Hello and welcome to the Intelligence on Economist Radio. I'm your host, Jason Palmer.

Every weekday, we provide a fresh perspective on the events shaping your world.

In Japan, there's a large and growing number of people who shut themselves in for years,

not working, not going out, sometimes not even speaking. It's a problem that was noticed a

generation ago that has recently gained greater urgency. And California suffers a range of natural

troubles, from droughts to wildfires.

Add to that list a plague of rats.

Even in the state's glitzy parts, the rodents run riot,

and a push to limit the poisons available means the rat pack will only get bigger.

But first, Britain is bracing itself for an election next week. Tonight, Prime Minister Boris Johnson will go head to head in a televised debate with opposition labor leader

Jeremy Corbyn. The snap vote was called in an attempt to resolve an impasse over Brexit, after more than

three years of arguments in Westminster over how to leave the European Union. The debate in London and

Brussels centers on Britain's relationship with Europe and the rest of the world.

But how much does that concern most Brits?

And after all that wrangling, what do they think of the options they'll have on the ballot paper next Thursday?

To find out, our correspondent decided to go for a walk.

I went up to Northumberland to walk the length of Hadring's War, which is a 84-mile frontier built by the Romans to mark the far northern point of their empire.

Tom Rooley is a Britain correspondent at The Economist and has written about his walk for 1843, Our Sister Magazine.

Not much of it remains anymore.

There are a few stones here and there,

but mainly it's just about trudging through lots of muddy fields,

seeing this sort of rather bucolic countryside.

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