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As if on cue, Lemn Sissay’s new series for Radio 4 tackles all those questions we would rather ignore in this season of good cheer and overindulgence. He starts out with a programme about homelessness, reminding us that the Christmas story begins with a young unmarried couple, ostracised because she’s pregnant and her current partner is not the father, who are desperately in need of a bed for the night. Cut to 2019 years later.

‘How do you decide how much to give?’ he asks a young woman in his audience who, it turns out, works with a charity for homeless people. ‘Do you ever feel you’ve not given enough?’

‘All the time,’ she replies, to which Sissay responds, quick as a flash, ‘You actually give money and go away and still feel guilty? Why do you give money then?’

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Sissay, who grew up in care, was thrown out at 18 and given an empty flat for a home but no furniture, no job and no support, has every right to prick our sensitivities.