The Sceptic

The Descent of South Africa – with Rob Hersov

Welcome to this Special Episode of the Sceptic, with South African businessman Rob Hersov.
Speaking at the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship (ARC) Conference, host Laurie Wastell and Rob discuss the history and decline of post-apartheid South Africa, the corruption of the ruling ANC, its chilling “expropriation without compensation” laws, the impact of Trump and Musk’s attention to South Africa, why its policy of “Black Economic Empowerment” is like DEI on steroids, the far-Left parties who chant “Kill the Boer”, and why Western liberal media refuses to admit what a basket case South Africa has become.
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Produced by Richard Eldred.
Filmed at the Westminster Podcast Studio.

Trump, Zelensky and the Delusions of Europe

Welcome to Episode 30 of the Sceptic! On the show this week, host Laurie Wastell speaks to the following guests:
Tom Jones, Conservative councillor and writer for publications including the Critic and UnHerd, on Ukraine, the bust-up in the Oval Office and the parlous state of Europe's armed forces.
Michael Wolff, author of several books on team Trump, on what really makes the Donald tick.
And for our premium subscribers, Laurie is joined by Dr Tilak Doshi, economist, former contributor to Forbes and now the Daily Sceptic’s Energy Editor.
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Produced by Richard Eldred.
Filmed at the Westminster Podcast Studio.

The Rebirth of the Right? – With Ben Sixsmith

Welcome to this Special Episode of the Sceptic, with Ben Sixsmith, Online Editor at the Critic.
Host Laurie Wastell catches up with Ben at the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship Conference. They discuss the conference and the state of the Right internationally; Kemi Badenoch and “muscular liberalism”; free speech, the grooming gangs and Britain’s international reputation; JD Vance’s Munich speech; how Trump’s domestic agenda is showing the world’s conservatives how to get things done and much more.
 
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Produced by Richard Eldred.
Filmed at the Westminster Podcast Studio.

Germany is Shifting Rightwards

Welcome to Episode 29 of the Sceptic! On the show this week, host Laurie Wastell speaks to the following guests:
Eugyppius, pseudonymous commentator and author of the substack Eugyppius: a plague chronicle, on the election in Germany and JD Vance’s bombshell Munich speech.
Professor Eric Kaufmann, Director of the Centre for Heterodox Social Science at the University of Buckingham and the author of books including Whiteshift (2018) and Taboo (2024), on a recent controversy over whether Rishi Sunak is English – and whether the Trump administration can reverse woke culture.
And for our premium subscribers, Laurie is joined by Chris Bayliss, independent consultant and writer for publications including the Critic, on what’s behind the shocking recent wave of migrant terror attacks across Europe.
 
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Produced by Richard Eldred.
Filmed at the Westminster Podcast Studio.

Guy Dampier: The Truth About the Grooming Gangs

Last month the grooming gangs scandal broke into the political conversation in Britain in a way it never had before – so much so that after days of headlines, the Labour Government was forced to launch five inquiries into affected areas like Oldham. While many think this still doesn’t go far enough, it’s clear the conversation has changed. Instrumental in that change has been the landmark GB News documentary Grooming Gangs: Britain’s Shame, and its research which found that group-based on-street child grooming had blighted more than 50 towns and cities across the UK.
In this Special Episode of the Sceptic, Laurie speaks to one of the duo behind that documentary, Guy Dampier, Senior Researcher at the Prosperity Institute and a writer for publications including the Telegraph, about his experiences making it and what he learnt about the communities where this scandal took place.
 
NOTE: Due to technical issues, this week’s other two interviews, recorded at this week’s ARC Conference, will be arriving next week.
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Produced by Richard Eldred.
Filmed at the Westminster Podcast Studio.

Lucy Letby: Miscarriage of Justice? – with Peter Hitchens

Welcome to Episode 28 of the Sceptic! On the show this week, host Laurie Wastell speaks to the following guests:
Peter Hitchens, columnist at the Mail on Sunday and author of books including The Abolition of Britain, on the bombshell expert findings about Lucy Letby and why her case must now be heard again.
Barrister Adam King, on his client with the Free Speech Union, former Royal Marine Jamie Michael, being found not guilty of stirring up racial hatred – and what it says about the Government’s post-Southport crackdown.
And for our premium subscribers, Laurie speaks to pseudonymous commentator Eugyppius, author of the substack Eugyppius: a plague chronicle, on the chaos in German politics after the fall of the German establishment parties’ cordon sanitaire against the AfD.
 
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Produced by Richard Eldred.
Filmed at the Westminster Podcast Studio.

Bonfire of the Globalist Pieties – with Andrew Orlowski

Welcome to this Special Episode of the Sceptic, with Andrew Orlowski, business columnist at the Telegraph and writer for publications including the Critic, Spiked and UnHerd.
Host Laurie Wastell and Andrew discuss Andrew’s work writing on business and technology, AI and whether it’s all it’s cracked up to be, the strengths of British innovation and why we fail to commercialise it, why the Left sneers at business, how Net Zero and mass low-skilled immigration are damaging our productivity and the rent-seeking of Amazon and Big Tech. In the premium section, they discuss why the policy-making class needs more engineers, whether the Conservative Party has a future, the impact of Trump 2.0 and Elon Musk’s coming war with Ofcom.
 
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Produced by Richard Eldred.
Filmed at the Westminster Podcast Studio.

David Starkey on Southport, Grooming Gangs and Multiculturalism

Welcome to this Special Episode of the Sceptic, with Professor David Starkey CBE, the eminent and acerbic historian, author and broadcaster.
In a wide-ranging conversation, host Laurie Wastell and Professor Starkey discuss the grooming gangs scandal, why Elon Musk’s takeover of Twitter represents the end of the long 20th Century, Trump’s second term, free speech, state censorship and the “noble lie” of multiculturalism, the parallels between communism and liberalism and why Keir Starmer’s response to the Southport massacre has been “contemptible beyond contempt”. In the premium section, they discuss English individualism and why it gave birth to the modern world, the challenge of imported ethnic tribalism, national identity in an age of immigration and what is to be done.
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Produced by Richard Eldred. Filmed at the Westminster Podcast Studio.

The State Failed the Southport Victims

Welcome to Episode 27 of the Sceptic! On the show this week, host Laurie Wastell speaks to the following guests:
David Shipley, writer on prison reform for publications including the Spectator, on the Government’s failings over the Southport attack and the serious questions for Keir Starmer and the Government about why we were kept in the dark about it. 
 
Fred de Fossard, Director of Strategy at the Prosperity Institute (formerly the Legatum Institute) and writer for publications including the Critic, on how the inauguration of Donald Trump is set to blow a hole in woke capitalism – and whether Britain can ever follow suit. 
 
And for our premium subscribers, Laurie is joined by author and historian Ed West, on why the fallout of the grooming gangs scandal could make it Britain’s Chernobyl.
 
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Produced by Richard Eldred.
Filmed at the Westminster Podcast Studio.

How “Islamophobia” Protects the Grooming Gangs

Welcome to Episode 26 of the Sceptic! On the show this week, host Laurie Wastell speaks to the following guests:
Dr. Freddie Attenborough, Digital Communications Director at the Free Speech Union, on how Labour’s “Islamophobia” definition has stifled discussion of the Pakistani-Muslim rape-gangs scandal – and what that means for local inquiries.
David Turver, author of the Eigen Values Substack, on how we narrowly avoided blackouts during the cold snap last week, and what that says about the parlous state of Britain’s energy grid.
And for our premium subscribers, Laurie is joined by freelance investigative journalist Charlotte Gill, author of the Woke Waste Substack, on the shady Left-wing funding networks and foreign billionaires influencing our politics.
 
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Produced by Richard Eldred.
Filmed at the Westminster Podcast Studio.