Daniel Johnson: Luke, you're a businessman, operating in a number of different fields from bookselling to broadcasting, restaurants to greyhound racing. What's been your experience of terrorists and political activists and the ways in which they try to manipulate business?

Luke Johnson: I wrote recently about this in the Financial Times, it was stimulated by a fairly vigorous campaign, which isn't necessarily full of direct threats to life, but has an undertone of menace about it, as regards a particular book that extremist Islamic groups clearly don't want published because they believe it is sacrilegious and offensive. There is clearly some form of orchestrated campaign to try to object at every level of the book distribution world, be it publishers or booksellers.

DJ: This is The Jewel of Medina.

Thursday

Hello. Welcome to British Gas. Calls are recorded for training and quality purposes.

Me: Hello, I wonder whether you could help me. One of your engineers is coming to service my central heating boiler this afternoon - between 1pm and 6pm - and I just wondered whether there is any possibility of giving me a slightly more specific time. I'd love just to pop out and do a bit of shopping.

British Gas: Sorry but our afternoon appointments are always between one and six.

Me: But surely your engineer must know by now how many jobs he's doing and so could give a rough estimate of when he'll arrive here. It seems a bit ridiculous that he can't say whether it'll be before 3pm or after 3pm, don't you agree?