We are heading into perhaps the most consequential local election in recent memory.

Forecasters are expecting big gains for reform in the Lib Dems and a bad showing for Labour and the Tories.

Could we be looking at the end of the two-party system?

To make sense of what comes next, please do come along to our local elections shake-up event.

Join the spectators panel and special guests Sir Jacob Reesmog and Zia Yusuf as they

analyse the results on the 7th of May at the Emanuel Centre in Westminster. For tickets, go to

www.combe.combe.combeau Hello and welcome to Spectator Out Loud. Each week we choose some of our favourite articles from the magazine and ask their writers to read them aloud.

I'm Patrick Gibbons and on this week's podcast, Ian Williams looks at Chinese influence in the UK and asks if the government's China audit is up to the job. Philip Patrick interviews Japan's

Last Ninja. Reviewing Damien Labass's The Drowned Places Diving in search of Atlantis, Guy Stagg explores the

myth of the city beneath the waves.

Yacenda Max Stone Graham reviews an unusual exhibition at the Food Museum and Stowe Market on

school dinners. Mark Mason provides his notes on quizzes ahead of the Spectator's Garden

Quiz on the 29th of May, which you can book your

place at at spectator.com.uk forward slash quiz. And finally, Cacchia and Olding takes us on a trip to

D.C. Up first, Ian Williams. Somewhere in the bowels of the Foreign Office, civil servants are

still working on the government's China audit.

The report was commissioned by the new Labour government to assess trade-offs in the UK-China relationship

and to ensure consistency across government, business and academia towards engagement with China.

Little is known about its workings or who's being consulted.

Instead of bringing clarity, the process is deepening confusion, and there are worrying

reports that the audit has been purred back to support Kiyosthama's pragmatic approach.

All the while, there have been a series of troubling events that demand

...