case.
4. And we asked Politics professor John Curtice, of the University of Strathclyde, what options David and his son have.
Listen to the result.
If you'd like to send us an Election Question drop us a line
]]>Peter was nominated for the iPM New Year's Honour by Sarah who wrote that many elderly people with retirement flats in the town were being overcharged.
She said unscrupulous landlords added administration charges on top of their standard buildings insurance premiums and maintenance costs leaving leaseholders with big bills.
We sent reporter Andrew Bomford to meet Peter and some of the people he's helped with his group called S.E.L.C.H.A
Between now and the general election, we at iPM are offering a new service to our listeners imaginatively titled Election Questions.
The first question we tried to answer was from Jean Buckton
"I am totally blind and in a wheelchair due to osteoarthritis of the spine, I'm 42. My daughter (14) was born with cerebral palsy.
My husband had to give up work 14 years ago to care for us both full time. We rely solely on benefits such as Disability Living Allowance and Income Support.
My question is: which parties will help carers and the long-term disabled the most?"
That's a judgement only you can make Jean, but we can help with information about what the parties say. And what better guide than the BBC's Disability Affairs Specialist Peter White. Listen to his advice
"I was admissions tutor in a Theology and Religious Studies department at a British university between 2000-04. I was bemused by a surge in applications from applicants in Pakistan.
I ignored them because they were so bad, but a common theme was they all came from young men with a background in chemistry, physics or engineering who now wanted to write about the glory of god.
Overseas students are a major income stream for British universities. No-one has made the connection with the cut to university funding just announced by the government. How will this affect British security, as universities, which are businesses, are starved of cash?"
On Saturday's programme we spoke to Andrew about his concerns. We talked to the Director of the Centre for Intelligence and Security Studies at the University of Buckingham, Professor Anthony Glees and finally we took the points raised to the President of Universities UK, Steve Smith.
Listen to the item as it appeared on the programme
If you have experience in this area or there's something you'd like to add, drop us a line ipm [at] bbc.co.uk
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The talk of manifestos, pledges, gaffes and u-turns has started. As an election year begins, iPM is offering a new service to help you through it.
Is there a question you'd like to ask or something you'd like explained? Send it to us and we'll see if we can find an answer for you.
It may be about transport, schools, hospitals, childcare, taxes, Europe, MP expenses, whatever, we don't want to be prescriptive, but do keep it succinct.
We'll try and invite the relevant politician or a panel of politicians on to answer it, or perhaps one of our correspondents could explain whatever it is you'd like explained - we can't promise we'll be able to get hold of them, but we'll do our best.
How do I send it
Email ipm [at] bbc.co.uk putting Election Questions in the title and the best way for us to contact you
or write to
iPM Election Question
Room G601, BBC TV Centre
London W12 7RJ
The name of Dave Pearson may not come to mind when you think of great British painters of the twentieth century.
But to his admirers, this painter exemplified what it means to be an artist: committed, eccentric, a determined outsider who was obsessed by his work.
Dave Pearson died in July 2008. One of his students, artist Bob Frith has spent the last year restoring his mentor's cluttered and decaying studio.
We came to hear about Bob when he was nominated for an iPM New Year Honour. Reporter Nigel Wrench went to the Rossendale Valley to meet him at that studio.