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Work and Pensions Secretary Liz Kendall has one the toughest tasks in Labour’s domestic programme: tackling the burgeoning welfare bill.Next week, the government is expected to announce reforms to the welfare system. There is unease over the plans within the party, with some Labour MPs saying they fear drastic cuts could push vulnerable people into poverty. The move could split the party and put Liz Kendall in a difficult position. A grammar school girl, Kendall went on to study history at Cambridge, where she liked to revise while sunbathing and listening to Wham. She became MP for Leicester West in 2010, and ran for Labour leader in 2015, but came away with just 4.5% of the vote. Now on Keir Starmer’s front bench, her supporters say she’s not afraid of a fight and willing to take on some of the party’s sacred cows. Production Team Presenter: Stephen Smith Producers: Viv Jones, Chloe Scannapieco, Hugh Sheehan, Keiligh Baker Editor: Bridget Harney Sound: Neil Churchill Production Co-ordinator: Maria Ogundele

As the European Union’s foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas is the bloc's top diplomat. So when EU leaders gathered in Brussels this week to thrash out a new defence plan for Ukraine, Kallas was in the thick of things. Before taking up the EU role she was Prime Minister of Estonia, the nation's first female leader. She was born in 1977 in the Estonian capital Tallinn, then part of the Soviet Union, into a family bound up with her country’s centuries-old struggle for independence. A Russia hawk and fierce critic of Putin, she is already on the Kremlin’s wanted list. Mark Coles has been talking with her friends and political allies to understand how Kaja Kallas came to be called "Europe's Iron Lady". Production Team Presenter: Mark Coles Producers: Viv Jones, Chloe Scannapieco, Keiligh Baker, Hugh Sheehan Editor: Ben Mundy Sound: Neil Churchill Production Co-ordinator: Katie Morrison

He’s the former corporate lawyer, who has a pilot's licence and loves music, but has never before been a government minister.Friedrich Merz was born in the west German town of Brilon in 1955 into a prominent conservative, Catholic family. He joined the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) while still at school, before going on to study law.Merz then worked as a lawyer and judge for a few years, but he always had his eye on politics.He was elected to the European Parliament in 1989, and his journey to the top has been a winding one.Sidelined by Angela Merkel before she became chancellor, he quit parliament entirely to pursue a lucrative series of corporate jobs and was written off as yesterday's man.But with the CDU topping the ballot in Germany's elections earlier this year, he is now on the brink of clinching the job he has coveted for so long. In a programme originally broadcast last month in the aftermath of Merz's election victory, when the prospect of a CDU coalition with the far-right AFD - now off the cards - was still a possibility, and Donald Trump's fiery meeting with President Zelensky was fresh in everyone's memory, Stephen Smith set out to find out how Merz bounced back.Production Team Presenter: Stephen Smith Producers: Arlene Gregorius, Caroline Bayley, Chloe Scannapieco Editor: Ben Mundy Sound: Neil Churchill Production Co-ordinators: Maria Ogundele, Janet StaplesCredits Audio of Friedrich Merz at the Munich Security Conference by Bayerischer Rundfunk Audio of swearing-in ceremony of Angela Merkel, 2005, by ZDF Audio of French President Macron at the White House courtesy of the White House