meta_pixel
Tapesearch Logo
Log in
From Our Own Correspondent

Treading Carefully

From Our Own Correspondent

BBC

News, News Commentary

4.41.3K Ratings

🗓️ 15 October 2016

⏱️ 28 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

We travel to Hawai'i, The Gambia, France and India-administered Kashmir this week. The programme begins in Australia where the plans of the prime minister, Malcolm Turnbull, to hold a national plebiscite on the issue of same-sex marriage have run into difficulties. Phil Mercer explains why, although his opponents agree with the premier’s objective, they don’t support his approach for achieving it. Chris Simpson is in The Gambia, the smallest country on the African mainland. Elections are due in December and the opposition parties agreed only yesterday to field a single candidate against the sitting president. But what are the prospects of the long-serving head of state losing power? Chris Bockman is in Toulouse following the story of a plane and its erstwhile owner. Colonel Gadaffi of Libya, the fifth anniversary of whose death falls next Thursday, hated flying but nevertheless acquired and fitted out in grand style an Airbus A340. But disagreements between the new Libyan authorities and creditors claiming that bills racked up by the former leader have been left unpaid in France mean the plane is parked at Perpignan airport. What will happen next? Kashmir is one of the most militarised regions of the world with India and Pakistan administering parts of it while both claiming all of it. Melissa van der Klugt journeyed to Attari to meet the station superintendent who manages the daily routine of journeys between Delhi and Lahore under the shadow of nuclear weapons held on both sides. And Simon Parker is fascinated by the active volcanoes on Hawai'i, particularly Kilauea. He decides to get up close and personal with the lava-spewing natural wonder – but will his feet be able to endure the trek

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

Thank you for downloading from our own correspondent.

0:03.2

This edition was broadcast on BBC Radio 4 on Saturday the 15th of October 2016.

0:09.1

It's introduced by Kate Adi.

0:11.6

Hello. Today we meet the railway station superintendent who presides over two trains a week in the volatile

0:19.1

border land between India and Pakistan. Beaches, mangrove forests, bird life and music.

0:26.0

What's not to like about the tiny country of Gambia?

0:29.0

Well, perhaps the man who leads it.

0:32.0

More reminders of the chaos left behind by... the man who leads it.

0:32.6

More reminders of the chaos left behind by Colonel Gaddafi, five years after his death, who

0:38.2

gets his private plane with the gold taps on the jacuzzi.

0:42.8

And our correspondence sets off to peer into the Hawaiian volcanoes

0:47.2

and wonders if he should be wearing trainers for his adventure.

0:51.5

We begin in Australia wrestling with that only too familiar problem of whether

0:55.4

decisions should be taken by the people or their MPs. The Prime Minister Malcolm

1:00.8

Turnbull has proposed a plebiscite early next year on the issue of gay marriage.

1:06.5

His critics want a straightforward vote in Parliament, all of which has left Phil Mercer wondering

1:11.7

if or when Australia will allow same-sex couples to wed.

1:16.9

In the flamboyant 1994 film The Adventures of Priscilla Queen of the Desert, the British actor Terence Stamp says although Sydney is a vile

1:25.7

stinkhole of a city, in a strange way it takes care of its gay and lesbian people.

1:32.3

I don't know if that ugly wall of suburbia has been put

1:35.2

there to stop them getting in or us getting out. Don't let it drag you down, let it

1:41.1

toughen you up. His transgender character Bernardette tells a fellow

...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from BBC, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of BBC and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.

Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.