IN the week of the Labour Party conference, can you guess which great socialist orator was outlining the following limitations placed on working-class life in contemporary Britain?

“No-one’s going to wait to invite you to the table,” said speaker explained, “particularly if you are from a working-class environment. You’re not bred for success. Talent is everywhere and opportunity isn’t. It just isn’t. You’re capped in a way.”

Who do you think? Sir Keir Starmer? Andy Burnham? No, actually it was James Corden, the co-creator of Gavin and Stacey and late-night American TV host, speaking to John Wilson on This Cultural Life last Saturday evening on Radio 4.

Sitcoms and musical theatre got their due during their chat – after he first got a job in the West End in the musical failure that was Martin Guerre, Corden quickly realised he was better off working in Bella Pasta: “I was actually earning more money as a waiter than in Martin Guerre because I did so well on tips,” he explained.

But, really, what Corden wanted to talk about was the time he spent working with directors Mike Leigh and Shane Meadows on films that were a world away from country house drama.

It was watching Meadows, a working-class self-starter, direct, Corden says, that inspired him to start pushing himself forward.

“I guess what I’ve learned from him is you’re going to have to bully your way through this. You’re going to have to get people to budge up to sit at the table if that’s what you want to do. It isn’t going to be just presented to you.” The Labour Party could do worse than book Corden for next year’s conference.

Each to their own but I am not a Strictly Come Dancing fan. Many are of course and that’s fine. There are plenty of other TV channels I can watch come Saturday. It’s the way it takes over radio too that bugs me. At times BBC radio channels all seem to spend half their running time advertising the TV show.

This Strictly season, Radio Scotland has been getting very excited about the fact that presenter Kaye Adams is one of the contestants. Stephen Jardine on the Mornings show even called her “our Kaye” at the start of the week. Yuck.

Maybe I am just annoyed that this infatuation suggests that even radio thinks TV is more important than the wireless.

Or maybe it’s just that I just want Helen Skelton to win.

Finally, a couple of farewells this week. Steve Wright signed off yesterday with his last Radio 2 afternoon show. I’m old enough to recall Wright on Radio Luxembourg at the end of the 1970s. He went on to popularise the zoo format on Radio 1, which opened the door to the later excesses of Chris Evans and Chris Moyles. Never mind.

Whether by intention or accident, Wright’s career is a throwback to the idea that being a DJ is for life. To his credit, it never felt like he was just waiting for TV to come along and offer him a contract.

Over on Radio 4, Fi Glover presented the last episode of The Listening Project on Tuesday. It contained a conversation between two young single mothers from very different eras that was full of compassion and empathy. There has been a lot of both recorded by the programme in the decade of its existence. If only we could say the same about the world beyond radio.