Off Air... with Jane and Fi - Formidable in the front, petite in the back (with Ian Russell)

Episode Date: February 26, 2026

It’s Thursday - the day before a very special day involving a Colin. Need we say more? Before we get to Colin, Jane and Fi cover cheerful train drivers, dobbing in your neighbours, disposing of deceased pets, and the fickle nature of muslin. There are also a few parish notices, including mention of a new playlist… Plus, Ian Russell, father of Molly Russell, discusses the upcoming documentary Molly vs the Machines. Our next book club pick is 'A Town Like Alice' by Nevil Shute.Our most asked about book is called 'The Later Years' by Peter Thornton.You can listen to our 'I'm in the cupboard on Christmas' playlist here: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1awQioX5y4fxhTAK8ZPhwQIf you want to contact the show to ask a question and get involved in the conversation then please email us: [e-mail] us on Instagram! @janeandfiPodcast Producers: Eve SalusburyExecutive Producer: Rosie Cutler Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Is it actual podcast time? It's actual podcast time. Matching laundry and the menopause. Welcome aboard, Rachel. Hello, Jane, Fee and Eve the Voice. Honestly. When will it end? You did this one yesterday.

Honestly. Yeah, we did. We did. That's fine. There's a bit of sensible production there. Well, I don't want to repeat things. No, you can. But people are very, very patient with us.

It's fine. Okay. I'm a relatively new listener. First time emailer, Crosby Girl, now living in Leicestershire, around three years younger than Jane. Did you read this bit? Yeah, yeah. We know about this. Oh, I'll read this bit again. Still astounded to learn that Jane's a scouser. I listened to the podcast impaired. Tonight, you made me laugh so much at to get up and write on the subject of matching lingerie. I'm flabbergasted to hear that merchant tailor's Jane does not wear matching niggers and bra as a manor high girl. Now, talk me through that. Well that's the it's the comprehensive There's no other way to put it That was the comprehensive down the road

Now called something else Very good school Did you at Merchant Taylor's Slightly looked down on Manor High I think they hated us Right And hockey matches between our school And the other schools in the area

Were always a Shall we say In particular I did sometimes feel that I got targeted Right A bruised ankle I got Well I talked to shin pads

Let's put it that way Right As a Manor High girl Matching Knickers and bras were a complete sign as an adult that I'd made it. Made what entirely, I'm not sure. It's a standing joke in our house

married 36 years next week. Well done. God, get the bunting out. That is a remarkable achievement. Isn't it? What do you think the anniversary is for 36 years? Because they go quite weird, don't they after 25? Fortitude.

Something like servitude. Magnitude. I'll look it up because it'd probably be a kind of, it'd be something like opal, wouldn't it? I think we could go back. Both, honestly, both, we could just go, blimey. That's, you know, that would be the blimey award. Yeah.

The reason my brother and sister and law were not successful in avoiding divorce was the fact that she refused to wear matching underwent. We did establish between us, Eve and I yesterday, that wasn't, that was a joke. What's the point of me reading this out again then? Well, because I wanted to put the case for my lack of interest in matching underwear and just explain it. There is, by the way, some quite meaty content in this podcast. So this is just, we're just warming you up with all this. I've only got two or three, I've probably got three good bras.

I've got quite, you know, got issues with my chest. Quite some, I think I'll just describe it. It's formidable. I need to be wearing the right bra and I go to that special shop. That does, you know, the right fitting bras or says it does. And I've no reason to disbelieve them, by the way. They've given me a great deal of satisfaction. So I can't, I haven't got matching knickers for my,

three good bras because the bras are really expensive. I'm not going to leave with matching knickers when knickers I don't have the same problem with. But sometimes I could go High Street. I'm wearing, so I've got because a bit like you I've got a very, very small back and not particularly...

Thank you for saying I've got a small back. Not particularly small front. I'm sort of there. I'm so aware that people we work with listen to this podcast. Oh, they don't. I think that's the good thing. I mean, Eve's here, but she checks out a lot of the time. I sometimes just don't want to cross too much for light.

Anyway, so like you, I do have to pay for a slightly more expensive bra. That's just a fact, isn't it? Yes. Yes. But I don't always buy the matching knickers, but they just have to match. So I buy a black bra. Oh, I see. And then I've got about six different black knickers.

Oh, I see. Well, actually, do you know what? That clears it all up for me. So it doesn't always have to be a set, but it just has to be colour-coordinated. Let's leave that email, which we have already read out. Who was it from? It was from... I don't want to demean somebody from Liverpool 23.

Thank you, Rachel. Yeah. And congratulations, honestly, on 36 years of marriage. That sounds to me. Yeah, I'm just going to look that up, actually. You found a very nice person and you've stuck with them. Well done. To you both.

Kate says, I have, like Jane, an Ellie Griffith's pile by the bed. Thank you, Kate. Just spat there. That was very unpleasant. It was a faulting, actually. I just got to acknowledge it. Terribly sorry. I've got an Ellie Griffiths pile by the bed.

I've also got the Claudia Hammond book Overwhelmed, which I bought after your interview with her. This evening, I'm going to finish off Lady Jane. That was another of your recommendations. Thank you for being my cultural anchors. I'd be lost without you. I'm so delighted that we are cultural anchors. And Kate, thank you. And it was lovely for me to check in with Ellie again yesterday.

Let's deal with a number of emails. Where's Jamal, people are asking? Jamal is Jane Mulcairons. Rest assured that Jane is still very much part of the. the off-air family, but she's also associate editor of the Times Magazine. She's very, very busy. She's actually in Mexico at the moment on holiday, but she's always flying all over the world, doing really important interviews for the Times Mag. But the good news for fans of Jane, and there are many, is that she has a new show on Times Radio, and it's a really good time, actually.

It's on Saturday afternoons between 1 o'clock and 4, and she's starting on the 21st of March. So make a date to join Jamal on the radio. Saturday, 21st of March, between 1 and 4, it is her first Times Radio regular gig, and it's richly deserved. It is, and you can hear her every Thursday on the live show as well, because she pops in to tell us what's in the Saturday magazine. Not today, because she's in Mexico.

Yeah, so that's ended up being more confusing than it was informative. Well, it was both. Okay, well, we tried very hard. We tried very hard. Can I just say as well hello to Wendy, who doesn't only have matching underwear, she has to have matching clothes pegs when hanging out the washing. She's a good woman.

She's a good woman, I can tell. Matching as well, they could all be wooden or their colour co-ordinated. Presumly they're colour co-ordinated. Although I don't like a plastic clip. I just don't, Jane. Darling, I know. I mean, I did actually put something on the line the other day, and it was such a liberation day that when the line is back in use,

but always, listeners, always get a cloth and give that line a wipe. Yes. Oh, my goodness. For your first use of the season. Oh, 100%. Very much so. Yeah. I mean, I think we've got Nancy Birk whistle joining us, haven't we quite soon.

Oh, good. On Tuesday of next week, so we'll have some more home care tips for you then. That would be lovely. That's just mine. We are also going to be discussing our Book Club book, probably in about two weeks' time, a town like Alice by Neville Schutt. It has stirred up quite a lot of conversations already, and I'm not surprised, actually.

There is plenty to talk about there. We probably won't have a guest, because Neville's no longer with us. Eve, come on in. Neville is no longer with us. We might be joined by Laura Hackett, who joined us for the last club. She's keeping us guessing, is she? Yes.

I'm actually in comms with the keepers of Neville's estate currently. Are you? So I'll let you know how that goes. Did he have children? Any offshoots? Oh, that's very good. But you only ever really laugh at your own chest. I know, I do, yeah.

Yeah, that's a good one. He did, he had two children. Shirley and Heather. Shirley Shoot. I'm after that. Shirley Shoot, what were they thinking? She actually went by Shirley Norway. I bet she did.

Where we had the Finland. Maybe he had her two certain names. Oh, okay. Anyway, by the by, I was also going to say we've literally done nothing up. She wanted to do the playlist. Oh yes. Oh, yes. Have you thought of a title?

Yeah, well, it's Coiled Spring. Coiled Spring. Yeah, because I'm... I really sensed yesterday when the sun was out in London. It was just a glorious spring day. And we fired up the weatherman as well. Our favourite weatherman was on. Jim Dale.

Jim Dale. Yes. And we talked about... And actually Jim was very... I mean, it really has excited me. He did say that because it's been such a wet winter, and it really has, that we are apparently going to have just a glorious explosion of colour.

Oh, I blumen hope so. And a wonderful spring when it comes. But do you know, all of the crocuses, should that be? Tocosai, whatever. Snowdrops and the Narcissai and the dafs. They're all up and about. I bet they are. And the blossoms out. Yeah, in London's parks. And I was surprised that they hadn't been dulled by so much rain that they were, you know, the ground wasn't kind of too waterlogged for them, but they're in fine form already. Oh, they're in great fettle. Yeah. Okay. So what is your track on Coiled Spring? You to me are everything by the real thing.

Okay. Oh, baby. Yeah, that one. Lovely. it. Okay, I'm going to have a bit of a think about that. I'm trying to ingest a lot of modern music at the moment, Jane, because, you know, when you get stuck in that algorithm, I'm just being sent so much stuff from the 70s, and it's too, it's overwhelming me. It's overwhelming me. I've just gone back, I'm listening on repeat to the best of China Crisis. China Crisis. I love China crisis. Well, China, okay, I couldn't, I don't think I could do more than six or seven China Crisis tracks. Really? King in a Catholic style. Yeah, that's nice. question. Wishful thinking.

Okay. That's some great ones. Yeah. Well, that's good. Yeah, thank you. That's good. But I might try and delve into something a little bit more. A bit more. 2026. Well, we look forward to your recommendations. A little bit of brisk this email from Pat.

For the person who has problems opening the bathroom door with greasy hands, do what I do, and pull your pajama sleeve down over your hand. Problem solved, Pat. Thank you, Pat. Yeah, or just wipe your hands. that's that hang on a sec because the 36th wedding anniversary is primarily known

as the bone china anniversary it signifies the elegance strength and durability of a long-lasting marriage I'd beg to differ actually I think that to me would say you're going to have to put it in a cabinet

or on a high shelf because at any time it might crack oh yes that's very clever I would say Teflon. The alternative theme is muslin. That's quite a leap, isn't it, from phone China, and we're celebrating our muslin anniversary.

Yeah, shout out to everyone who's in... What would you... I mean, would you... Muslin, as in the things that we used to cart about when we had babies. Yeah. What was the link? Well, I don't know, but, I mean,

the obvious place to go to is it's a bit of a strain. Oh, very God. I'm going to stop now. You really are on form. We're heading into the weekend, everybody. Don't worry. Three days off. Actually, no, we've got a bonus episode, haven't we, tomorrow? Yes. We'll tell you more about that in a minute. Right. This whole business of people, we had an email her in the week from a listener who was really very wary about going away because she had such an elderly cat.

And this has turned out to be quite the thing. There are lots of people who wrestle with this. Following your conversation on Tuesday's pod says Bridget. I thought I'd get in touch with a tip. for listeners who worry about elderly cats when they're away from home on holiday. Years ago, I met my lovely friend Bonnie while we were both serving in the Royal Navy. Her husband was a submariner at the time, and their family cat suddenly died while he was deployed at sea. Serving parents sometimes miss out on key milestones in family life while they're away on duty, but my thoughtful friend had a pragmatic solution.

Chisling a grave in their frozen back garden in Scotland to bury the cat was not top of her to-do list, what with keeping the children alive and working. So she wrapped the cat in a bin bag and popped it into the freezer. It stayed there for six months, nestled between the fish fingers and the frozen peas, until her husband came home and was given the task of digging a suitable grave. Our last cat lived until she was 20, and for the last five years of her life, I would wonder every time we went on holiday whether she'd be alive on our return. So each time we went away, I would clear a shelf in the freezer just in case. Bridget is a very organised individual.

Yeah, I just think I would really, really, really have scared the kids if I'd put Ponks in the freezer, I think. Although, I'm really, really sorry to inform you. Punks is still in the whole cupboard. Because we haven't, we haven't... What? We haven't buried as ashes. Oh, the ashes are in the cupboard. No, that's okay.

Yeah. That's okay. Is it okay, though? I'm just really thinking of bringing in the authority. there just for a second. But also if we're about to move house and we probably are, then I don't know, it's just

is it better that we'll be able to take him with us? Or should actually he have stayed in the eternal resting place of the place that he rested the most in? Oh, I think probably the place where he rested the most. So I should bury, I should do the ashes before we go. I

think so. Gosh, this is sensitive stuff. Isn't it? Yeah, I think so. Have you got email about Vincent. Well, of God, yes, I have. It's Liz, in brackets from Oxfordshire. And I'm just going to do the PS first. The PS is that Angela doesn't even like cats.

No, you need to know that. Hold that in your thoughts. In the year 2000, we went on a family holiday abroad at Christmas time. On Christmas Eve, I took the cat into the cattery. They was so busy there was a new person helping out. I wasn't expecting to be asked for a local contact whilst we're away. The only number I could remember offhand was my good friend and neighbour, Angela's. I didn't think to tell her this.

About a week after we left, she got a phone call telling her they were very sorry, but Vincent had died. They didn't say they were the cattery and she couldn't remember who Vincent was. Can I just say that? That's a basic in the staff training down at the cattery. If you are going to ring up with a message like that, for pity's sake, say where you're ringing from. Identify that this is a feline. After a very confusing conversation, she realised it was our cat and not some forgotten uncle. She was asked to collect Vincent so she drove to Henley

and imagine if you hadn't established by that time that it was a cat. And they had to cough the Fiat for the few days he'd managed to live and was then handed his body in a cardboard box I should say at this point he was a very large ginger tomcat. When she got back she managed to contact us

and told us of Vincent's demise and then asked what she should do with the body. We decided in the end that the best thing to do was to bury him at the bottom of our garden. Angela had a full-time job and a family so the only time she could do it was at night. It was January. The ground was frozen,

and she needed to dig a very big hole by torchlight to accommodate the enormous cat. Angela is a really good friend. Angela is, and Liz does recognise this by ending her email. I've tried my best over the following 25 years, but I don't think I've ever been able to offer a favour that matched this act of friendship. P.S. Angela doesn't even like cats.

That is just, that is so above and beyond, isn't it? What a fantastic, fantastic friend. And what a macabre thing to be doing as well in the bottom of the garden on a frozen January night by torchlight, digging a huge, great big hole for a great big fat, Tom. Yeah, I mean, fervently hoping, presumably that there's no neighbour abroad. No one's suddenly going for a late night, tinkle, winkle, and looks out the window to see you digging a huge,

hole because you would have suspicions, wouldn't you? I would phone somebody. Well, if you saw a neighbour digging a huge hole... If I saw a neighbour at night with a torch, digging a hole, I mean, you know, that's the start of nearly every episode of Silent Witness. I was listening, there was something on the radio today about people increasingly dobbing in their neighbours if they think they don't have a TV licence. I do think, ooh, that seems...

It's an idea. Yeah, you're right. I'm not doing much tonight. I might just go up and down the street. Well also, isn't there an HMRC anonymous tip-off tax line that you can call? Is there? Yeah, if you think people aren't paying their taxes properly, which, you know, does... Yeah, people, we should say, you need to pay you tax.

Does it? Yes, yeah. I don't know whether it's still in existence. Shall we go down under? Why not? And bring in Marianne. Marianne. The conversation about elderly pets keeping their owners housebound,

my spoodle, Mimi, will be 15 in June, Look at Mimi. Isn't she lovely? Mimi is gorgeous. She is a really adorable dog. She's grey. Perhaps she's just, did she start off brown? She's gone grey? What do you think?

No, she would have been that colour, I think, all the way through. She does appear to be trapped in a warm and loving embrace with a cuddly toy there. She's making love to a cuddly toy in the image that you've sent us, Mary Ann. But thank you anyway. She's going to be 15 in June, if she makes it. And she's my dearly loved, constant companion. She joined the household when the last of our three children left her.

here in Geelong, is it Geelong or Geelong, to study in Melbourne? Geelong. I'm looking to my Aussie correspondent. I don't know. I think you might do an accent. From Slough. Oh, I can give you an accent, Geelong. Yeah.

Whilst I've never been totally enamoured with travel, I do need to see my son and his family who've lived in New York for the last decade. This May, we plan to meet with them in Greece, as we're not keen on going to the US at the moment for obvious reasons. My problem is that Mimi is gradually failing in health, but is not at end stage just yet. It's a big ask to leave her with anyone as she does require regular meds

and her skin issues need treatment. It's not always pleasant. Now, I'm a retired Royal Navy midwife, I think that's what you're saying, and this doesn't bother me. What do we do? Vets have said it's quite acceptable for me to decide on euthanasia

before I go away, but I just can't bring myself to make that decision. Now, that is a tough one. She still runs on the beach, She does Zumi's when she's excited, and she loves her food and walks. I'd much rather stay home. Last year I had the excuse to stay at home because my daughter was expecting her second baby, and she wanted my support.

So my airfare was cancelled at some expense. I know I can't really do that again. You'd think that at 71 I'd be able to suck it up and be braver. I don't know. Mary Ann, this is a really hard decision to make. And I appreciate you've already cancelled one trip for entirely the just. legitimate reasons and I hope the baby's doing well. But, oh, golly,

I don't know whether I could take a pet to be put down because I need to go on a trip when the pet itself, although elderly, is still taking joy in life. It's a really tough decision. I wouldn't be able to do that. No. It would, I think you have to imagine

how you then feel maybe halfway through that really, really long flight to New Zealand, because you would grieve your beautiful, lovely, much-love pet and I'm not sure that the guilt that you're going to feel about it is going to, I think that might last a very long time. On the other hand, Mimi has given you great joy. She's nearly 15.

If you knew you could be with her in her last very peaceful moments rather than perhaps her dying when you're not around and not being with you. I don't know. I'm just putting the case for... No, I don't know either. I mean, I know that my holiday decisions at the moment are rather shaped by Nancy, who's definitely in the twilight years,

and I'm quite deliberately only booking holidays for I know that she can come with me. Or only go away for three or four days, just because I know that I think she's... I'm just going to be honest about it. She's probably got another year. with us. She's 13, which is very old for a greyhound. But I really, I do think a lot about exactly the point that Marianne has made about those final moments with your pet. You do want it to be

you, but I wonder whether the pet actually really minds if it's you. Well, we can throw it open to other people and see what they, but I absolutely agree that we're in no way underestimating what you're thinking about there, Marianne, and you shouldn't underestimate it either. No, not at all. Just because you've been a medical professional, you know. We were talking about tube drivers and train drivers generally who sometimes just go the extra, I'm going to say mile.

Kilometer, Jane. Sorry, I offer a kind of special verve with their announcements. I mean, sometimes they don't say anything at all. Often they don't. But I've definitely over the years quite enjoyed the contributions of tube drivers in particular. Sonia says several years ago, a northern rail train driver made a mid-afternoon week-teenth-day. journey from Lancaster to Barrow and Furnace much more bearable with the following announcement.

Ladies and gentlemen, we're now approaching Alveston, at which station approximately 300 overexcited, over-caffeinated and sugar-immursed schoolchildren are due to board this train. There is absolutely nothing I can do about this. The only glimmer of light is that the majority of them will leave the train at Ruse. Thank you, Sonia, for telling us about that. That would cheer every single person on the train up, wouldn't it? Yeah. A very, very, sensible, funny. Sardonic.

Yes, all of that. Now, I'd never come across this suggestion from Practa, and I'm amazed that nobody else has mentioned this. Practure would like to draw our attention to a program currently on Channel 5. It's called Curfew. Have you heard of it? Well, I've only heard about it, but thanks to that email. Yeah.

Yeah. I promise you, says Practor on email, that this is better than the Anasol drama, wouldn't take much, I know. This is about a dystopian society where men are electronically tagged and made to stay indoors between 7pm and 7am. It's worth a watch, particularly in our current climate, and I'd love to hear your views. I've emailed several times, but have never been read, I write in hope. And Pratcher has been to several of our live shows. Don't feel that that prohibits another visit. There are no rules. We'll see you at the next one. This is in association with the

times. It is and we're travelling all the way around the country. Rest assured you'll find out about it. Very much so. You like it or not. Perhaps we hope to see there. I hadn't heard anything about that at all. Sometimes I think people are still really, really snobby about Channel 5 and the reviewers and people like that, the highfalutans, they don't review stuff that's on Channel 5 and really, really good stuff sometimes just goes by the by.

Yeah, I mean, they do specialise in those royal things on a Saturday night. They certainly do. the Duchess of Gloucester's handbags. Yep, very much so. I mean, they do go on for, I mean, I don't know how they fill those shows. We did try and stagger our way through royal lip readers. I think you're saying royal lip gloss. Nope, it was lip readers where they got together some of the finest lip readers in the country.

And they had made basically a... Thank you. Very good. She has been funnish today. It's her birthday tomorrow, everybody. It has been fun. God almighty. Are you doing anything special?

We are going for a curry in our favourite curry house in White Chapel. What will it be? Prong Boona. So I will have a prawn boon. Yes. And it's a place called Tyabbs. If you're in London

and you're at a loose end and you want to go somewhere that you will never forget go to Tyabs. It is a huge curry hall in White Chapel. You're in and out within about half an hour. I like it.

You want to linger. It is not... Making small talk. When you can't make small... You cannot hear a single thing because the dining room is vast but it's superb curry. I used to take the kids when they were tiny because you could just

it was a glorious place where you could make as much mess as you want to. We go back to Jan Lehman. Come in Jan Leaming, come to Ty Abbs and it's just a wonderful night out. We all love it so we're off there. Have a lovely time. Thank you very much. I just wanted to mention this because I have never heard this or seen this

reported before and I just thought it was worth just dobing in to our conversational mix. Because we do sometimes talk about porn. And this is from the Suns Sport pages yesterday. I don't think I've seen it anywhere else and I do always have a look at the sports pages. It's about the whole K.R. Rugby League Super League star Joe Burgess. And he has cut porn from his life and says it's brought him huge benefits. Now I confess I've never heard of this chap. He's 31 and I'm just going to read what the son has said about him in the past, like many other red-blooded males.

He would have stared at a screen watching triple-X-rated films late at night. But ditching them two years ago means he has a new energy and as four trophies in a year has proved, more success. Burgess says, I remember getting introduced to porn when I was about eight. I mean, that's the reality though, isn't it? Yeah, it is. all the older lads just plastered it all over their computers I found it hilarious at the time

but young men going through puberty have got such easy access to free porn and I think it's so toxic for the mind it's poison but it's just not spoken about enough if anyone feels like they have a problem with it stop for a month or two and tell me it hasn't made a difference it's definitely made a difference in my life

it's given me more energy Burgess's confession has attracted many sniggers, especially online. Well, I suggest to the sniggers that they have a little think about what Joe said. Well, good for him. I completely agree, it's really nice to see somebody having a conversation out in the open.

If you look at the statistics of how much porn is being used, so let's just take your average office, maybe there are 50 people in there, let's hope it's 25 men and 25 women. If you were to then transpose onto that, workforce, the number of people who are watching porn and X-rated double X-X and triple-X rated porn, it probably be about 90% of them. I think you're right.

And nobody talks about it. No, but I really take my hat off to this bloke, Joe. I have never heard a male sports star ever talk about it. Good for him. So, yeah. Yeah. Can I just drop into the mix something that I learned yesterday, Jane, because I was at this very interesting day run by the Sahari-Stuart Trust

and they fund all of these projects. They're a family philanthropic trust, small projects that maybe would not struggle to get funding elsewhere, but would find it difficult to access funding in the charitable sector, the third sector, because they're very small projects. And yesterday's event was all about projects dedicated to reducing the re-offending rates from our jails and the resettlement of offenders. one of the striking things, and hopefully we'll get some guests on the podcast who were there yesterday,

but one of the most striking projects enabled us to have a conversation about the largest growth area of detention, which is picosos, a term I hadn't heard before. Standing four. Standing four prisoners convicted of sexual offences. and that is the largest growing part of the prison population and it is predominantly young men and it can be absolutely everything from having watched the wrong thing online

deliberately or unintentionally so you have not realised how maybe how young the people are involved in the pornography that you've watched and it can go all the way through to very serious sexual assault but they are all bounded in this one term and they are predominantly young men. And I don't think we're talking about that enough at all because in terms of the resettlement of those offenders,

if there is an element of having been foolish or naive involved in that crime, you do your time, you come out the other side, you're on the sexual offenders register for the rest of your life. Finding a job becomes incredibly difficult. Settling back into a community becomes incredibly difficult. where's that conversation? Well, I mean, well, it doesn't happen. I suppose that's why I was so intrigued by that story about

because we just, Helen Rombolo has written another brilliant piece in The Times. It's on the Times.com. Do read it if you get the chance. Just about, she's linking Giselle Pelico, Epstein and Porn. And just saying, you know, look, let's, I mean, but we've said this before about Helen. She's done some wonderful stuff. But why is it Helen writing about the male addiction?

to porn. Helen's not a man. We do need more men speaking out about this and about the dangers. And as you say, lives are blighted. Yes, we know that horrifically the lives of the victims of child abuse, of course they're, but so are the lives of those young men you talk about. I mean, you cannot get work. It's hard enough if you're not. You haven't had these sorts of difficulties, but if you have, you are forever tarnished. And also, I just think it's so unhelpful not to be talking about it. Surely, in having an open discussion, you just give more young men and women the ability to know when they're in a situation

where they're at risk or when they've put themselves in a situation where there might be consequences for them. So, you know, that's vulnerable young girls not being able to identify when they're being groomed, when something inappropriate is being said to them, you know, what consent actually is.

But also for a young man, it's witnessing exactly the, the same thing. And if you've never had a conversation about whether or not what you view online is illegal or illegal, I mean, are you meant to be able to tell, you know, when you're 19 years old? I just think we... Or when you're 10? Yes, we just need to... Yeah, God. We need to flush it out an awful lot more, don't we? Well, do let us know what you think about all this. And dead pets as well. And pets and freezers. Keep it coming. A few parents have done more to try and make the world of tech safer for our children than Ian Russell, and he's done it from the saddest of places,

because his daughter, Molly, took her own life when she was just 14, after viewing content that encouraged her self-harm and took her down a path of no return. Now, in his film, Molly versus the Machines, which you can see on Channel 4, he turns the tables on the technology, and the film asks AI, and of course that's tech built by the algorithms and imagery and scraping the content. all of that contributed to his daughter's death, he asks that AI to explain Molly's life to us. It is chilling and it is massively powerful. Ian, it's lovely to see you in the studio.

Thank you very much indeed for coming in. Good to see you. We talk about this a lot on the programme. Both Jane and I have young adults and children ourselves. I have never seen anything as powerful as the opening to your film though. So I would love you in your own words to explain exactly what I've tried to about what the AI is doing here. That's extraordinary to hear,

because when you work on a project, you get so close to it, you don't quite know how effective it might be anymore. The film begins with that asking an AI computer to speak in the voice of Silicon Valley. and it's something that the director Mark Silver struggle with people like me can be interviewed and we can speak on screen but how do you represent this invisible other force which is not just affecting children like Molly

but affecting all of us in our everyday life and all of our nations as well how do you how do you represent something that is intangible and invisible and completely different from anything we've really come across before. And we thought of, we had long discussions. It's Mark's film, but we had long discussions talking about, should we have a famous voice, do the voice over? Who should that famous voice be? And Mark was, someone suggested, have you seen this clip? And I think it was something

like AI explaining something from the point of view of the devil or something. So he started to play around with an AI engine. And it wasn't long before he put in from the point of view of Silicon Valley tell me the story of Molly Russell and her death and the alarming thing was these AIs came up with bits of script

that I don't think any of us would have dared right by ourselves because we would have thought it would have been too strong, too much hyperbole, not believable but the AI itself didn't have any of those bashfulnesses if that's a word

and wrote these extraordinarily chilling, haunting, sinister. It's almost mechanical, isn't it, that opening? That opening to the film, which basically sets the scene for the next 80 minutes of the film. And what's so chilling in is that you feel that the AI knows your daughter. We know that the AI never knew your daughter. But also it is trying to be human in its response, but it's not human and it doesn't say what any real-life person would say when asked a question about Molly and knowing that you're in the room which is I'm so sorry about what happened to your child.

It can't do that because it's not our friend. No. I think we're at a crossroads here. We're at a crossroads where the technologies like social media that are coroner can, contributed in a more than minimal way to Molly's death, are still there. And Molly died now more than eight years ago, and we haven't learned enough lessons. Molly Rose Foundation, the charity we set up in her name, has done research that shows the sort of content that we know Molly saw in the last six months of her life and contributed

to her death. is still available online. It's almost as easy to get to. One extra click it might be to get to. And worse than the fact that it's available on social media platforms, it's still being algorithmically recommended to use us. If you dip your toe for whatever reason, if you hover and just pause on a nihilistic, bleak, black and white post

that might mention self-harm or suicide, you're likely to get more of that. And the more you look at them, the more you're going to get. That mechanism that contributed to Molly's death is still alive and well, if I can put it that way, on social media. And yet we've got these new technologies, these new things like AI that aren't coming down the tracks. They're well and truly here with us. And we should have learned lessons about social media and applied it to social media. We haven't even done that yet.

We need to be ahead of the game. And we haven't learned those lessons. and we're not applying enough foresight to what's coming towards us. Another thing that we see in the film is a recreation, I mean, almost in real time of the evidence that was presented at Molly's Inquest, and that is using real actors to really bring all of that detail to the fore. And I was flabbergasted by exactly what you've just said, how much you knew at the time that actually that could have also been, you know,

God forbid, an inquest that was held last month. You know, we have not travelled very far in that time at all, but you've been knocking on all the right doors, you've been asking all of the right questions. What is that obstinacy about? Is it money? I think the glittering new world that technologies seem to promise was just accepted without question.

It's exciting. It's new. And there's always something fresh and almost shocking about new things. And also, of course, there are huge financial prizes that come with it because some of the biggest and most profitable companies on the planet are tech companies. So probably each of us as individuals and most nations on the planet were hoodwinked. And we only saw the good side that tech does. And tech, we should also remember.

But tech does good. We live in a technical world. That isn't going to change. And it brings with it huge amounts of benefits. And we just saw that. And we didn't stop to think about anything that might come with those benefits that wasn't so good. We didn't stop to think how people might misuse the platforms and how algorithms that were written to promote engagement so that a platform made more money and increased its profits could be very harmful to the people that were using it. But surely the truth in is that if you took away all of that very sinister content and websites that are devoted to how to get anorexia, how to self-harm, all of that kind of stuff, they can't possibly be making as much money as a website selling fantastic skinny tops and nice trousers.

Why would one thing be profitable against another? It seems really counterintuitive, I think. And it's taken me so long to sort of get to grips with this. And I think if you strip it back to how the platform's algorithms are designed, they're designed by people to do a job for meta, if you're talking about Instagram and other platforms, of course, as well. But they're designed to keep people on that platform because that's how they make money. Because when someone's on the platform, you can be receiving. Adverts from that platform.

Those adverts make the platform money. When you're on a platform, your data is being mined, and the profiling that goes on of you as an individual by that platform is also used to make money because they can target adverts and sell adverts for a greater fee if they're selling targeted adverts to someone. Okay. You also feature some of Molly's friends in the film. you are just, gosh, how lovely they all are.

They're the best thing in it. Oh my goodness, they are amazing. And obviously they've got a clarity of vision, haven't they? And they say such interesting things. One of them says, we didn't realize, but we were just living in a world that was completely about competition. And that's what the Internet had created. And also they talk about the fact that they just weren't ever free.

And that is a truth for all of us now, isn't it? It is. but I think the world is waking up and if the best thing about Molly's friends is that that wonderful connection they had to her which is so obvious when you see them speaking and the warmth and love that they still have for Molly and the fact that they're the closest thing

that we've got to being able to speak to Molly if she was in her early 20s now and you can see see how they really do quite understand this world in a way that perhaps people of my generation and parents who didn't grow up with digital technology don't. And I think it's, it might be quite daunting, but it's not as frightening or hard as it might seem to begin to become aware of how the digital world is. I use the phrase mugging us off.

If I go into schools and do a talk, I only need to say this whole thing about a platform needing you to be on their product in order to make money. Why are the little red notification circles on your smartphone? Why are they red? I'm told that's because a psychologist many years ago said it's ever so slightly harder to ignore something that's red. If it was a little green circle, you might come back to it later. You want to get rid of that red circle, so you go into the platform. When you're in the platform, why is there, is it? Infinite scroll because you're there longer.

Why are there autoplay videos? Because you're there longer. And if you point that out to 11 and 13 year olds in classrooms today, they get it instantly. And if you use the phrase, be aware when you're online about when a platform might be mugging you off. You can see their eyes lighting up and you can see, I've had kids come up to me and say, look, they show me their phone and I go,

what? I've deleted Instagram. I've deleted TikTok because they completely understand it. So the steps that you need to take and the awareness that all of us need to have to be safer in this world when we're using digital technology aren't as huge or daunting as I think we might fear they could be. Are we helped by our government in particular at the moment? We've had the Online Safety Act. When you talk to government and I hope that government listens, are you impressed or not impressed? The Online Safety Act took too long to come to pass

it was five years going through Parliament or maybe even longer Offcom were given a time limit of 18 months to implement the Act as a regulator, independent regulator empowered by the Act we're beyond that now and things are still being sorted

and looked at and codes of practice are being tweaked so it's just taken too long and I think that's a measure of the dusty old relic of a world in which we live. And it's causing, I think, many problems for society. We live in a world that has done pretty well up until now, moving quite slowly, because if you move slowly, you can go cautiously and you change things carefully.

If you move too fast, you can cause problems. You can't do that when you're talking about problems created by technology because the technology moves at lightning pace. And we've given social media a two-decade headstart in a race that they're moving faster in. So we have to move at lightning speed. So when it comes to governments, they've tried, but they have not moved fast enough. And the disappointing things, if I talk to there's so many other bereaved parents. It's sadly a growing number.

But when we get together, we talk. The most disappointed thing, the hardest thing for any of us to bear is inaction. Because we know that inaction is letting us get further behind in that race. And what does inaction look like? I mean, is that Liz Kendall not returning your calls? Is that not being heard? What is it? I think we're on a pivot point because inaction has looked like many things.

It's looked like secretaries of staff. kicking the can of the Online Safety Act when it was a bill going through Parliament down the road and insisting on pre-legislative scrutiny, which was a time-consuming process. It probably led to a better act, to be fair, but it took time. And there was this, I can't remember the number of Secretary of State, eight secretaries of state, eight secretaries of state, five Prime Ministers, something like that. I can't remember the figures. There's so many that it took to get the Act.

And then when the current government came to power, there were really promising signs. together with other bereaved families we were in the office of Peter Kyle who was the DC Secretary of State at the time he said he took this matter very seriously and he'd do something about it 18 months or more went by and

next to nothing was done that caused all sorts of problems but now there seems to be a change of attitude and there seems to be some tough talking and an acceptance that where we are the status quo is not acceptable that it's causing too many problems,

it's spreading too much misery, there's too many parents who are rightly concerned about their children, and something has to change, and that change has to come at lightning speed in governmental terms. Right. There has been an interesting story today

from Instagram, which is saying that for the first time, Meta, which is the parent company, will proactively alert parents to searches by their child on Instagram for harmful material as long as parents and teens have enrolled in the teen accounts experience in this country, America, Australia and Canada. So, I mean, that for people who don't know is where on your teenager's account, you have some kind of access.

Your teenager has said, I am under 18 and this is the ultimate parental control. So you have to have had that kind of initial bond. But that's a move in the right direction, isn't it? Well, first of you, I think if I was a parent, unaware of a mental health problem with my child, unaware that they may be self-harming or even thinking about suicide, of course I'd want to know. I'd want to know so that I could do something about it. So I think that goes without saying. But if you look behind this headline, I think it's entirely a PR move.

This is based on experience. every time there's tough and difficult news that comes out. When we first told Molly's story, there was a whole load of changes that Adam Messeri, the head of Instagram, announced that they would no longer allow graphic self-harm content, for example.

Not quite sure why they were allowing it in the first place, but at least that was a change in 2018 when Molly's story was first told. But every time there's a tough bit of comms to negotiate from a PR point of view, they so often announce a new safety measure. And then with the benefit of time and hindsight, you can look back and see that the safety measures don't do what Metta say.

If you take teen accounts alone, they, I think they claim, if I remember the numbers rightly, there are 53 different tools on Instagram's teen accounts. Molly Rose Foundation, together with a Facebook whistleblower, who knows the inside workings of both Meta and Instagram. Artura Beha, together with an American organisation called Fairplay who looks into these things and others. So there was a group of us all looked in to the teen accounts. We could analyse 47 of those 53 accounts.

And in our opinion, meta would disagree with this, but in our opinion, only eight performed as meta described. So they brag about over 50 tools to keep kids safe. we don't think they deliver on that. And that's dangerous because that can create a false sense of safety. If parents switch off and think, oh look, it's fine. I've switched on the teen accounts. They'll be safe now and they're not working. It's worse than not having them sometimes.

You are absolutely right. And also the thing that you said just a couple of moments ago, Ian, is absolutely spot on. Why is that stuff there in the first place? And you've got to think about the people who create these sites, who create that content. You know, these aren't faceless machines. there are people involved at every level in this. We've only got a couple of moments left in, and I mean, I hope this isn't too painful of me to ask you to do this,

but can we just talk a tiny bit about Molly? Because what absolutely shines through in your film is just what a gorgeous, gorgeous creature she was. And as you said, she was absolutely adored by her wonderful friends. And she deserves to be here in this room with us, actually, doesn't she? I know she would always be with you. but just tell us a bit more about her. Well, I would say as her dad, but she was, I've got, I still say got,

I've got three lovely daughters. Molly was the youngest. And she was the most amazing of persons. She was sort of emotionally intelligent, bright, but not sort of super brilliant at school. And the most impressive thing about her was, she was never quite like being the centre of attention. But if she felt something wasn't right, if I was perhaps picking on one of her sisters, at the dinner table or something.

I could remember her eyes flicking between us at the dinner table and she'd be weighing up what was going on. And she'd gather the information, she'd make up her mind and if she thought I'd cross the line, she'd shout out and put her hand up and shout, stop it, Dad. And she would stand up for anything that she felt was unjust or unfair.

One of the most caring. She was only 14 when she died, but she was one of the most caring people I've ever known. And I think that does come out. Through Molly's friends, I think that does come out in the film. And I urge anyone to see it. I should say it's in cinemas.

It premieres this weekend on Sunday the 1st of March. And it's on Channel 4 not tonight, in fact. It's on Channel 4, a different Thursday, next Thursday, the 5th. Right, my apologies. It's a real pleasure to meet you. Thank you very much indeed for coming in. I do think it's a really, really remarkable film. And I would urge everybody to watch it.

Really lovely to meet you. You're an amazing person in for doing what you do. and it's appreciated by many, many of us. Thank you. So it's Channel 4 next Thursday. Next Thursday, Vith, yeah. Got you. Thank you very much, Ian.

Ian Russell. How he keeps going, I just don't know, Jane. The fact that he does, I think, has informed us all about a world that we have been really naive about. And it is brutally clever to ask the same technology to explain itself. and it's part in the death of a young child. Because that's what makes you realize how autonomous it is, how it believes that it can do what it wants, it can say what it wants. You know, there's no suggestion at the beginning of that film.

And they show you on the screen, as Ian said, exactly what the prompt has been to the large language learning model. And the AI model doesn't come back and say, oh my God, I'm so sorry what happened to Molly. It doesn't, it just goes, Molly Russell. You just think, oh my God, of course it's not human to you, because you're not human. No.

There was a desperate conversation on the Times Radio Breakfast Show this morning about what our colleague, the breakfast show presenter, co-presenter, Stagable called the warm puddle of futility, which is about AI and defence systems and how in tabletop exercises is AI will choose the nuclear option, literally. Well, it is what everybody's warning us about.

I know, I know. As far as I can make out, there isn't a person who's left a great big tech company and said, everything's great. Yeah, they've gone and they've left. Anyway, we have got a Colin, if you're worried about us marking. And I'm going to have the face. And lots of people on our desk are giving up charge.

chocolate for Lent, which is much more for me in particular. Although I won't have the face. You know it's my birth. No, it's always my birthday. I used to particularly dislike my sister's birthday, and I don't like yours much either. Well, Alison and I are going to form a loving group of two further down the line, and we're going to rub some kind of salve into the wounds created by quite vindictive older sister attitude there, Jane. Chrysidocrine.

Goodbye. Bye. Congratulations. You've staggered somehow to the end of another Offair with Jane and Fee. Thank you. If you'd like to hear us do this live, and we do do it live, every day, Monday to Thursday, 2 till 4 on Times Radio. The Jeopardy is off the scale. And if you listen to this, you'll understand exactly why that's the case. So you can get the radio online, on DAB, or on the free Times Radio app. Offair is produced by Eve Saul's. and the executive producer is Rosie Cutler.