The Convex Conversation Convex

In this week’s Convex Conversation we explore behavioural science and its role in helping tackle some of the greatest challenges in society.
Behavioural scientist Elspeth Kirkman – Chief Programmes Officer at innovation charity Nesta – reveals how issues like the nation’s health, domestic decarbonisation and the disparity in early childhood are being viewed through different lenses to bring about positive change. 
Elspeth explains how thinking like an artist can improve our decision making – a concept explored in her new book ‘Decisionscape’ - and reveals her shock at delivering a speech at the UN with no idea she was doing it! 
 

To mark the 80th anniversary of D-Day, Helen joins the Paddle Group, Royal Marines Association, on the Thames in a folding two-man boat, known as a Klepper, made famous by the Cockleshell heroes. 
As she paddles with former Royal Marines corporal Chris Maynard and some of the team preparing to cross the Channel to Normandy, she discovers how these expeditions help personnel from all the forces with their mental health, bridging the no man’s land some experience between serving and civvy street. 
The Paddle Group will re-enact some of the key events and landings of 1944, with 99-year-old veteran Norman Stanley Ashford watching from the beaches. 
 



Fmr Corporal 
Chris Maynard LC2 RM
 

Phil Gilby MBE 
The Royal Marines Charity
 

Colour Sergeant
Lee Waters ML1 RM
 
 
 
 

Travel writer Catherine Fairweather talks about her new podcast series, Voices from the Frontline, exploring lives shaped by war.
In the first episode she interviews her husband, revered photo-journalist Sir Don McCullin, and recalls how she first heard about Don from foreign correspondent Jon Swain when she was 11, living in Laos during the Indochina Wars.
Catherine’s father was a diplomat and her mother Mikhail Gorbachev and Margaret Thatcher’s translator. Their exciting life living all over the world experiencing different cultures gave her a thirst for adventure which led to a career as a travel editor for magazines like Harper’s Bazaar and Porter. Catherine reveals the places she’s left her heart, including Bhutan in the Himalayas.
 


Photograph by Max McCullin


Photograph by Sir Don McCullin
 
 
 

Prince William is building 24 sustainable homes on his Duchy of Cornwall land at Nansledan to provide temporary accommodation and support for some of the many people sleeping rough in the county, in partnership with homelessness charity St Petrocs. 
Jon Sparkes OBE is a trustee of St Petrocs; ran Crisis; Scope; is currently CEO of UNICEK UK and is about to move to Mencap, where he’ll be pushing for change for the 1.5 million people in Britain with learning disabilities.  
Jon shares his very personal story of why he ended up in the charity sector, reveals the frustrations and rewards it comes with, and discusses the depths we’ve fallen to in terms of social care policy, including the £7 billion pound reduction in spending on it over the last decade.  
 

Deep in the sub-basement of the Natural History Museum in London, surrounded by a vast collection of dinosaur bones, world-leading palaeontologist Prof Paul Barrett gives an insight into how prehistoric times can inform current issues like climate change. 
In this golden age for prehistoric reptiles, where on average one new dinosaur is discovered every week, innovative digital tests and detailed online archives mean we can find out more about their life on Earth, our planet & evolution. 
Paul has an armoured dinosaur named after him - Vectipelta Barretti - and describes finding a new fossil, and being the first human to see it, as a moment of pure discovery. 
 

An insider’s view from former cabinet minister Rory Stewart OBE on the upcoming UK election and the difficulties a new Government will face taking over a country that he believes is bust, with public services we can't afford. 
Rory is already selling out venues like the O2 in the autumn with his The Rest is Politics podcast co-host Alastair Campbell when they'll be debating the issues before the nation votes. 
He shares candid stories from his eye-opening decade at the heart of Government, detailed in his memoir Politics On The Edge, saying there are elements of privilege in elected politics but it’s “bruising beyond imagination and only very unusual personalities usually survive in it.” Rory reveals he’d like to work on public policy for a Labour government, perhaps chairing a commission on Ai in the NHS.