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Happiness Rules: Should Wellbeing Dictate Government Policy?

Richard Layard and Amol Rajan


This week, Amol sits down with Lord Richard Layard, the author, economist, and Labour peer who has spent decades making the case for happiness and wellbeing. He successfully helped implement talking therapy to the NHS, and was a key figure in persuading the UK government to measure wellbeing. But he wants to go further - in this conversation, Lord Layard outlines why he wants happiness to become the main objective of all government policy, and argues that this radical change would even pay for itself. But what actually are happiness and wellbeing? How can we make ourselves happier? And why are young people less happy than ever before?


2 July 2026


Radical (podcast)


https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m002ybmb

This publication comes under the following theme: Mental health policies