This is a Global Player Original podcast.

Please give a very, very warm welcome to the amazing Peter Tatchel.

Peter, you are, you are very, very welcome. I'm a bit of a fan girl of yours, although we haven't always agreed on everything over the years. But I read recently that when it came to the Queen's Jubilee, you were asked to be part of the National Treasure presentation, procession.

But you said, no. Why was that? Because you are now a National Treasure, aren't you?

Well, it wasn't just National Treasure Procession. It was actually a special VIP thing with only, I think, 100 celebrities and people

of public note at the very end outside Buckingham Palace.

But I am a lifelong Republican. I believe we should have a democratically elected head of state.

And so that's why I said no.

But you are a national treasure, aren't you?

Well, I hope not, because national treasures get put in glass boxes and stuck in museums,

and I'm not ready for that yet.

Okay. We will come to all of the things that you still want to do in a bit.

But let's go right back to your childhood where you actually started your campaigning.

Even at school you were a campaigner, weren't you, in Australia?

That's right. At the age of 15 at high school, my first ever campaign was against the death

penalty in the state of Victoria, Australia. A prisoner,

Ronald Ryan, allegedly shot dead a warder during a jail escape. But I read the autopsy

report summary in the local newspaper. At 15? At 15. And worked out from where the alleged killer, the escapi, was standing,

and where the warder was standing, the bullet would have to have done almost a U-turn in mid-air.

So I thought there was a serious doubt about this man's guilt. On that basis, if nothing else,

he should not be hanged. But he was

hanged anyway, and that turned me into a radical because from that moment onwards I thought,

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