Hello and welcome to this special Christmas edition of Inside Briefing, the podcast from the Institute for Government.

I'm Catherine Hadden, IFG Senior Fellow and Consumer of far too much

television. But then, let's face it, who hasn't resorted to excessive binging of Netflix in the past

couple of years? Because we've all had quite enough reality in our lives and we've all been at home

rather a lot. And now, with many again facing Christmas in self-isolation and an uncertain January,

and the NHS facing another Herculean effort, our thanks to all of them, we thought we would try

and take your mind off it with something a little bit different. That's right, it's the return

of our now official annual look at what fictional and fantasy worlds can teach us about government,

and what the IFG would be writing reports about if only the screenwriters would give us a cameo.

Fans of this podcast will remember that last year we discussed Darth Vader's failure to outsource construction of the Death Star,

the urgent need for

Ofsted to pay some attention to the safety record at Hogwarts, and whether a police and crime

commissioner should be elected to sort out the quite ridiculous murder rate in midsummer.

And this year, we've got some absolute Christmas treats on the menu, taking you into a parallel

world of fictional spies,

cartoon pigs and prime ministers who enjoy dressing up in slightly ill-fitting police uniforms

came maybe not the last one. But I've got a great panel with me to help ruin your

enjoyment of yet more TV shows and films. Back in the virtual studio again is IFG senior researcher Alice Lily. Hello, Alice.

Hi, Kath. Most important question to you, first of all, have you actually finished the last

season of succession? Because if not, I'm going to have to ask you to leave. So, controversially,

I actually haven't. But before you kick me out, I've read detailed plot

synopsies for the last couple of episodes. I mean, that's a shame, but on the other hand,

...