Dr Andy Palmer is one of the most respected figures in the automotive industry in the UK and beyond. After a stellar 23 year career at Nissan - where he developed the Nissan Leaf among other standout models - he became CEO at Aston Martin in 2014, then in 2021 he left to focus on projects in the electric vehicle space. In this wide-ranging discussion with Nick Peters, he underscores the urgency with which the UK government needs to act to secure the future of the national auto industry. He also talks about his career, his management and engineering philosophy, and about his passion for helping disadvantaged young people into manufacturing and engineering apprenticeships.

The General Election 2024 will signal a sea-change in the way the UK economy is run. Growth is central to that and an industrial strategy is the key to achieving it. But what does industrial strategy actually mean? How does it work? Is it just money? (No.) Is it politically quite hard to carry off? (Yes.) And do manufacturers have a role in shaping it? (Yes, again.)
Nick discusses all this with Giles Wilkes, who was Sir Vince Cable's special adviser and helped run industrial strategy in the Coalition years and then special adviser to PM Theresa May for the 2017-19 industrial strategy, helping devise Made Smarter and much else.

Author Will Hutton believes passionately in the power of manufacturing to lead a renaissance in the British economy. For decades, he has promoted the idea that a successful economy, a successful society, can only be based on harmony between individual self interest and community, the I and the We as he puts it, and it is all brought together in his new book, out now in paperback, called This Time No Mistakes: How to Remake Britain. It's a sweeping historical analysis of the state we are in - and how to repair it.

Also in this edition, meet FOBEM: the Festival of British Engineering and Manufacturing, a bold new initiative to introduce young people to the joys and thrills of modern manufacturing.