Podcasts presented by Juliette Foster

On the day that Chancellor George Osborne made his budget speech to the House of Commons, the government's controversial Trade Union Bill was dealt a major blow by peers in the House of Lords. By a majority of 320 votes to 172, they defeated a proposal to change the way that union members pay their dues. It was a strong show of support to a recommendation from a cross-party committee which had said that any changes to party funding should be restricted to new members only. The Lords then ended what had been a bruising session for the government, by giving its overwhelming support to two other bill ammendments. So what happens now? Is the Trade Union Bill dead in the water? Will the government now have to rip it up and start again? Silkie Cragg is the "Policy & Campaigns Support Officer" for the TUC, and Professor John Weeks is Share Radio's regular economics commentator.

The decision on whether the UK stays inside the European Union in the upcoming referendum, could depend on whether a large number of young people turn out to vote. An online survey by "Opinium" - on behalf of "The Observer" newspaper - found that 43% of those questioned wanted Britain to leave Europe while 39% wanted the country to stay in. The results may be a setback for pro-Europe campaigners but for those on the opposite side of the fence, it's further proof that Britain is capable of functioning outside the EU. David Owen is a former Foreign Secretary who from 1992 to 1995 also served as EU peace negotiator in the former Yugoslavia. He's also the author of the pamphlet "The UK's In Out Referendum: EU Foreign & Defence Policy Reform". Earlier he came into the studio and he gave Investment Perspectives presenter Juliette Foster his reaction to that survey.

This is Emerging Opportunities, the one and only show on your radio dedicated to global emerging markets, featuring Gavin Serkin, the author of Frontier: Exploring the Top Ten Emerging Markets of Tomorrow, and the Managing Editor of Frontier Funds. His guests today are Zsolt Papp, Global Head of Emerging Market debt client portfolio strategies at JP Morgan, David Pollard, a professor of physics turned banker for Citigroup and his daughter Arese Pollard, whose many roles have included investment at Barclays, whom both created ‘Pollard Et Filles Capital Management’. Topics on the agenda today take us to many different locales, from Guyana to Brazil, to China, Cuba & Jamaica, looking at investing in emerging markets.

A very good afternoon and welcome to today's edition of the Apprentice Investor. Regular listeners to the show will know that our Apprentices are five members of the Share Radio team who've each been given fifteen thousand pounds of virtual money to build their own individual share portfolios. They have a minimum of eight stocks, which they've been buying and selling through The Share Centre. So, how well are they doing? Are they feeling in a celebratory mood or is it a day for drowning sorrows? Juliette Foster welcomes apprentices Olivia Demetriades and Matt Cox, and Share Radio's Senior Analyst Ed Bowsher.

This is Conversations From Africa with Chris Bishop, Managing Editor of Forbes Africa Magazine. Today, he and Share Radio's Patrick Jones discuss President Jacob Zuma being convicted by a high court in South Africa for failing to uphold the constitution, electricity giant Eskom increasing it's rates despite an outcry and Mozambique's economy being downgraded from a poor d2 to an even worse d3, by Moody's Ratings Agency.

The aircraft manufacturers Boeing and Airbus are predicting bumper orders over the next twenty years from India, the world's ninth biggest economy. They believe that India's position as a fast growing market has the potential to offset weaker sales elsewhere. Some analysts believe that by 2040 over 50,000 new planes could be in the skies thanks to strong demand from emerging markets. So is aviation a sector worth sticking with? What are the ethical issues investors need to think about? Or should they be looking at alternative sectors? Ketan Patel is Associate Fund Manager of the Amity UK fund at EdenTree Investment Management and joined Juliette Foster in the studio.

The Weeks Update: In the wake of the killings in Brussels a number of people were arrested, although on Monday a man charged with direct involvement, was released due to a lack of evidence. The challenge now is to track down other militants and break up existing IS cells before they strike again. That won't be easy since the exact number isn't known and - as Brussels illustrated - there will always be terrorist suspects who evade the intelligence gathering net, especially if sections of that net are already weak. Joining Investment Perspectives host Juliette Foster with more analysis is Sir David Omand, the former Director General of the government intelligence organisation GCHQ, and Professor John Weeks, Share Radio's regular economics commentator.

Investment analyst & author Jeremy Miller, whose new book "Warren Buffett's Ground Rules - Words of Wisdom from the Partnership Letters of the World's Greatest Investor", explains Buffet's attitude to investing via 33 letters written between 1956 and 1970, joins Juliette Foster from New York to discuss the book and the man himself. It's published by Profile Books on April 7th and costs £12.99 in hardback.

April marks the first anniversary of the Nepalese earthquake, which killed over eight thousand people and injured more than twenty one thousand others. After the disaster the International Monetary Fund told the Nepalese authorities they would have to pay back the $3.5 billion of debt the country owes to its creditors. The IMF said the money can't be written off because Nepal doesn't qualify for relief from a special fund for countries hit by natural disasters. That decision outraged anti debt campaigners who claim that wealthy states are often responsible for the financial problems of poorer countries. For example Mozambique's debt, which is priced in currencies like the Dollar, has ballooned because of the weak exchange rate, forcing the government to use 13% of its revenue to pay back what it owes. So is it time for the creditors to ease up on the indebted? Tim Jones, of the "Jubilee Debt Campaign", joins Juliette Foster in the studio along with Professor John Weeks, Share Radio's regular economics commentator.

Share Radio's Book Review: Can society and business exist in a mutually respectful relationship where one side knows where the other is coming from? On the surface, the answer to that question would appear to be "No", since most people believe that companies work to undermine the public interest. Yet there's no denying the fact that business and the public need each other although the challenge is to find a meaningful way of bringing both sides together. Well one man who may have the answer is the peer and former CEO of BP, John Browne, whose new book, "Connect: How Companies Succeed by Engaging Radically with Society", is published in paperback this week. John Browne joined Juliette Foster in the studio.