Alan Pearce was the BBC’s Kabul correspondent when the Taliban over-ran Afghanistan. But he never realised how low-risk his life had been until he started writing about the health and safety death-traps that threatened his native Britain. Apart from reporting on trip hazards and hanging baskets, and a stint producing TV-am’s Roland Rat Show, he has covered conflicts around the world for the past 30 years for a variety of news organisations, including Time Magazine, The Times, Sunday Times and Sunday Telegraph.   He is the author of the bestselling Playing it Safe (2008) and Whose Side Are They On? - How Big Brother Government is Ruining Britain (2009)