Friday Drivetime

BCfm’s weekly politics show presented by Tony Gosling

At five: discussing the big stories in Bristol, Britain and around the world
After six: straight talking and investigative reports with Martin Summers and Marina Morris

For all the shows back to Easter 2009 visit the Friday Drivetime archive page.

This popular show is still available here

First hour: Mayor referendum and police commissioner election taking place this May but are either going to be good for Bristol or for democracy? Does anybody really want it? Councillors are ‘corporate parents’ for over 700 children in Bristol City Council care. What is the role of a local authority? Bristol has a turnover of £1bn anually. Are LibDems just propping up a Tory government with no voice at all? Debt write-down in Greece but Greece still unable to meet financial targets. We are no nearer to solving the financial crisis despite nearly two years of the coalition government they are still blaming the previous Labour government. Main regulation is 1989 capital requirement for banks which means now they can not lend. Casino style investment banking. Profits in investment banking are preying on the real financial sector such as the Avon County Council pension fund. Greg Smith resignation letter from Goldman Sachs calling his former employers ‘muppets’. Goldman Sachs not actually mupets but much more devious. Harriet Harman faces Nick Clegg at Prime Minister’s Questions on the topic of the privatisation of the National Health Service in a few days time. Jeremy Corbyn asks about private rent regulations, private landlords raking it in. Child protection or child theft? Marina Morris looks at secret family court system which takes children off their parents but doesn’t look at the rights or needs of the parents. News review with political economist Polly Winch and LibDem Councillor for Bishopston, Dr. David Willingham.
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Second hour: The Battle For Arnhem – A Bridge Not Far – recent revelations that show Field Marshal Montgomery’s Operation Market Garden, in September 1944, aimed at severing German supply lines on the Western Front should have worked. It was early morning in Holland on Sunday 17th September 1944 and as the gliders and paratroopers poured down along a sixty mile corridor to hold the bridges. The furthest bridge from the front line at Arnhem became the focus of attention as and the biggest airborne operation in history unfolded. Was it really ‘A Bridge Too Far’ as the title of Cornelius Ryan’s book and Robert E. Levine’s famous film imply? Or could the tanks and ground troops of XXX corps have gotten through to relieve the surrounded British paratroopers? With Arnhem only 10 kilometres, a 30 minute drive away and a virtually clear road ahead – General Horrocks’ M4 Sherman tanks inexplicably halted for 17 hours. By the time the tanks started rolling at lunchtime the next day British paratroopers had run out of ammunition, been forced to surrender and German Panzer 5 & Tiger tank reinforcements had arrived to block the way. The Nijmegen bridgehead was established around 19:00hrs, 3 hours later, at 22:00hrs that evening the British were forced to surrender at the Arnhem bridge. So paratroopers of the 1st Airborne division at Arnhem bridge may have been relieved in the nick of time and war in Europe could have been over six months earlier, by Christmas 1944. We look at Cornelius Ryan’s book ‘A Bridge Too Far’ as well as Joseph E. Levine’s film of the same name. Interviews with: Captain T. Moffatt Burriss, author of ‘Strike and Hold’ who was commander of i-company, 504th regiment, 82nd Airborne division during the legendary Waal river crossing; Robert Kershaw author of ‘It Never Snows In September’ who interviewed 10th SS Panzer Division Brigadeführer Heinz Harmel, commander of the German defence of the Nijmegen and Arnhem bridges; Major Tony Hibbert who was a senior officer of 2nd batallion 1st brigade, British 1st Airborne division at the Arnhem bridge; Tim Lynch author of ‘Operation Market Garden: The Legend of the Waal Crossing’; Sir Brian Urquhart, army intelligence officer in the run-up to the operation he was critical of it and transferred before it began… but later became Secretary General of the newly formed United Nations.
There’ll be a special ‘new Betuwe scenario’ event at noon on Saturday 17th March at Cut And Thrust Wargames on Old Market.
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