here's a quiet, arresting radio revolution going on at LBC between 7pm and 10pm Monday to Thursday. Putatively – and often – it's a political programme, a mellow but rufty-tufty panel-debate between Tory Iain Dale and his guests. That's all pretty straightforward: as Julie Burchill says, for people who like that sort of thing, that's the sort of thing they like. But Dale has a second string to his bow, an uncanny ability with phone-ins to make people cry. It only works because he's not trying to do it; if he were actively soliciting tears, people would be suspicious, and revert to telling him how unemployed people are all lazy and what's really killing this country is high taxes. But his very reserve, the sense you have from his voice that he would actually be quite mortified to see real humans weeping, is … just … dynamite. I'm about to start crying right now.

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It's obviously not entirely innocent, since he chooses his subjects deliberately for their emotional impact: depression and mental illness; bereavement, the death of a child; it's not the sort of thing you'd want to talk to James Whale about. Yet it's not cynical, and his sincerity gets him into the most intimate conversations. Last month a man rang in to talk about his suicidal ideation. Dale deployed his other secret weapon, which is the ability to stay silent when someone's talking. It was striking, but not exploitative.

I found Wednesday's programme even more moving; in a conversation about death, Dale – who lost his mother five months ago – became audibly upset, and a guy called Nigel called in to talk him down. "You are the sum total of your mother and your father," he said, feelingly, as Dale took deep breaths. The whole phone-in relationship – which usually sounds quite needy, callers desperate to keep talking, presenters ruthlessly cutting them off – was totally remade in that moment. It was just Iain and Nigel, two people, finding consolation in the humanity of voices.

Obviously, he's still a Tory; in case he strays on to Nadine Dorries or the environment, you have to stay ready with your off-finger at all times.