Off Air... with Jane and Fi - More than a handful is a waste (with Minette Batters)

Episode Date: June 9, 2026

There's a new theme song in today's pod – we're not entirely sure it'll catch on, but we hope you enjoy it... After that, Jane and Fi cover deck chair trouble, the annoying nature of voice notes, the power of beetroot, and why Fi thinks her cat has joined the manosphere.Plus, they speak to former National Farmers Union president Minette Batters about her provocative political memoir 'Harvest'.You can buy tickets for Fringe by the Sea: https://www.fringebythesea.com/off-air-with-jane-fi-and-special-guest-jan-ravens/Our next book club pick will be a collection of short stories! 'Interpreter of Maladies' is by Jhumpa Lahiri. You can check out our YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/@OffAirWithJaneAndFOur new playlist 'Coiled Spring' is up and running: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4tmoCpbp42ae7R1UY8ofzaOur most asked about book is called 'The Later Years' by Peter Thornton.If 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 Producer: Eve SalusburyExecutive Producer: Rosie Cutler Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Right, welcome to off-air with Jane Fee. We had our mysterious Monday off, but it's Tuesday now, and we're back at work. And we have a real treat to start with. We certainly do. Talking about what turned out to be an AI-generated estate agent song that had been written to accompany a house for sale, I think it was on Trinity Road in Oxford. To be precise.

To be precise. If memory serves me correctly. And incoming from one of our very attentive listeners, Imogen. Would you like to explain what Imogen's found or done? Well, what she's done is she has made contact with AI. I should say she's not had the easiest time lately, so let's just honour that Imogen.

You carried me through becoming a 45-year-old granny in the height of lockdown. I mean, that's not a bad thing. And I always felt that you were talking directly to my experience. I found the pod again recently, and again, it immediately resonated. I'm now a 51-year-old granny and mother of five young.

adults, but I've also been through breast cancer and I'm now living with the same amount of estrogen as a 100-year-old woman. This is her own assessment, I should say. As someone who used to work with the elderly as a nurse on the wards, I'm all too familiar with what an old lady's body looks like, and I think it's quite disheartening to see one's own looking the same. I was trying to think of a word that does it justice, but all I could come up with was withered. Right, I think you're probably being incredibly hard on yourself, Imogen, and we're all aging, and I don't expect to look the same at a hundred, if I'm blessed. But I think it's such a good point to make, because if you can't take HRT, if you can't replace your estrogen, and most women who've had

breast cancer can't use HRT, then you do change. I mean, it just must be so frustrating to hear the, I mean, it can feel like a pretty all-incoling. encompassing universal conversation about HRT. It's got coffinous. Yeah. It really is. And we do end up with plumpers skin and all of that kind of stuff if we're on it, don't we? Well, she goes on to say, I don't think people talk enough about the impact of endocrine treatment.

Perhaps you have, and I've just missed it. I don't think we have. Not enough. No, probably certainly not enough. Anyway, that's not why she's writing, but we just wanted to acknowledge that we have read that image and we understand the things have not been the easiest for you. I'm in the process of trying to sell my house, so my ears pricked up. when you mentioned the estate agency who had a song to go with the house. Ridiculous, obviously.

However, the idea that this has taken someone a lot of time is where you're incorrect. AI will have done it. To prove my point, I asked AI to do what fee? Well, Imogen has asked AI to come up with a jingle for the pod, and it came up with the below in about 20 seconds. Here is a bit of it. Come on, Dave Double Decks, get going. Put the kettle on the boil, let the laundry sit.

The dog can wait to go outside. The teenager threw a fit. But shut the kitchen door, my friends, and find a comfy seat. Because Jane and Fee are on the mic and giving us. A treat. That was really awful. And I just in all conscience don't think we should do anymore.

No. But the verse is a terrible image in, aren't they? It goes out. This is the chorus. Oh, it's off air with Jane and Fee, a little slice of sanity for women just like me, from menopause to microwaves and nonsense in the news. They're setting right the modern world

with highly sensible views. They're tackling the big debates like what to have for tea and wondering why the thermostat is such a mystery. Do you know, what's awful about this is that, Some of it is spot on. Yeah, it's totally scraped us. With brilliant guests and petty gripes and stories of the week, it's exactly the kind of clever, cynical comfort that we seek.

And I'm with you, Imogen, it's the fact it comes back in about 20 seconds that is so spooky. Because there isn't a data centre that's just got all of this stuff stacked up like a library. It's actually generating it on the spot in the moment. I just, Imogen, thank you for this, but it just makes me feel so tired and world-weigh. I just want to go back to a world of, I think I'd like to be in a, I don't know, a 16th century nunnery weaving when I come up against stuff like this. Do you see, do you understand what I mean? But I also do, attending my herb garden.

But I do really believe that if we don't use it, we can't change it. Oh, yeah, that's probably true. And I think those of us of the generation, which was born in the analogue world and then had to adapt to the digital world and have constantly felt the backwash of that, isn't that the lesson that we have to learn this time around? We've got to just stay with it. We've got to be in it.

To win it. Which reminds me, I have entered the World Cup sweep. At work? At work. I have, yes. We haven't had our teams allocated. No, we haven't had the teams because we've got to get to 48 people. People.

Oh, yes, and we haven't got 48 yet. Come on, everybody. Because if you win, you'd, It's winner takes it all, isn't it? 144 pounds. Not to be sniffed at. No, not to be sniffed at all. I think if you or I did win it,

then we are going to have to put it into the kitty. Nonsense. Okay. Don't invent the rules. No, we do have to. You can't have presenter. What for the Christmas dinner? Takes everything.

Okay. Well, let's see. No, we definitely can't do that. Just on the AI thing, though, I was using one of the AI thing, Mejiggy Wattsits, to just try and work out some money regarding a house sale, so stamp duty fees and all of that kind of stuff.

And I did mention the fact that my sale, and I don't mind saying this because it's... Have you sold your house? No, no, I haven't yet. But I am selling because it's an agreement as part of my divorce settlement. And we always agreed that we would sell the big family house once the kids are up and running. And I told Chat GPT this, and that is the one that I'm using. I know that for some people that's controversial. To be honest, I don't think there's an uncontroversial.

so that's just where I was over the weekend. And it came back with the most frighteningly human response to that particular added emotional detail. And at one point, it said, may I congratulate you on your financial independence at the age of 57, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. I'm not entirely independent. I've got quite a big mortgage.

That's what I was talking to chat to you about. But I just thought, wow. Because apart from anything else, it made me feel chuffed in the moment. And then I just thought, hang on a second, love. This is a machine making up a response, but it's elicited in me the same emotion

that a friend saying, you know, you've done all right. It's kind of, you know, it's worked out okay, thanks to your hard work. It was so bizarre, Jane. It was so, so bizarre. It really caught me off guard that one. Well, we're going to have to get used to this,

aren't we, I'm afraid? and we're going to jodder from this point to the point in our lives when robot carers are doing our personal care for us so that's the way we're going we all know that really it is the way that we're going and I still just can't work out Jane

whether or not I would still be so angry about the advance of technology that I would say no to a kind empathetic, funny and quite lovable robot carer if that was the only thing that was available to me, I think I'd be welcoming it with open arms, sadly. I'm just being honest there.

Yeah, I think I probably would as well. Actually, you've just reminded me of an email from Amanda. She was listening to us talking about the Captain and Teneal. It was the Captain and Teneal, wasn't it? It was. And they were the sort of showbiz couple, a duo, had quite a number of huge hits. And we discovered, whilst we were Googling them during the course of our conversation, and not uncommon experience on this podcast,

that they had actually, love didn't keep them together, as it turned out. It broke them up. But then they got back together when one of them was ill. I think it was the captain. And Teneal went back to look after him. To look after him. And Amanda says, I have done this.

It was to protect our children, but it was bloody bizarre to be giving personal care to someone who I hadn't actually been intimate with for years. I do wonder if there are men who've done the same and gone back to care for an ex. Well, I mean, I suspect it's less common, but we don't know that it never happens, and I'm sure there are plenty of great examples out there of men have done exactly that. People did tell me, she says, that I was amazing.

I really wasn't, she says, and I questioned whether it was out of guilt as I was the one who'd left the marriage, but whatever the reason, I'm glad I was able to, for our children and for him. We had better conversations in the last few weeks than we'd had for a long, long time, and I do know that he truly appreciated me being there, as did the kids. I knew when I moved back in, it would only be for weeks, not months, and I expect that help my decision. So, Amanda, you've been incredibly honest there about exactly what happened. And I appreciate that you knew when you did agree to do it, that it wouldn't be for a huge amount of time.

Still, though, it's quite the commitment. And I think you probably need to know that people are going to admire that gesture. Well, it's more than a gesture, isn't it? It's a hell of a thing to do. And I wonder whether actually it created quite a lovely cadence. Yeah. You know, whether there are more people who would be willing to do it than you might otherwise think, actually.

Yeah, that's true. Because at least you are with somebody who you have once had a level of intimacy with. Yes, yeah, exactly. So probably, well, it's both easier and harder, right? I find this such a complicated area. But hats off to you, Amanda, for being incredibly honest about what motivated you and also acknowledging that you were the one who left the marriage in the first place.

Shall we just talk about happier things? And that's not to dismiss what you've said there, Amanda, but Eve did go to Greece. And she did, but you ended up not in the place you expected to be, which I do think is a very winning side of your personality. You're not always entirely sure where you're going. No, I told you, everyone, I told everyone, I thought, I told myself. I was going to Paris.

turned out to be Paxos I was going to. What's the difference? I'm not sure because I never went to Parros, so I couldn't tell you. But is Pairos next door to Paxos? No, I think it's just the letters that's the similarity. In the days leading up to it, I was checking the weather forecast,

literally until I was there for Cephalonia, because I'm going there later on the summer I hadn't realised that I wasn't going to Kefalonia there. And then we flew into Corfu, I had to get a ferry. you can tell I wasn't the lead organiser of the trip but when I eventually got to pack She wasn't as the tripler

She's not Captain Scott Is she? No I know one of my friends When she bought her ferry to pack Clos And she put it on the group chat I thought oh God

Who's going to tell her She's going to the wrong place She's got the wrong place Only it was the right one I thought oh god Oh my God Someone's going to have to say I said Tula this is really awkward

But no it was awkward For me For me Yeah Okay And can we Sorry, I just need to roll back here for a second, just for the group. For the group.

So when was the dawning realisation? Once my friend booked her ferry to Paxos and I said, OK, and then everyone piled in and said, we're on Paxos. But then I was still checking the forecast for Cephalonia. That didn't really click into place. But I understand this doesn't feel very reassuring for you to as I'm your podcast producer. Yeah, you're actually organising aspects of our lives. But I'd like to think that because I spend a lot of my working life organizing,

I've really just switched off for the holiday. I think that's fair enough. You obviously didn't plan very many things to do on Paros. Did you? Or was there a whole selection of table bookings every night that you then had to cancel? I took a back seat in all things. But I can really, really recommend Paxos. Oh, good.

Excellent. It was beautiful. Okay, so where are you going next? Where do you think you're going next? I believe I'm going to get. Cephalonia. Definitely, Cephalonia. Definitely.

If you're in Koss over the summer and you hear the unmistakable tones of Eve, do let us know. I could be anywhere. Just put a blindfold on her, spin around and see where she goes. I'm sure it's all lovely. Well, on a tiny, tiny but similar scale, for years, I had Dolston in Cumbria as my weather forecast. And I don't live in Dahlston in Cumbria. I live in Dahlston in Greater London. and I just spent a couple of years being so pleasantly surprised

at how wrong the day the forecast was. What do you think, Dalston and Cumbria has got in common with Dalston in London? Just its name, I think. Definitely not its cloud formations. And sometimes we were rocking some amazing summer days. I thought, this is absolutely brilliant. It's really turned out so much better than I was expecting. I did think of our listener who ended up in Berwick upon Twee.

Oh, I know. We often think of them. Yes, don't do that. I find it very comforting because... Well, look, it's lovely to have you back. Thank you. It's lovely to be back. Well, you nearly sailed away with a salty sea dog.

Yeah, we did a little boat trip. We rented out a boat and I was away with some girlfriends. All week we'd been wondering, how is this going to play out? Is it going to be... Is the skipper going to be any fun? It's going to be a bit of a creep. Do you look for a fun skipper on your... Tasing, Chris.

A silence fell amongst the girls at 9.30 a.m. and the port of Paxos when the most beautiful young Greek man pulled up in sunglasses. We honestly thought it was like out of James Bond. He was so beautiful and we just shuffled onto the boat in absolute silence. Okay, I don't think we need to hear anymore. But a jolly good time was had by office. Did he get a big tip? He did. Was he any good at driving the boat?

Yes, he was very capable. We'd probably added. Oh, definitely. Yeah, definitely. I think men who can operate machines are deeply, deeply sexy creatures. We were quite easily won over. Was it the Odyssey that's coming out?

It is. Yeah, we'll think of him when we're watching that. I don't think they had a motorboat. That's true. It took him ten years to get home. History would have altered. Well, the history, of course, of history would have been altered if they had a motorboat.

Yes. Yes, okay, well you're over that now. That's shameless. That is enough ogling, but men. Yes, I know, it's terrible. It's absolutely awful. Don't do it. Don't do it.

I'd like it to stop enormously, enormously soon. Best wishes are coming in from Liz. Jane's assertion she had never overheard any interesting conversations reminded me of a humdinger of one I heard on a bus in Newcastle of Pontine back in about 1996. This probably needs a trigger warning for anybody going through a very raw bereavement. So we popped that out there. I was a student heading into town when I took out my...

earphones to listen more closely to the two women behind me, not quite believing what I was hearing. One was explaining to the other that her colleague was confused as to why nobody was talking to her at work. Said colleague was due to go on holiday with her husband and her mother-in-law who lived with them had died just before they were due to travel. Instead of cancelling the holiday, this couple decided to put the poor woman's body in their freezer and go away for a week, presumably to do the right things once they got back. I sat in stunned silence on my way into town and I've always wondered what the consequences were of this deranged and appalling decision and why this woman was surprised that her colleagues were unimpressed by her actions. Ironically, I often listen to the pod whilst

walking the dog and I'm often in a world of my own so I'm less likely to overhear such conversations now or indeed chill my brain, as Jane put it. Did you say chill your brain? I think I say chill your Chill your beans. Yeah. Now that is an extraordinary conversation to have overheardism. I mean, apart from anything else, it's completely illegal to do that. It's preventing a burial. Yeah.

But also, I just... No, don't. On every level, on every level, that is just bizarre. It's a dreadful thing to have done. It's very, very undignified. It's actually a bit selfish and nasty. It's just wrong. It's wrong.

Okay. But also to tell your colleagues at work. I mean... You know, what have you got up to this weekend? Well, I put my mother-in-law's body in a freezer. Also, have we more or less seen the back of the chest freezer in the average home? Well, because they came in, didn't they, in the sort of, was it 70s or 80s? And certainly my mum and dad suddenly started buying a quarter of a lamb and things like that

and sticking it in the chest freezer. I think it depends on what kind of a house you live in. I don't know anybody in London, I mean, we live in quite cramped spaces, don't me? who has ever had a chest freezer. But in... Yeah, it's hard. In bigger houses, if you've got a garage

that you can shove it in or an outbuilding or... And especially if you're living on a farm or somewhere very rural, you must still need one. Who's our guest today? Minette Batters. I'll ask her about her chest freezer

and what she keeps in it. Well, we're not hoping... We're assuming nothing... No. Like our correspondent. But honestly, that is... I doubt that anybody can top that as an overhaul. heard conversation. I hope they can't, to be perfectly honest with you. Minette Batters is the former

head of... President of the National Farmers Union. First ever female president of the NFU. Still a farmer. Still very much a farmer. Got a lot of things to say about how we've got farming and food wrong in this country. Okay, well that would be very interesting. Now actual Claire Powell has been in touch about the book that a lot of people have already told us was Claire's seminal work at the table, Which you loved. Which I did love, and I'm really, really, really sorry. Also, Claire, you'll be glad to know I've started your new book All In, and it is indeed absolutely brilliant. I'm really enjoying it.

If you're going on a sunshine break, grab a copy of All In, you will not be disappointed. On the subject of Clare's, she does say, you are absolutely right. There are loads of us. But worse for me is there also a fair few Claire Powell's, one of whom is a best-selling children's author, and the other, a celebrity talent manager who most famously, represents Peter Andre. For years now, I've been getting emails from Peter Andre fans, asking if I can hook them up with an autograph or a meet-and-greet. I even got a bunch of flowers once from a tabloid journalist mistaking me for the other Claire Powell. It's like a very low-brow version of Naomi Klein's doppelganger. I'd love to come back on the show, says Claire. Well, I think we can arrange that, Claire. I think it's the least we can do. Yes, I think it is the least we can do after the shamazel that I made. So absolutely, consider yourself booked. We'll get Eve onto it when she stopped dreaming of...

What was his name? Timite. Timote. You just called him Timotee. Right. Okay. It was probably Telemachus. Something a little bit more Greek than that. Probably Len.

Anne-Marie is delighted for the word boobage, which has now entered her lexicon, and we're very happy to make that one stick. And this one comes from Lindy. And, do you what, I'd never thought of this before, and we are here to help on any number of levels, and this one is driving in Europe. I'd compose this reply in my head,

but never managed to put it in digital form as I listen to your podcast whilst out walking, committing the airport walking crime that fears so militant about a pandemic. I'm sorry. I dare not dictate a voice note as I walk that is just beyond embarrassing. You can tell I'm not an influencer or podcaster. I do also really hate the voice note thing.

You know, when you see people suddenly whip their phone out and they shout something of legend. I've never sent a voice note into their phone. Do you use that facility? I don't. And I know some adults who do use voice notes. I won't be listening to them. So there are friends who sent me voice notes.

I just, I don't know why. It just annoys me. It's taken up too much of my time. Just put it on a text. Yeah, absolutely fine. Or do the old-fashioned thing and call. Call me. Yeah.

It's weird. Why do we not like the voice note? I mean, it's just like an answer machine you don't have to dial into. Yeah, I just don't like them. Don't like them. Never sent one, never will. Anyway, here comes Lindy's advice.

Like a lot of your listeners, I'm a buying. If you want to hear my voice, you've got to pay. Yeah, I am. Like a lot of your listeners, I'm a bilingual driver for the past 20 years. I've lived in both France and Britain and car driving is necessary here in France as our farm is located

an hours drive from the closest train station. Like both of you, I used to shudder at the switch the brain thing when getting behind the wheel until my lovely French friend, Anne, said this one sentence that changed my anxiety from shoulders clenched up near my ears to, you've got this, stick it and drive and go.

Sounds like something Eve would say. The steering wheel is always closest to the middle of the road. That's all you have to remember. Say that again. The steering wheel is always closest to the middle of the road. Oh, yeah. So you don't have to think, am I on the left, or am I on the right,

you just have to make sure the white lines, if you've got white lines, as close as possible to the steering wheel. It is very good. I mean, absolute credit to your friend Anne. Yes. Gosh, that's an amazing French logic. Yeah.

I'm still thinking about it. I think it's so beautiful. It's actually brought my blood pressure down. At which point, I bring in a neuroscientist who's emailed Isabel. She specialises in cardiovascular research. I've studied the effect of dietary nitrate to lower blood pressure and beetroot is the best thing you can eat to lower blood pressure, she says. The double-blind placebo-controlled trials are very clear that beetroot is very effective.

But antibacterial mouthwash is not your friend. There are oral bacteria that convert the nitrate, gosh and this is where it gets confusing, to nitrite. Now nitrite in your bloodstream is reduced to nitric oxygen. which dilates blood vessels and lowers blood pressure. Now I'm confused. So is it a good or a bad thing? Oh, you'll have to get back to me.

Do you understand that now? I'm looking at you, Dr. Glover. No, to honest, you lost me. No, I know. The double-blind placebo-controlled trials are very clear that Beatrice is effective. I think that's the sentence I'm just with. Yeah, so let's just take heart from that. Yeah.

But antibacterial mouthwash is not your friend. Well, I mean, I just, yeah, I'd, I'd, I'd finish that sentence there as well. So definitely drink the beetroot juice, but don't drink antibacterial or mouthwash. Okay, right. And then you should be okay. I very much hope so.

Well, I'm still here at the moment. Yeah. Yeah. Did ring the doctors again yesterday. You see, they had a thing to tell me, but they just said I was in the system. Well, I mean, we are hoping that if something massive had been flagged up, a claxon would have gone off,

and you would be put near the top of the system. Well, you'd hope. So we very much, we very much hope. One of the incidents that slightly raised my blood pressure for the weekend was that the fox population have now decided to eat the sling on my deck chair. So I've had to order a new deck chair, canvas sling. And the first one that arrived was the cheapest I'd got on, that well-known shopping emporium.

And it wasn't the right size. Although you could squash it onto the deck chair frame, you can't actually sit on it. No, because it just springs you right back up. Oh dear. So you do need to be tackling these foxes, don't you? Well, I mean, I know it's a well-worn topic, but in fact, do you remember last week we interviewed a wildlife expert?

In fact, these are very highly respected. Is it Bertie Gregory? Is that the name of the year? And he actually got quite aerated when I described foxes as a bit, Manji and he took issue with that because a lot of wildlife people love foxes and they're just I mean I don't find them that lovable and I find their sort of omnipresence in my back garden frankly profoundly irritating and I don't want them nibbling my deck chairs for God's sake have some respect well do the chili spray thing or get some male urine yeah you keep saying well because

it's the only thing that that helps in our street. Highly recommended by... I'm not writing mail you're in on my hand. Fox users. Yeah. Okay. Or I think you just need to get a more aggressive Dora companion.

Yeah. Because I sometimes think that the barrage of pets that the foxes are now greeted with in our house seems to have diminished their desire to come inside. Do all, how many, is it in total? It's five. Four. Four.

No. No. How many cats have you got? Three. I thought you had four. No, I got three cats and a dog. Yes. And in fact, Coles had to take him to the vet this morning at 8.30 this morning.

God. He was having the pus from an abscess lanced. Okay. Thanks very much, Fee. Just around the corner. And he's on antibiotics now. Is he indeed? Right. Yes, he is.

But he's all right because he's 16. And last night, you know, me and the kids were kind of like, okay, well, Well, you know, this might be it. And we love him very much. And as the... The Fet said, he's lost too much weight. Obviously, he calls us the one who was fat and happy. But now he's very slim and happy.

Yeah. And the Italian vet has gone. And no, he does seem to be all right. He does seem to be all right. And now the boil has been lanced, much more comfortable. Much more comfortable Tuesday ahead of him. Wonderful. Dare I ask, where was the boil?

It was on the side of his of his chin. Yes, I think that's where my sister has a, I'm just going to say it, a really ugly cat called Percy. And, you're poor sister. She doesn't have to get a knock on this podcast. No, no, not at all, but, you know, he's, he's been the subject of conversation on her local neighbourhood chat group because he wanders.

He's not remotely loyal to my sister's overstead. He does spend most nights there. But he wanders the district. And he's just got an enormous lump. on his face, which they have taken him to the vet, and the vet said, well, frankly, there's nothing. He's just got a lump. He's just got a lump. It's one of, it's nature's way of saying,

what? I don't know. You're ugly. You're just an ugly cat. I was waiting for something very profound there. And so people are always chattering about whether Percy's all right and being looked after. He is. He's just got a lump.

Anyway, I just hope I've settled a few. nerves there. Yeah, definitely. If you do see Percy, he is horrible, so I'm not surprised that people make comments. Your facial expression is exactly what I suspect the good people of that part of the city is. Okay, it's really weird though, Jane, because we have had a lot

of pets in our time. We've just never had a really unpleasant cat, or dog actually. Brian's a little bit difficult. It's a bit of a rogue. But he's still quite affectionate when he wants to be. Would he vote reform?

I think we quite often say that he is definitely part of the cat manosphere. He goes out and we just know that he's a bit dismissive of women. We can tell, by the way, he saunter's back in. But Barbara's quite good. Sometimes she just pounds him with her little balls. Yeah, that's the way to do it. It really is. It's ages.

It's been ages since we talked about Ken Pollock and breasts. So we've got to bring them back. Well, it's summertime. It is. Get them out. It is summertime. Adam says my reading normally takes place in the half hour of getting into bed and falling asleep so it can take me a while to get through a book.

Holidaying in the Kimberley, in the Kimberley, Western Australia, I've had 14 days of breathtaking scenery, leaping into crystal clear swimming holes. Doesn't this sound great? Edging under waterfalls, fishing. I knew in the downtime I'd be able to immerse in a few novels. So I downloaded Barbecue at Number 9 on your recommendation, and it was beyond fabulous. I found it unput-downable. I've also finished Giselle Pelico's A Hymn to Life,

which left me exhausted, not to say bewilderingly uncomfortable at what is evidently available and normalised in some dark places on the web. As a backup, I also downloaded Alan Bennett's Killing Time, which was a gentle read, as you might expect. But on day 10, I'd finished everything. So, unable to connect the Kindle into Wi-Fi,

I found myself delving into the boat library of discarded books and I found a Ken Follett. Night over water. It was a thick tome. I haven't read Night Over Water. Would you mind Googling it to find out what happens in night over water? It was a thick toome. I'm racing through it to be finished by the time we dock in a couple of days' time. I'm really glad that we've accompanied Adam on this. Sounds like an amazing holiday. Notwithstanding the need to make sure I'm finished and whilst thoroughly enjoying the story, I've kept a lookout for Ken's infamous breast references. and it didn't take too long.

So page 104 of 666 pages, he does always offer value, Ken. 666. Exactly. I just would have written one extra just to move it off that. Yeah, I think I probably would as well. Just a couple of sentences, just to agree.

Isn't that odd? Why didn't he think of that? I suppose when you're writing it, you're not aware of how many pages there are going to be. Or maybe he's Satan. Yes. Why didn't I think of that? Anyway, here's the quote.

She was sitting up in bed with the covers pulled up under her bust. I just don't know why. Why is this funny? So that her breast showed. Mark loved her to sit like that. He thought her breasts were wonderful, though she always felt they were too large. Right?

Well, I'm glad Mark was happy with them, because that's what matters. It feels there's a lot to explore in that excerpt, says Adam. And now halfway through the book, the size of her breasts and or what the characters think of them hasn't been referenced again. Perhaps their role in the plot will be revealed in the second half. If they are...

If it is revealed, he says. I'll be sure to let you know. If you wouldn't mind. Adam, brilliant. Thank you very much. Oh dear. So the plot briefly. Fictionalised account of the final flight

of the pan-American clipper passenger aeroplane during the first few days of World War II. Okay. Oh gosh, well, that does sound interesting. So why breasts would come into that? I just have absolutely no idea. But I suppose there will be some female characters and they will have breasts.

They will. It's quite odd. It's quite odd, isn't it? You just think as a male writer, you think, okay, I'm going to write a little bit of a descriptive passage here about the female body. And I'm going to imagine that a woman thinks that her breasts are a bit too big.

I suppose it would be much worse if the man was imagining that the woman felt their breasts were too small because we've been taught haven't we that you know that men like a larger bust although more than a handfuls a waist oh my god one of the other 1970s sayings that we could now use

oh my god what did I see the other day on something online it said you shouldn't judge a woman by a photograph because you can't tell what it looks like round the back. What? Yes. What? I know. Where were you?

I don't know. What platform are you on? I must have seen it on there. That can't be right, can it? That's not very nice. No. No, it's not. No, not at all.

This is why I can't retire. I just spend days, even yesterday on Mysterious Monday Day Off, I was obviously looking at my phone more than you. And by the way, I do love this content, which is why even Substack is sending lots of... You know, there's very winning videos of young children being fitted with hearing aids and glasses. Oh, and singing and hearing for the past time. Yeah. I mean, they are adorable.

Yeah. But I must have seen about 20 of them yesterday. And I did watch them all. Okay. Yeah. Well, that's good to know. Or is it? Oh, I tell you what, I did a couple of short stories from the Jumper Lahiri in

interpreter of maladies yesterday on my day off. I mean, I'm not saying that I'm more intellectual and high much more you are. Maybe I am. I'm going to tell you in a minute which book I'm reading. You'll be horrified because I am reading all in, but I'm also reading something else. Okay. Can we just stick with the book club book for a second? Have you started it yet? No. No. Okay. Well, the only emails that we've had so far are hugely complementary about it. And in fact, I'm going to save, I don't want to peek too soon, but I will do a couple in. tomorrow's episode of people who've been quite transfixed by the genre of the short story, never having really gone there before.

And I would agree, there's something about the short story, because it's such a sharp kind of attack on your senses. I think the characters can stay with you sometimes more than a 667-page novel, where perhaps because you're so fulfilled by the end of it, you then don't feel the need to return in your head to their lives. But the short stories, Jimper-ahiri's short stories, I've done exactly the same thing. I've found myself returning to these characters

because you're just not told everything about them. I think they're good, Jane. I think you will. I know, I'm sure I will. And our audience so far is enjoying them. Excellent. And also you can't, I think they're great for our summer read because we're not asking people to go into a huge kind of investment of a novel.

And you'd be really weed off, wouldn't you, if you took a big novel recommended by us for the podcast as your summer read and you got on the boat and actually you didn't like it very much. Oh, no, that would be, gosh, that's my idea of a nightmare. Yes, it is. It would be a nightmare. Yeah. So what are you reading? What's your other book?

I needed a book at the station the other day and this book I should say has sold by the truckload so it's the autobiography of a former Everton player Duncan Ferguson and it's called Big Dunk and I bought it, I love the name by the way Big Dunk. I couldn't call my own autobiography

that for a string of reasons but I do think it's a great name for a book and yes it goes certainly into the weeds of his career there's absolutely no doubt about it I'm sort of compulsively, I'm going to finish it. But sometimes you just look at it and you think, okay, why have people bought this? And I think it's because if you're the fan of a club and he was a very, very significant player for Everton,

you are just going to buy it as a point of mark of your loyalty. You'll just go out there and buy it. Honestly, it's been in the bestsellers for donkey's ears, both in hardback and paperback. And he hasn't even joined Everton yet. I'm about 100 pages in. So, yes, I can see you're nodding off and so is Eve. But sometimes it's just fascinating to pick up a book that people have loved to try and find out why.

Very much so. And actually, Adam's point about running out of things to read and then delving into the library of, you know, wherever you have ended up spending your summer holidays, there's often stuff in those where I end up reading a book that I would never have picked for myself. And it is wonderful. And also, and I think we have touched on this before, the pretentious nature of some of those bookshelves. The person who took Ulysses on holiday

and this pristine edition just gets left there. You just think, yeah, come on. You know, take your Joanna Trollope, enjoy yourself, really. Exactly. You're there to have fun. Yeah. This one comes in from Kate, and it really rang a bell, Kate, actually, especially this weekend,

because Jane and I have had a long weekend, and I thought, yes, of course I'll. I'll pick up my quilt, my little quilting that I've tried to do. And Kate says you were talking about crafting. Fee mentioned quilting and how she's procrastinating. I wanted to reassure her. It's not just her. It's something my crafty friends and I comment on.

We often find that we could be sewing, but end up doing everything but we aren't sure why. I've quilted from my 20s. I'm now in my 50s. I do love it. I find it meditative. And sometimes I think this is why I procrastinate because once I'm in the zone,

I will lose a few hours. I genuinely feel that crafting is so good for mental health. but to focus and create his nourishing for the head and soul. That's what I think. Sorry to put my feminist hat on. Never apologise. Never apologise. All you're doing is wearing the KP of equality.

But it really annoys me that old tapestries and quilts made by women that have taken hours and hours to make are so undervalued compared to old paintings mainly painted by men. I completely and utterly agree. 100%. So you will go and see some of the great masters they leave. me cold, Jane, but the story

behind somebody's quilt, always interested in that. I've made a quilt for all my nephews and nieces for their 18th birthdays as a one-of-a-kind gift that was made with lots of love. I think that's great. Really good point. And what was that amazing book? The History of Art Without Men?

Yes, by Katie Hessel. Such a good book. Yep. Yeah, because I totally agree. The craft can be incredibly underappreciated and underestimated. Yeah. And I'm sick to death of the female nude seen by men. Who cares?

We're back to Ken. We are back to Ken. Are they too big or are they too small? Right. I think it's high time. We went down on the farm. Let's do that. Minette Batters is a powerful voice for farming in this country.

The first ever female president of the National Farmers Union. She now sits as a crossbench pier in the House of Lords. And over the last couple of decades, She's brought the cause of those who are custodians of the land to the ears of those who eat the produce with clarity and strength. But in her memoir, harvest, we meet a very different younger Minnet, so unsure of her voice she couldn't entertain the thought of public speaking,

nervous of her academic ability because of her dyslexia, and thwarted, or at least not encouraged in her attempts to run her farm by a father who didn't see that as a woman's place. Manette. You're very welcome on the programme. How are you? I'm fine and thanks for having me on. Well, an absolute pleasure.

I learned so much about you in your memoir. I mean, it's part memoir, part manifesto. We will talk about all of the political stuff as well. But I wonder whether you had any nervousness about telling everybody quite so much about your childhood, which wasn't always a great big burst of rural sunshine, was it? No. You're absolutely right.

A lot of nervousness, particularly as it got closer to, publication and I'm quite an introvert. I don't think I've really told anybody outside my family about my life. And so then to suddenly be telling everybody did feel quite nerve-wracking, does feel quite nerve-wracking. But I wanted to get quite a lot of messages across, I guess, at the end of the day. I think not just for women, for men as well, I think often education is a bumpy road. Why was it particularly bumpy for you? I think, you know, back in the day when I was at school, dyslexia, I can't even say it, sign of the times, wasn't really being diagnosed. So you just got demoted.

And I think then you got quite troublesome, quite disruptive. And I just couldn't wait for school to finish. I mean, I just couldn't have got out of there fast enough. And I think, you know, I write about sort of. you know, the moment in time when I decided to reset my life. And I think a lot of people go through that, the journey of life, different

moments, different times. And I guess I hope people reading the book will really feel empowered by it. Because I do think we ourselves have the power to change our destiny and to be known for

what we want to sort of say, whatever that might be. And for different people, it's different things. I mean, my kids think I'm completely mad because I do so much. Well, that's the job of kids. That is the job of kids. So is that defining life-changing moment, the lasagna moment? To a certain extent it is. It was just a real moment for me when, you know, this lovely speech on my wedding day and he finished it, Roger, by saying, you know, but never mind, Manette makes their best lasagna I've ever eaten. And it was a real, oh my goodness, is that it? Is that my epitaph making a great lasagna? Much as

it's good to be able to make. great lasagna. For me, it summed up all sorts of previous moments. And I thought, no, I'm going to do life differently from now on. So I look back. And a lot of the book is about actually sort of failure teaching you more than success, learning from what's gone wrong in your life. And that moment was a particular moment where I didn't know what the future held, but I knew that I was going to do things differently from that point onwards. Tell us a bit about the family farm that you were brought up on. So we are tenant farmers. I'm a tenant farmer now on the farm. I'm a fifth generation farmer. So my, my ancestors on my father's side have always been farming, but they've not been owner occupiers of land. This is quite an unusual thing, particularly in England, but also in other parts of the UK, whereby 50% of farmers in England don't own their farm. They are tenants, often on long-term tenancies. Some, with succession. So you'll have three generations of farmers with rights to that farm. Mine isn't like that.

Mine is a 25-year farm business tenancy with an option to renew, which I've just renewed. So I grew up on the farm that I'm on now, but with a different agreement. My father always knew that his agreement was going to end. So he always said to my brother and I, you're not farming, and you're not farming here, because our tenancy is coming to an end. So that's it. It ends. and you're never going to own a farm, so don't go into farming. You know, in other words, don't go to college, don't go to university. And I think the more you're told you can't have something for farming, and I write about it in harvest, it is about that link with the land,

that absolute intrinsic link with your DNA and that relationship that you have with the land that you've grown up on, the landscape around you, the trees, the river, the ponds, the field names. And that's what I've tried to write about. is this relationship that farmers have with the land and why our family farm structure matters so much to all of us. It's the patchwork quilt that when we fly over the country we see and the country is so different and so diverse

and without the farmers, the landscape would be very different. And, you know, it underpins our whole rural economy, something I talk about that we don't value rural. You know, our economy is run from London-centric, the city of London, a service-based economy. And I talk a lot in the manifesto about the opportunities there are by valuing our countryside. And we will talk more about the manifesto. But just a little bit more on your family life, Minette. Your dad, he'd had an accident, hadn't he, which had left him with some paralysis and some disability.

I mean, farming with a disability must be incredibly disavit. difficult. He comes across in the book, though, as being difficult towards you. Do you look back now and think he was trying to protect you because actually it had been very tough for him? You weren't quite reconciled with him towards the end of his life, were you? No, and I took the decision to write about that because for me, when I was at the NFU leading sort of 47,000 farming businesses, it was a a common occurrence that people weren't having the conversations around succession, around planning for the future, around the next generation coming in. And my father and I just clashed. And I think to a certain extent, he was trying to protect me and encourage me to go down a different route,

but both at fault that we just couldn't resolve those differences of opinion. And I think, And I think a different era, you know, he'd signed up, lied about his age, signed up to fight in the Second World War, gone out to train in Italy, led a pretty tough life. You know, he'd, when his parents died, his mother died very young, you know, he was just basically left a note saying, you know, best of luck to you. And I think, you know, that tough upbringing, he was probably keen to divert both my brother and Hawaii. away from farming, go and get another career. And to a certain extent, I've done that slightly with mine, and that farming is difficult. We don't own this farm.

You need to get a career outside of farming, which is something that I feel is wrong. Farming should be seen as a career. Ideally, we want people coming in from all walks of life because, you know, it can't just be about land ownership. A lot of people are never going to have the wherewithal or the wealth to buy land. But actually, there are a lot of opportunities by renting land

and producing food. So I hope that particular bit changes. Motherhood and work is often quite a gritty experience. Motherhood and farming as work must be beyond gritty sometimes. Yeah, I write about the juggle, as I see it, of being a working mum, the guilt that goes with being a working mum. I think a lot of us as women really do struggle with peer pressure, what is right, what is expected of us, how do we be good mothers and do the job?

And farming isn't something that you shut the office door on. You know, you don't say, well, I'm going to finish it at five today. It's something that you're on call 24-7. And so then the decision for me on getting involved with the NFU, something that was going to add a huge amount more to my working day, was a big challenge. Take me away from home, the kids, the farm. and there probably wasn't a day that went by

where I didn't feel that guilt and I've written about it because in my experience is something that a lot of women face into and I think we challenge ourselves much more than our male counterparts on it and we try and manage the juggle without telling people how much we're juggling.

I bet your kids are very proud of you, aren't they? Who knows? I mean, my son's proudest moment was when he realised that Jeremy Clarkson was following me on Twitter and I was one of 140 people and he thought that was it. That was made it as far as you.

Take the win. Just take the win. We might do a little bit more Jeremy Clarkson in a moment but here's the whopping question for you. Have we lost our connection between food and farming in this country in a way that we really

will never be able to get it back? So I think as far as as we, the people, are concerned, I think there's a real realisation, actually, that farming matters, that many people have experienced not being able to buy what they wanted to buy when they wanted to buy it. So, shortage of eggs, rationing of salads, all the challenges that went with COVID. Politically, I write about what I think is the disparity between Whitehall and the national plan for the country. and the plan of farmers.

And, you know, if you look at Emma Reynolds, the Secretary of State in Deffer, she is Secretary of State for the environment. That's great, but there's much more to the countryside than just the environment. And if you get the farming bit wrong, the food production bit wrong, actually there are enormous problems for the environment.

All the correspondence I've spoken to from the Times, the Telegraph, the Mail, in publishing this book, have all been the environment correspondent. So the voice of food, 70 million people on an island, you know, it seems like we've just taken that for granted. And politically, I think we've just thought, well, Tesco's is running the show, so it's fine.

That's a big mistake. And, you know, I talk a lot about the need to build resilience. People want to buy local. They want a local food system, as well as being able to shop for what they need at Sainsbury's or Tesco's. So we can't afford. to lose the link. You do say in the book that other countries do it differently and you note that in Australia and New Zealand you wouldn't have this feeling that farmers were a lobby group.

They're much more involved in the actual infrastructure of a country. Is there a flavour of politician that has appeared over your career to have been better able to lean in to that different way of doing things? I think ever since we joined the European Union effectively, when we joined the Common Market in 1973, a lot of things changed. And we sort of handed over responsibility for food production to Europe. And we were dictated to by Brussels. And our whole load of ramifications around why people voted out and why farmers voted out. But I think then Westminster, stop getting involved in food policy. And that was a big mistake.

And other European countries, the culture of food is at the heart of that nation. And we've lost that, I think, in England. Scotland, different Wales and Northern Ireland, slightly different, much closer to the rural agenda, much closer to food, but not in England. It is quite a weird one, though, isn't it, Minot? Because geographically, even if we live in the middle of a city

in this country, we're still very very, very close to the countryside. We're just not a very big country. No, we're not a big country, but we've got a lot of people, as I say, on an island. And there are so many benefits. I mean, I'm always struck things like, you know, everybody who would be aware of all the housing developments, the infrastructure that is going on now, any infrastructure project has to buy biodiversity net gain credits at a huge cost, very narrow, very costly. And those BNG credits have excluded food-producing trees. So wouldn't it be lovely to have new infrastructure projects with allotments, with orchards, with food within that landscape? And we've actively said no. Now, in Kenya,

where I've done a lot, they want to focus on carbon, they want to focus on biodiversity, but most of all, they need to show up their food security. So they actively encourage food producing trees. And we've sort of created an either-or when actually we've got to. to do both and the health of this nation would be so much better if we were all closer to nature. You talk about city centres not being far away. They're not, but I would say there's a greater disconnect than there has ever been, which we need to rectify. John says, what is your view on Frankenstein chicken? Frankenstein chicken. Well, you know, I think a lot of people are taking much more interest in how their food is produced. And the UK.

has taken a lot of leadership on welfare with the first country in the world for to legislate on animal welfare with the first country to put in, you know, stocking densities to actually lower the number of birds that can go into a shed, to have slower growing birds. So what we want, and I think we have in this country,

you know, you can buy an organic chicken, you can buy a corn fed chicken, you can buy a higher welfare chicken, you give consumers a lot of, lot of choice. What we're seeing, though, is a very constrained planning system whereby we are producing less poultry meat and less eggs, and then we're importing more from Thailand and from other parts of the world. So what I think we've got to do is recognise that animal welfare happens under one sky, and we've really got to know what we're importing as well as what we're producing

here. And at the end of the day, this is about consumer choice. Is Jeremy Clarkson good news or very, very, very bad smelly manure news? I think personally, Jeremy has been brilliant because I think he's opened the door into farming to people he would never have taken any interest really before. And he's done it. And what is so extraordinary with all age groups. So from you to my son to our parents, effectively, he resonates with everyone. And he's incredibly amusing.

So in a world that's quite doom-laden a lot of the time, Jeremy makes you laugh. So he informs you and it's funny and it's given people an insight into what goes on on a farm, which he's made amusing and it's informative because it's real. And much as country file and things like that are great, Jeremy's Clarkson's farm is real. And it's got Gerald, you know, I write in my book about the people on the farm, the people in the landscape because they are amazing people and they're the people that are rebuilding. building the stone walls, they are the vets, they are the characters. And I think what Clarks has farm does is bring the characters. You know, you've got Caleb there, but you've got Gerald who nobody can understand what Gerald is saying, but you sort of get the meaning. And then you've got fairly serious, cheerful, Charlie, who's anything but cheerful. He's doomed personified.

But it brings to life actually what happens on most farms. Yeah. What is going to happen to us all if fertilizer really doesn't. doesn't come through the Strait of Hormuz for a very long time. So I think what we're aware of now with what is going on in Ukraine and what is going on in the Middle East is that, you know, food can very quickly and very easily become a weapon of war. Before Russia invaded Ukraine, they stopped exporting fertilizer three months before they

invaded Ukraine, knowing that this was going to cause global challenges of food security. And it's the same with the Strait of Hormuz. You know, you've seen the US saying that they are going to blockade Iran from getting supplies of food in. All of this speaks to building your own national resilience in what you're good at. So we don't have a fertiliser plant anymore in this country. That does leave us at risk. It leaves us also very volatile to global fertilizer prices. I think the new technology is what I would call the green revolution of agriculture and food production.

You know, we've got the ability now and the science to be able to be stripping out phosphates from nitrates, massive issues with water, with sewage sludge. We can be really starting now to scale up these green fertilisers where you're drying, you're pelletising, you're moving the dangerous toxic nutrients away from watercourses and using them on land where you need that fertilizer. So I would like to see us, and I put it in the review to government that I did, I would like to see us focusing much more on that. At the same time, we shouldn't rule out, you know, being able to have our own fertilizer made here

because we are at risk. And I think Europe now very much waking up to the fact that energy, food security, defence are the three things at the forefront of the challenges we face. Can we be weaned off cheap food? Zach Polanski declared himself to be surprised and horrified at just how cheap some vegetable. are in supermarkets, 7p for some vegetables.

But, you know, times are hard for an awful lot of people. It's a difficult ask, isn't it? Yeah, what surprises me in this country is that we've let retail runs the show effectively. You know, you go and buy your vegetables and everything else in the supermarket. In many other countries across the world, you have, you know, a sort of wholesale market system running at the same time, which actually, in most cases, sits above retail, where people can go to local markets by fresh produce that has been produced locally. Now, we see some of that. I've got a great market in Salisbury, but it's not available to everyone everywhere. And if we want affordable

food, you know, the area to be investing is in where that production is taking place. So incentivising people to be growing fruit and vegetables, controlled environment. You know, we have hot water coming out of city centres with the use of heat. pumps, you don't need gas, or if you do, you can be using green gas, whereby we could producing much more of our salad ingredients here, rather than waiting for Morocco to have a weather event and then rationing salads. So it's all about taking food security seriously, taking our self-sufficiency seriously, and deciding actually what the country needs and producing for what we're good at. We're not good. We're not going to have citrus fruit bananas here. But there's a lot of fruit

vegetables that we can be growing here. And wouldn't it be great to have that local connection? I would love to see, you know, food hubs in every county with the local authority lead. So we're really joining up the opportunities with those primary producers, local authorities, district councils and people and allowing people access to that land. Minnet, it's an absolute joy to talk to you. We could have done another half an hour. Apologies to people who sent in questions that we haven't had time to ask you.

you're so much more than a lasagna but I bet your lasagna is very good Minette Batters and her memoir is called Harvest and I think we have for many of us to do a little bit of work Jane on re-establishing that

connection between where our food comes from and what we then think about it whether we are choosing it simply on the grounds of price whether we are caring enough about the people who've made it available to us there's an I don't think there's enough of that in our daily lives at all anymore.

No, I don't think. I think it's probably rather shameful, to be honest. And I don't for one minute think that farmers have it easy. I think they most definitely don't. I think it's important that we say that. Well done, sister. We'll be back tomorrow. We're Jane and Fee at Times. Dot Radio. Who's our guest tomorrow? Well, who's the guest tomorrow?

Leila Farsat- Oh, yes. We've got some great guests this week as well as Minnet Batters. We've got Elizabeth Strout on Thursday, and I'm about to record that interview today. And we have Leila Fazad tomorrow. She played Nat. She's playing Nat in two weeks in August, which is a show that for once, not only have we both started it.

We've both finished it, haven't we? We have. Yeah. And you can't say that about every show. No, I genuinely think it would, I genuinely think it would be better to wait until after your holidays to watch that. Yeah, okay.

I just want to say that I was so triggered last night by a documentary on the I player about Brexit, the anniversary. It's very good. It's very good. but Boris Johnson's hair I had to take a photograph of what I saw on the screen

But okay, I'm going to challenge you on this Sometimes your hair is quite Boris Johnson mask It is No, it's not Now that's it, I'm leaving But it is It is unkempt It's lively

Boris Johnson I'm not a former Prime Minister If I was, I'd have a hairbrush And I simply don't believe that he doesn't own one Over and out Yeah, I'm less and less worried about his hair and more and more worried about his legacy and the knitted condom

congratulations you've staggered somehow to the end of another off-air with Jane and Fee thank you if you'd like to hear us do this live and we do it live every day Monday to Thursday two till four 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 Salisbury and the executive producer is Rosie Cutler.