Radio choice Charlotte Runcie
Polyoaks RADIO 4, 11.30AM
The scalpel-sharp, character-driven NHS satire by Dr Phil Hammond and David Spicer returns with a new series. Casting a critical and comical eye at all the trials currently being faced by the health service once again, this series confronts PFIS and privatisation, social care, corporate consultants, GPS and the Care Quality Commission. It stars Nigel Planer, Polly Frame, Simon Greenall, David Westhead and Margaret Cabournsmith, and features a guest appearance from Sheila Reid, who is deemed so healthy she should be struck off the practice’s patient list.
Dead Ringers RADIO 4, 6.30PM
Sure to provide some much-needed light relief sorely after the tumultuous events of recent weeks, Dead Ringers returns. As always, it has performances from Jon Culshaw, Jan Ravens, Lewis Macleod, Deborah Stephenson and Duncan Wisbey all sounding like voices rather more well-known than their own. Culshaw has been honing his Donald Trump impression of late, and one suspects he will have good cause to roll it out this series – even if the US president’s real-life antics are often beyond any satirist’s imaginings.