'We're appeasing the tech bros': Beeban Kidron, from film-maker to lawmaker
Political Thinking with Nick Robinson
BBC
4.6 • 2.5K Ratings
🗓️ 20 February 2026
⏱️ 48 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
What links Bridget Jones to social media regulation?
The answer: Baroness Beeban Kidron. In 2004 she directed the Bridget Jones sequal. 20 years later, she became one of the most vocal campaigners for regulation of social media and tech in the UK.
She joins Nick in the Political Thinking studio to tell her story, from joining Marxist dinner parties in her childhood home, to filming and living with the protesters of Greenham Common in the 1980s.
Today, she has strong words for Keir Starmer's government, and is pushing for law-changes from her seat in the House of Lords.
Producers: Daniel Kraemer and Flora Murray Editor: Giles Edwards
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, music radio podcasts. |
| 0:07.2 | We get it. Life is busy. You want to keep up with the news, but there's just too much going on. |
| 0:13.0 | Which is where newscast comes in. We do the work, and when you're ready to dig deeper into the day's news, you just pop us into your ears. |
| 0:22.3 | It does mean we have to put in the hard work though. Listen to newscast every day on BBC Sounds. Hello and welcome to political |
| 0:28.4 | thinking. One middle-aged woman against Silicon Valley, that's how my guest on political thinking |
| 0:33.8 | this week was described by none other than her husband. Baroness Beban Kidron |
| 0:38.5 | has spent the past 13 years warning about the unregulated, concentrated, commercial power of giant US |
| 0:47.4 | tech companies. She led the campaign to force them to alter their products to protect children, |
| 0:52.7 | but now she wants them to go much further, |
| 0:55.6 | and indeed, to protect us all. A multi-award winning documentary maker, director of TV dramas, |
| 1:01.6 | like oranges are not the only fruit, and the Hollywood blockbuster, the sequel to Bridget Jones. |
| 1:07.2 | She now directs events in the real world from her seat in the House of Laws where she's a cross-bencher that is not a member of any political party. |
| 1:20.5 | Baroness Beban Kidrom, welcome to political thinking. Great to being here. Your husband's words, you against the tech companies. |
| 1:31.3 | Is that how it's felt for these long 13 years? |
| 1:34.1 | I think it has. |
| 1:35.0 | I used to someday say if they find me at the bottom of the Thames, it's Facebook, what done it. |
| 1:40.1 | But yeah, no, it has. |
| 1:41.7 | And I think it has been a remarkable journey in the sense of, I think everyone's caught up now. |
| 1:48.1 | You know, we all know there's a problem with tech. |
| 1:50.7 | And so now we're moving to what are we going to do about it? |
| 1:53.7 | Yeah, the what not were the weather? |
| 1:55.6 | When you heard the Prime Minister this week say, no platform gets a free pass he said trying to sound tough it seemed to |
... |
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.