The Big Issue

The Big Issue is one of Britain’s leading news and cultural magazines. Every week’s edition is packed full of original takes on the biggest issues of the day as well as interviews with the most significant figures in politics and entertainment. The Big Issue was founded 1991 to give people experiencing homelessness the opportunity to earn their own income. We continue to support hundreds of vendors across the UK and all proceeds from sales go to help anyone wanting to lift themselves out of poverty.

Safe harbour

THE DISPATCH • News, views & miscellany

THE BIG ISSUE

EDITOR’S LETTER • Bold action is vital for the nation’s health

BIRD’S WORDS • Poverty is the UK’s biggest growth industry, and people are the collateral damage

LETTERS

Across the UK, a deadly new drug has been linked to 284 fatalities. In Birmingham alone, it killed 21 people last summer. Yet few outside the city noticed. Big Issue investigates a shocking and hidden tragedy • Authorities are reluctant to discuss the growing epidemic that has ravaged Birmingham, but Big Issue’s investigation led us to a retired GP who’s gathered the truth. This is the inside story of the synthetic opioid crisis sweeping the UK

‘If you can get people to laugh you can get people to care’

IAN BROUDIE • He found his tribe at the heart of Liverpool’s punk scene, and it all began at Woolworths with a £14 electric guitar

BLUE

Animal magic

Going interstellar to let the light in

Friends reunited

THE ART OF TRANSFORMATION • At the peak of the pandemic in 2020, Madrid-based pianist and composer Fer Isella was 5,000 miles from his father, who was in intensive care back in his native Argentina. Isella, who has worked alongside Brian Eno and been recognised at the Latin GRAMMYs, turned to music to cope with the grief. He writes about how he was determined to preserve his father and transform death into life.

ROBIN INCE IS ON THE ROAD

Love is called my old piano

Lost in the mists of time

Puzzles

MY PITCH • Shell Garage, Eastville Park, Easton, Bristol 9am-12pm, 2pm-5pm, every day

Welcome to our Travel Special

Turning tourists away is not the solution

Postcards from the frontline of overtourism

Can cruising turn the sustainability tide?

Is the party holiday officially over?

The stress-free way to see the great outdoors

Around the world in Ironman mode • Celebrity Race Across The World ’s Billy Monger is travelling to Hawaii. But rather than a dream holiday, it’s to raise vital money for Comic Relief-funded projects with his toughest challenge yet

What in the world?