The Brighton Bombing - the attempt to kill Ma...

In 1922, Ireland gained its independence. The new state promised to revive the Irish language. A century later, English still dominates daily life. What went wrong?In this episode, I speak to John Walsh of the University of Galway, author of One Hundred Years of Irish Language Po ...  Show more

In the 1920s, the newly established Irish Free State embarked on one of the most ambitious engineering projects in its history: the Shannon Scheme at Ardnacrusha.This was a state-of-the-art hydroelectric plant that paved the way for the electrification of Irish society. The schem ...  Show more

Matt revisits the last night of the Conservative party conference in 1984 when the IRA bombed the Grand Hotel in Brighton in an attempt to kill Margaret Thatcher. 

Author Rory Carroll explains how the attack was carried out and journalist Philip Webster remembe ...

The horrific Guildford Pub Bombings of Saturday 5th October 1974 sent shockwaves through Britain, worsening the sense of crisis sweeping through the nation. It cast a dark shadow over the election campaign due to take place five days later. The future had rarely seemed grimmer, w ...  Show more

Martha Kearney uncovers the secrets within the Government files of 1984.Margaret Thatcher's government faced some formidable adversaries. The long-anticipated battle with the National Union of Mineworkers and its leader, Arthur Scargill, finally erupted, dominating the political ...  Show more

Three days after one of the most devastating IRA attacks launched upon British soil, the Conservative Prime Minister Edward Heath called an election, in circumstances that had never been more dire. Running against him was the veteran Labour leader, Harold Wilson, now as tired and ...  Show more