Nick Robinson

There is little to beat the thrill of finding a letter you didn’t know existed and being transported back in time and deep into your family’s history. Dated January 1955, it is addressed to ‘Desmond and Evelyn’ and urges them to show ‘tenacity, resolution and COURAGE’. It is signed ‘Pater’. These were the qualities deemed necessary for the son of an English colonel to marry the daughter of a German Jewish refugee against her father’s ferocious opposition. ‘I have the greatest respect for the good qualities of your race and I respect their fighting qualities,’ the man who would become my English grandfather wrote to the couple who would become my mum and dad.

She’ll never do it. She’d have to be mad. Why take the risk? That’s what everyone said when I announced at the end of my BBC1 interview with Rishi Sunak that we were still hopeful that Liz Truss would also agree to a half-hour in-depth conversation in prime time. Well, guess what? She has agreed and will come into Broadcasting House just a week before most people expect her to move into No. 10. Too late to have any impact on the result, say the cynics. That ignores the fact that 10 to 15 per cent of the Tory selectorate will not, I’m told, vote until the last minute. More importantly, it ignores the tens of millions of people who have had no say in the choice of their next prime minister.

I spent my last night in Kiev in the ‘Presidential Suite’ of a city hotel – what used to be known as the underground car park. The general manager, a man whose name I never knew but who I hugged tightly before leaving, had promised to make it a shelter for guests who hadn’t checked out by the time it was clear that war was looming. We stayed there with his staff, their young children and elderly parents, their dogs and cats too. It is still the home of the BBC staff who remain in Kiev: the reporters and presenters you know as well as those whose roles are just as important but whose names you seldom hear.

‘Aren’t you meant to be in quarantine?’ the man in the cloakroom queue asks. I sense that his enquiry is motivated more by concern about his wellbeing than mine. ‘Don’t worry! I’ve not got the coronavirus,’ I try to reassure him cheerily. That’ll teach me to talk about my health on the Today programme. I mentioned on air that I’d taken a precautionary test after returning from holiday in south-east Asia with a cough. Soon afterwards my guide in Phnom Penh sent a message to ask how the rest of my trip had gone. Pleased and somewhat puzzled by her solicitousness, I quickly realised that she had heard about my test and wondered whether I — or rather, she — was all right.

There is one thing Covid-19 has changed for the better. It’s persuaded No. 10 that Today’s seven million listeners do deserve to hear from a cabinet minister. The Health Secretary, Matt Hancock, was the first to appear since the election. The ministerial boycott has actually been welcomed by many, who say it’s made for a better listen. To be fair to politicians, I think that is a comment on us as much as them. People had grown weary of tetchy and unproductive standoffs between presenters who felt their questions were being ignored and ministers who felt frustrated they weren’t being given a chance to get their message across. It will always be a vital part of our role to hold to account those with power — in government, business or anywhere in public life.

Douglas Murray was not 'ambushed' by me on the Today programme. Nor was he called out. Nor was he misquoted.  He was asked about something he once said and wrote in a lengthy Today programme discussion – around eight minutes and not the four he suggests – about Barack Obama’s warning about the idea that young people should be “woke” – quick to seize on allegedly offensive remarks.  Douglas had already had two opportunities to spell out his thinking in response to questions which could scarcely be described as aggressive: “Are you surprised to find yourself cheering along with Barack Obama?

Scientists are experimenting with growing replacement vocal cords in the lab, as well as transplanting them from dogs. That was the Sun’s imaginative angle on my somewhat croaky debut as a Today programme presenter (only one of mine is working properly). It led me to ponder which species of donor would be fitting for my new role. Rottweiler? Too aggressive. Terrier, perhaps? Annoying after a while. Maybe a shepherd or a pointer would fit better with the mission to explain? All suggestions gratefully received. Bar one, that is. Husky is out. If my first programme had not been dominated by events in Paris, I had planned to talk about the world’s greatest city. I speak of Manchester, of course.

I am standing in the courtyard of HMP Wormwood Scrubs with the Prime Minister. He’s there, or so I read, to convince the papers that his approach to law and order has moved from ‘hug a hoodie’ to ‘mug a hoodie’. I’m there to ask him not just about that but about why he let his Chief Whip stumble along wounded for so long; and to put to him suggestions from his own party that he and his ministers look, well, less than competent. Having batted away my questions with painful ease, the PM delivers a final blow as we film a couple of editing shots. With a mischievous smile he tells me he resisted the temptation to raise the subject of an organisation really facing a crisis. Ouch. These are not the easiest of days to be working at the BBC.