Woman's Hour - Buying sperm online. Author Julie Ma. Vintage wedding photos

Episode Date: February 26, 2021

People wanting to start a family, who need to use a sperm donor say they feel forced into finding sperm online in unregulated spaces because NHS funding is rationed or they don’t qualify for it and it's too expensive to go to a private clinic. The UK’s fertility regulator has warned that doing so carries “significant risks”. We hear from the Chair of the HFEA and from two women who sought donors via the internet.Julie Ma's first novel Happy Families won the Richard and Judy/WH Smith 'Search For A Bestseller Competition' in October and has just been published. She talks to Anita about the book which is centred around a Chinese takeaway the Yau Sum in West Wales which closely resembles the one she grew up in and now runs with her brother. And Charlotte Sibtain who's collected more than 400 vintage wedding photos from charity shops, markets and the internet and tries to track their owners.Presenter Anita Rani Producer Beverley Purcellillustration Chris Vallance

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. I'm Natalia Melman-Petrozzella, and from the BBC, this is Extreme Peak Danger. The most beautiful mountain in the world. If you die on the mountain, you stay on the mountain. This is the story of what happened when 11 climbers died on one of the world's deadliest mountains, K2, and of the risks we'll take to feel truly alive. If I tell all the details, you won't believe it anymore. Extreme, peak danger. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.

BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, I'm Anita Rani and welcome to Woman's Hour from BBC Radio 4. Welcome, welcome, welcome to Friday's Woman's Hour. You're welcome, even you. Now, what lengths would you go to to get pregnant? Would you consider buying sperm from a stranger online? We'll be hearing from two women who have. Today, we're also talking weddings. Remember those?

Well, actually, we're technically talking about wedding photos. Do you have all the wedding pics from all your family weddings ever? Do you like looking at other people's snaps? Well, Charlotte has a master collection of 400 wedding pics, and she doesn't know who any of the people are. She might have photos of your family, and if she does, she'd quite like to get them back to you. I'll also be recommending a page-turner today.

How many of you have read a book about the British-Chinese experience? I'll let you have a think about that one. Well, I'm really looking forward to discussing Happy Families with Julie Marr, who turned first-time novelist at 51. Truly inspiring. And flower deliveries are going through the roof as we are reaching out to our loved ones with this thoughtful gesture.

So this morning, I'd like to know if you're sending and receiving more gifts than usual. It feels like a way of reaching out and connecting, doesn't it? A thoughtful and generous way of letting them know you're thinking about them. Or maybe you've just been buying yourself gifts. Like my husband, I'm going to stitch him up this morning, who along with a group of friends,

they've all bought themselves remote control cars, which they're building from scratch. And then they are all going to go at some point to the park and race them. They've regressed in lockdown. So what have you bought or received and how meaningful was it? You can text me on 84844. Text will be charged at your standard message rate. Or you can contact me

via social media. It's at BBC Woman's Hour. Or you can email us through our website. But first, the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act of 1990 makes it illegal to provide fertilisation services without a licence. But private sperm donation still goes on. A BBC Freedom of Information request found that no concerns have been raised in the last five years with any of the UK police forces who responded to us. People wanting to start a family who need to use a sperm donor say they feel forced into finding sperm online in unregulated spaces because they don't qualify for NHS funding and private clinics are just too expensive. The UK's fertility regulator has warned that doing so carries significant risks. Reporter Faye Kirkland, who is also a working GP, has been looking into this whole issue and

joins me now. Faye, let's unpick this. What have you found? Well, as you say, GP has been looking into this whole issue and joins me now. Faye, let's unpick this. What have you found? Well, as you say, I've been looking into this trend of people turning to social media to find sperm donors outside regulated UK clinics. Now, during lockdown, some NHS fertility clinics had a reduction in donors and some private clinics reported less men were coming forwards. And at the same time, anecdotally, from the people I've been speaking to, in these closed social media groups on Facebook, more people are searching online to find sperm donors.

And what does the law say about this? Well, this is one thing that comes up repeatedly on Facebook chat groups. So is it illegal? And for some, that really is the key barrier or the worry that stops them going ahead with it. And there's all sorts of questions being asked. Is it illegal if I buy the sperm? Is it illegal if I pay for the person's travel? And that really is a complex question. Essentially, the Fertility Act says you can't procure or distribute sperm without a license. But as we understand it, that essentially seems to catch businesses and not individuals who might be doing it privately in their own home. And there hasn't been a test case looking at this. So it's really a grey area. So who's going online and why?

A wide variety of people, so single women, same-sex couples. And it's either because they feel priced out of what can be very expensive private clinics or don't qualify for NHS treatment and need donor sperm. So sometimes I've seen adverts regulated with the UK clinics for sperm costing anywhere between £850 and £1,300 a time. You might need several attempts. And that would add up to a lot of money. Well, I've been speaking to a woman we're calling Chloe, not her real name as her family and friends don't know her story. Following a failed round of IVF, the only one available to her in her area under the NHS after her husband had fertility issues, she looked on Facebook and began looking for a donor and trying to get pregnant before the

pandemic. Back in 2016 we visited the doctor because we'd been trying for a year without any success. We went through the relevant tests and we were then referred for our first round of IVF, which then took place in October 2017. Obviously it was disappointing that we wouldn't be able to conceive naturally, but it was a route that we had to take, so we just sort of came to terms with it. So we'd got that disappointment that it hadn't worked and if we wanted to try again we would have to find like thousands of pounds to fund another round. It was actually my husband who suggested that we should go down the unregulated route and he was comfortable with that because he wanted to be a father and although it wouldn't biologically be his it would still

give him that opportunity. I joined some groups on Facebook just to understand what was out there and how it worked. So it was just talking to other people really of what sort of things to be aware of. There's like a risk list of names of people who to avoid. They have multiple accounts and what sort of checks to ask for and advice on getting to know the donor. So the first donor was found through Facebook. I just put up a little bit about myself and my husband. Obviously not in great detail. We want to stay anonymous.

But we would obviously speak to the donor. Once we got to know someone, we would ask a bit of background on their medical history, family medical history, etc. You can see what sort of documents are real and what are not real because you can do your research on Google to see what looks fake and what isn't fake so I was comfortable with what I'd seen. The first donor we used I used to meet up with. I'd arrange to meet him, let him know when I was not far from the location, he would prepare the sample, meet up, hand it over and then I would go into the toilet and do what I needed to do.

We did have a success but unfortunately that ended up in a miscarriage. After that we decided to go with a different donor. He was more local. He travelled to me and at my home so I was obviously a bit more relaxed in my own environment and now I'm pregnant. We agreed at the beginning what we wanted. We don't want any contact with him.

He has absolutely no rights to the child. My husband's name will go on the birth certificate. We've chosen not to tell anyone because nobody knows that my husband is unable to have children. As far as our child is concerned my husband is their father it affected both of our mental health having to go through that IVF journey and not work and then the prospect of not being able to afford more IVF so it's changed so much our relationship's better mental health is better it's just given us something to look forward to whereas a few years back we felt we hadn't we'd reached the end of the line you've got to not think about what other people think there are going to be people out there that think it's really wrong that you

shouldn't do this but you've got to do what's best for you I think that's one of the reasons why we've chosen not to tell anybody we're happy and we're comfortable with the decision that we've made. That was Chloe, not her real name, and voiced by an actor. If this has got you thinking this morning, or maybe you've experienced something similar yourself, we'd love to hear from you. You can text us on 844 or you can contact us via social media or via our email. Just go to the website. Now, Lorraine joins me now. She's in a same-sex relationship.

As a gay woman, you can get fertility treatment under the NHS, but only if you can demonstrate you've already tried to conceive at least six times, and rules vary in different areas. She now has a little girl after using a donor she found online. Lorraine, welcome to Woman's Hour. Why did you go down this route? Hi, we went down this route basically because of the IVF being far too much money. And you don't know how many attempts it would take to get pregnant.

And again, we were told about these facebook groups and we went on there um put a little bit about ourselves and people the donors would message you and that's how it all started so tell me more about these groups like How do you find them? How do you go on to them? Are there lots of other people? What's the situation? Okay, so there are lots and lots of different people on there, more than you actually realise. You think that maybe you're the only one going through this at this time, but you realise there's probably 20 or 30 donors on there. There are good donors, there are bad donors.

And there are straight couples, women on their own and gay people. So, yeah, there's lots of different people. You say there are good donors, bad donors. How can you tell the difference? At the time, you can't. There is another Facebook group on there that are solely for the recipients to look at. And they say, oh, has anybody seen this person or that person? Have they spoken to that person and you sort of get like a lowdown on that donor um and then you'll be talking to a donor and all of a sudden you'll get close to your window and then gone they ghost you completely ignore you or block you and it's completely heartbreaking

what concerns did you have before you decided to go down this route? Well, I was concerned both me and my partner were concerned that maybe they would come after you for the baby, whether they wanted to co-parent. Just loads of concerns, really. Wanted to make sure that the checks that they sent you were right and all of that lot. But again, you go on Google and you know what are fake and what are not fake, you know, and you have friends that have been down that route and you ask them advice. So you've had friends who've

done the same thing yeah 100 so what questions do you ask well you ask them about their background about their medical history um a bit about themselves you know just to make sure that they're not a down and out really um but how do you know Lorraine how do you know when it's it's all just via a Facebook site how do you know what you've got you get I think what you're getting into well after you speak to them for a little while you kind of get to know them and I suppose you have to use your gut instinct that's all you can do you know as a woman you're so desperate to have a baby. And this is kind of the only way that we can do it because we can't afford the IVF.

So again, gut instinct and, you know, you FaceTime them and you see them. So, yeah. And why did you choose the particular man that you you chose because we had a couple of donors that we were talking to to start off with and you would message them and it would be like two three hours sometimes two three days before they would message you back again and you as a woman only have 24 hours for your window so if they don't kind of reply back to you or answer all your questions as such before your window's there then we have another whole month to wait um the reason why we chose our donor was when we started speaking to him, all of a sudden he was asking us all the questions. We was on the phone for three hours

and he was asking us so many questions. It was refreshing because it was always us trying to ask them one question at a time. So yeah, and it was just a really good gut instinct about him. Did it ever cross your mind about possibly the consequences or breaking the law? No, not a chance. Didn't even think twice.

And what checks did you ask? What did you ask him? So he asked you all these questions. And then how does it work? Did he hand deliver it? Did he come to you? How do you exchange the sperm so um he said that he would well we we spoke about it and we decided that it would be more

comfortable and more relaxing for our part if he would come to us he never asked for any money whatsoever and he said all we would have to do is pay his travel and as he come from London it was literally 36 pounds uh return ticket on the train he never even asked for that either he said he would buy the ticket and then when he come to us we would just give it to him in the cash and what what what's what about long term what about parental rights and child support what kind of influence at all if any will he have on on your child's life absolutely nothing at all and that was one of the conversations that we had right from the beginning because you know we we don't really want him involved at all and he doesn't want to be involved he has multiple children already um we don't have

anything done by a lawyer but we do have a 16 page little leaflet kind of thing saying, well contract should I say, saying that we wouldn't go for him for money and he wouldn't come to us for rights for the child. He doesn't want any involvement and we don't want any involvement from him either and he was well and truly happy at that. I mean this is still a legal grey area at the, Lorraine. What do you think needs to change? To be fair, I think that it needs to be on the NHS for a starter. I don't see why for straight couples that after a year of trying, they get it for free, yet gay couples have to pay for it like what is that about this is something that's free and quite natural to straight couples um

yet we have to pay for the effort it's it's not okay and for some other people that can afford it great but there is a lot of people that haven't got that sort of money. OK, Lorraine, thank you very much for speaking to me this morning. Faye, it's just so fascinating to listen to Lorraine speaking there. What are the concerns? Well, I think Lorraine explained it incredibly clearly, really. I think there's two parallel worlds at the moment. There's this very regulated sector sector fertility sector in the UK and with very strict rules and guidelines

and then this the online world really which escapes or seems to escape regulation and the fertility regulator would warn against going online because it does lack safeguards so for example in regulated clinics the men would be screened for sexually transmitted diseases and genetic conditions. And Lorraine did ask those questions and she got them. But people worry that there are concerns that some of the documents men may produce might be false. And for the men themselves too, there are concerns about potential financial responsibilities for the child if the right consent forms aren't signed. Now back in 2005 if a child was born using a sperm donor in the UK they have the right at 18 to know if they want to to be who the sperm donor is and be able to contact them which clearly isn't guaranteed on Facebook and in regulated

clinics donors can only have 10 families to try and prevent genetic pooling. And as we've seen with Lorraine and Chloe, many men have more than that on Facebook. Some men claim to have hundreds of children. So I think it's these people who don't meet NHS criteria or feel outpriced by this private sector who feel really forced into making what the regulator themselves would say is risky choices. So is this a case of the internet outstripping regulation? Well, the Fertility Act, as you said, came out in 1990. It was updated in 2008. And it's made it illegal to procure or distribute sperm. But clearly, the internet has grown massively since then. And concerns about sperm donors and social media have been around for years now. So I asked the regulator, I asked the HFEA, how many times they'd reported concerns

to the police over the last five years that people might be acting outside the law. And they replied saying there was no data available. So I asked the UK police forces, I asked all 45, 42 replied, and no forces reported any documented concerns from the regulator or elsewhere. So that would include social media sites like Facebook in the last five years. And what have the NHS had to say? Well, I asked the NHS what they thought because both Chloe and Lorraine live in England and a spokesperson from England said, ultimately, funding decisions about who gets treatment for fertility care goes down to local decision groups. So are gps ccgs who are under the obligation to balance various competing demands on the nhs locally where people live within the parliamentary

budget and we asked them thank you faye thank you for that um we asked facebook for a statement as well and they said we allow people to discuss sperm donation on facebook but we work closely with law enforcement to remove content that breaks local law. We want to keep people safe and encourage people to report behaviour they believe doesn't belong on our platforms so we can take appropriate action. Well, we have the chair of the fertility regulator,

the HFEA, Sally Cheshire with us. Morning, Sally. Welcome to Woman's Hour. How concerned are you about what you're hearing this morning? We are concerned. As you said, I think Fay explained very clearly what the risks are of not going down the regulated route. But this isn't a new problem. There was a test case back in 2011 with two men who would advertise services online and were taken to court for procuring and distributing sperm. The distinction here

is that distributing and procuring sperm, as Faye said, is illegal, but private arrangements aren't. And whilst we as the fertility regulator can make sure that treatment provided in clinics is as safe and effective as possible, and all those safeguards that people need when they are thinking about donation, we can't regulate all private arrangements that people make. Does the law need to be updated then? The law is very clear on where the businesses operate and what happens in a clinic. The law isn't as clear around what happens in a private arrangement, but that is a

private arrangement. And it would be quite hard to have a catch-all law, I think, to cover those. What we'd always say is we'd encourage people where possible to try and go to a clinic to make sure that those health checks are in place, that the legal parenthood decisions are made correctly. There is a real risk here that someone who donates is still the legal parent of the child. And I'd have to say we'd encourage people to take legal advice because any contracts that you draw up privately are likely to be null and void. So are these people breaking the law? They're not breaking the law in a private arrangement. It's quite a grey area though, isn't it? Because is it a private arrangement if men are, you know, from what Fay has discovered and what we've unearthed, men are selling their sperm to if you do it in a legal manner.

And it's all happening in a local area. The health repercussions of this, for starters. Aren't we surely opening a Pandora's box here? Yes, the 10-family limit is in place for a very good reason, to try and prevent people who may have been brought up in the same area and used the same donors potentially having a relationship with people that they are genetically related to. There's also psychological research that suggests that as human beings, we struggle sometimes with having a large amount of siblings.

So having up to 10 siblings may be acceptable mentally, having 500 half siblings may not be. So the 10 family limit is a long-standing limit and that applies in other European countries to a greater or lesser extent. But you've got men doing, maybe having children with 40 or more women doing it on this. Surely there needs to be some regulation. Surely this is an area that needs to be looked into.

So at the moment, the law is very clear about when you should have treatment and what the ramifications are. But the law doesn't seem to be keeping up to date with what's happening online. It hasn't for a while. The difficulty is that these are private arrangements that you make, just like you can have a relationship with anybody that you choose to that society and the government can't regulate. But it sounds like some men are running it as a business if they're selling their sperm to more than 40 women how is that not a business? I think in most cases in fact we haven't heard of any cases where men are selling sperm they are donating sperm and recovering their expenses, which is in line with the law in the UK. So you are not allowed to pay sperm donors or egg donors beyond a very small

amount and reasonable expenses. And I think Lorraine explained that their donor only charged expenses, which is in line with the law. What contact have you had with the Department of Health around this area? Are there any plans to look into the sale of sperm online? We don't believe there are any plans currently. This is an ongoing issue that's been around for a number of years. We're much more concerned about the safeguards

around health implications, around you potentially being in a relationship with someone you're related to. But if nothing is being done about it, if you're saying that it's only the legal, the regulated clinics that you regulate and actually this is just private negotiation. And there are all sorts of women who are being exposed to health implications at the moment.

We are. All we can do at the moment is offer information to women who are considering donation on our website about what the legal safeguards would be. We would advise them to take legal advice around parenthood, around family responsibilities, around health screening. And donors are, sorry, women who are seeking donors are quite knowledgeable, as you've heard from Chloe and Lorraine. But this potentially raises huge risks for the women involved. And we haven't talked about donor conceived children for whom knowing about their origins surely is the thing that they will need most in the future. And I think if you go down the regulated route, then you are much clearer. Donor conceived children can come to us and we hold a register of all of the information and find out about their donor when they reach the age of 18.

So in 2023, we are looking at quite a surge in donor conceived people who reach the age of 18 since anonymity was lifted in 2005. And hopefully it will help them to come to terms with their life and their future and potentially know about any medical issues they may have. And I'm sure everybody who is desperate to try and have a baby would like to go down that route, but they simply can't afford it, which is why they're having to go to these sites online to try and negotiate acquiring sperm from people that they're having to do their own checks on. They're not medical professionals. They don't know what's happening. They're just acquiring what they are hoping, in good faith, is what they say they're getting, on they're not medical professionals they don't know what what's happening they're just acquiring what they are hoping in good faith is what they say they're getting and what they're being told they're getting so where do you stand on cost so the cost that we talked about earlier in the program around um 800 to 1300 pounds per cycle is the cost of a cycle of IUI in a clinic where you would use donor sperm. IVF

treatment is more expensive than that. The issue that we have is that we don't regulate funding. And actually, one of the biggest issues isn't just fewer donors during the pandemic. This is a long-term issue. One of the biggest issues is around funding. So funding by nation varies quite widely, with Scotland funding more NHS treatment, with England funding the least, because those decisions are now taken locally. And we have huge empathy for all of those women and couples who can't afford access to treatment. But we are clear that there should be fair access to treatment, not a postcode lottery wherever you live. And we're encouraging all clinical commissioning groups through NHS England to make sure that they comply with nice guidelines. So there are specific guidelines which are supposed to be applied across the country that women under 40 would be entitled to three cycles of IVF treatment where donor sperm are used during your natural cycle, that six cycles will be provided to couples who have a fertility problem.

Sally Cheshire, thank you so much. And Faye Kirkland, thank you very much for joining me this morning. 84844 if you'd like to text us on this or anything else you're hearing about on the show. Louise has just messaged in saying, I just listened to Chloe's story and alarm bells are ringing loudly for me. I was conceived by donor insemination and this fact has caused much pain over the years. Chloe's approach in deciding not to include the biological father's name could be damaging. What about the child's right to know and perhaps have contact? If the donor has many children with many different women, perhaps the child might unknowingly set up a relationship with a close family person. And this is a big concern. You can also email via our website. And don't forget, you can always catch up with Woman's Hour at any point on BBC Sounds. Yesterday, Emma spoke to Camilla Batmanghelic, the founder and director of the

disbanded charity Kids' Company, who recently won a high court disqualification case. In her first in-depth broadcast interview since the verdict, she lifts the lid on her battle and talks about some of the powerful figures she alleges led to her own personal public vilification and the closure of her organisation. Now, Julie Marr's first novel, Happy Families, won the Richard and Judy WH Smith Search for a Bestseller competition in October and has just been published. The book is centred around a Chinese takeaway, the Yao Sum in West Wales, which closely resembles the one she grew up in and now runs with her brother. In the book, the Lee family is complicated

and there are silences and secrets which 34-year-old Amy Lee thinks needs to be sorted out before Argun, her grandfather, dies. Well, I'm delighted that Julie Marr can join me now from The Takeaway, where the Wi-Fi is better than at home. Julie, before we get into it, let's hear a reading from the beginning of the book which gives us an idea of the place of Yosam in the community. Journey Guru Review, Yosam Takeaway, Kaus Menin. Reviewed December.

A local institution, five stars. We come here every Christmas when I visit my parents and we get the set meal for four. Always a nice change and fills the gap until New Year when you've had enough of turkey. Place is like a time capsule though. Mam and dad say it hasn't changed in 40 years. Even the woman behind the counter looks exactly the same. Could be her daughter though. Smiley face emoji. Sandy S. Welcome, Julie Marr. First of all, congratulations on winning the competition and being published for the first time as a novelist at 51 years old. I've read the book, thoroughly enjoyed it.

But for everybody who hasn't, tell us about Amy Lee. Does she resemble you in any way? Amy Lee is a better looking, more intelligent, much nicer version of myself. So what more could you want from your fictional self, really? She's had to move back home to live with her grandfather. And grandpa lives in the flat above the shop. When grandpa collapses in the street, it's to amy to get to the bottom of why the old man and his son-in-law who's amy's dad haven't spoken for the last 30 years even though they live and work together

um it looks like time is running out if she wants to make this family a happy family and that's what anybody wants really um families can be squabbly unhappy places but it's up to everybody to work around that and and there's lots of family secrets in this family there are lots of family secrets and i think there are lots of um secrets that families work around all the time um there have been two cases where we've mentioned today where perhaps people may find in later life that they have 10 siblings. That's going to be a bit of a family secret in years to come. Isn't it, Jess? So, yes, it's all about family secrets, but it's also...

Sorry, go ahead. No, no, no, you're all about family secrets, but your family in the book, they seem to deal with it in a very interesting way, that they take it on, just take it on the chin, don't they? They take it on, just take it on the chin, don't they? Take it on the chin. I think there's a lot of families have arguments. Sometimes I think about these arguments as being like boulders in a river where the water flows around the argument. So everybody pretends that this argument isn't going on between two members of the family. And also there is a bit of a rift.

One of the characters in the novel is based um slightly on my mum and she was born in this country in 1933 and i think within about three years she had to move to china so she basically moved back at an early age didn't have any english was raised in a chinese environment came back here in adult life and although although she's British, she's not British. And also there's a question as to, Dad, why did you send me home, send me away for the last 15 years? But they forgive, well, she forgives him. Families just work around these things, aren't they?

That's the reality of being a family. I think the characters are great in your novel, but the women particularly. I'm, you know, the characters are great in your novel, but the women particularly. I'm glad you brought the mother character up, Amy's mum, Joan. And also Elaine, who, you know, the family, the Chinese family, they're sort of the outsider family in this tiny little place in West Wales. And then her mum's friend, Elaine, is also the outsider. She's the woman who's had three children from three different fathers.

And so the whole community treats them as the other, don't they? Yes, I think that's the way things were then. I hope they're not like that now. I think that in the case of Elaine, there are lots of people. And also there's a character called Phyllis. Lots of families they're big messy things and you don't need to be related to them by blood I think previous title for this novel was um this is not a normal family and one of the characters says

in a version in a scene that's been cut oh my family's not normal because we have lots of stepbrothers and stepsisters and siblings and half-siblings. And he's told, no, that's perfectly normal. Families are made up from all sorts of people. You don't need to be related to them by blood. And throughout this family, we had lots of support from local Welsh people who would happily come in and babysit a gaggle of Chinese babies.

You know, I loved reading the book and I was nodding along with so much of it because it reflects the migrant experience, including my own family experience in some ways. And it was so refreshing to read a book about the British Chinese experience. Yes, that's one of the reasons I wrote the book, because I wanted to write about what I know, but also about diversity, not just of ethnicity or gender or sexual orientation, but very much I deliberately included characters from different class. There's the regional voice from Wales and also occupation because I think that people will think that a mortgage advisor from Rutland isn't interesting enough to be in a book and they are. And there are people in this book, there are postmen,

there's a policeman, he doesn't investigate murders. He's the sort of policeman who will knock on your door in the middle of the night if there's an emergency. So I wanted to represent everybody. I think everybody's worthy of being in a story. You might not be worthy of being in a six-part series on Sunday nights on BBC One at nine o'clock, but you can certainly have a chapter. Maybe one day, maybe one day. Now, your first novel published at 51 years old, you won a competition. Was it a meteoric rise or is this years of hard graft, Julie? It's been years of hard graft. And I would say about this competition, which is such a mainstream competition that I never really expected to win at all, is that this novel has been kicking around for a long time in various formats

and it's been submitted to lots of outlets, some of them specifically to reflect diverse voices. And I never heard back from any of them. This is the only time it's been successful and you only need for that to happen one time. But I think the thing is that the publishers, Welbeck, they clearly realize it's important to select stories that represent all of us in society every day and perhaps not like

other organizations just when they've been told that they have to I think we should be more well back on this we should be more diverse all the time here here well um Julie it's been wonderful to talk to you and you can find Julie Julie's book. Highly recommend it. Happy families. It's out there. Now, for the past nine years, Charlotte Sibtane has been collecting vintage wedding photographs from charity shops, markets and off the Internet. Charlotte has more than 400 photos in her collection and around 30 on her walls. She's been sharing her vintage wedding project on Instagram and online to display

her found photographs and has also been on a mission to reunite relatives with their lost treasures. Welcome to Woman's Hour, Charlotte. When did this obsession with collecting strangers' wedding photos begin? Well, it probably happened, I think, probably about nine or ten years ago and I was in an antique shop and just perusing having a look and I came across this bin under a counter and in it was just full of these random photos random images and I came across these two wedding ones and I just thought it was really sad that these photos had been sort of lost, removed from their original sort of families, really. So I wanted to take them, look after them and, yeah, display them.

You found, where did you find your first set of photographs? It was in this really great antique shop in Brighton. There's one on the lanes and it's huge and there's loads of different dealers and it's crammed full of stuff. So, yeah, I found the two in there. And it was just brilliant because you just you didn't know what you were going to find. You know, there were hundreds of 70s postcards and other family snaps and stuff buried in between like everything else. There were these two beautiful photos.

I'm totally with you. I bet there's lots of people listening who can relate to that experience. You go into a lovely vintage shop and then looking at old photographs and even old postcards, it just takes you into another world. But what was it about the wedding pictures that made you think, oh, I need to buy these? I think it was because it was somebody's special day. I think, you know, weddings are a very special, emotional time for a lot of people and you know I think having got married myself you you know you really treasure those pictures and you really love to look back at them and remember the day and so the fact that these wedding ones had just been sort of tossed away I think made them even more special and then it basically picked up at speed. You've got 400 of them now. Where?

Well, I had to, so in the flat that we lived in previously, they were all in little boxes crammed in different parts of the flat. And now we've got a slightly bigger house and I've got a space for them and a proper little kind of section in an office. And, you know, they're all kind of looked after. And did you and did you know what you were going to do with them or were you just collecting them because you like the aesthetic and you like looking at pictures and you just thought well I'd rather have them than them get gathering dust in a vintage shop yeah I think I just um I think initially it was just about collecting them and saving them really and just making sure that they were sort of kept safe um and then I think what

was it maybe about five years ago I started sharing them on social media and that's when it starts to really sort of ramp up and it became very clear that other people love them too which was really nice because I thought I was the only weird one out there that we're all voyeurs who like looking at other people's photographs particularly wedding pictures I've had a look at your account actually my favorite and they're all black and white is that is that something that you've done on purpose yeah I think so I collect them from sort of the late 1800s right up to the 1960s and I think for me the black and white ones are the most sort of poignant and historically interesting. I do randomly get some coloured ones in bundles that I buy,

but yeah, they're mostly black and white. And now you're doing this wonderful, I don't know, terrifying thing of trying to reunite some of the photographs with the families. I say terrifying because you don't know what the story is, right? Maybe they got rid of them for a reason. Yeah, exactly. And I think I always assume that this is going to be like a very happy ending and everyone's going to be so pleased to see them um and luckily for the most part that's been the case but yeah you just don't

know what the story is and that's what makes it so interesting I think and how's it gone trying to find how do you even begin to track down the relatives? Well, it is tricky because most of the images in the albums don't come with any information. So people aren't terribly good at annotating dates and locations and names on the objects and the images. So there isn't a huge amount to go on. But fortunately, some of them do have names and dates. So it's a case of finding marriage certificate, finding information online, the name of the church.

And then you can start to sort of gather a bit more information. But it is like piecing a puzzle together. It's tricky. And it must be wonderful when you actually find the relatives and match them with the lost photographs. Yeah, it's the best feeling because I just think, you know, these images people just assume are just lost forever and they're never going to see them again. So when you're able to hand them back and give them to somebody and see how pleased they are, then yeah, that's a great feeling.

Well, I'm sure lots of people will be going onto your Instagram to have a look and I don't know, maybe even sending you pictures to try and track down the... You're nod you'd like to do yeah yeah I'm kind of uh up for any other wedding photos any albums that people have got kicking about and don't know what to do with do send them my way how would you and your husband's in the background going no shaking his head no actually he really really likes them now he's um he really can see the benefit and really appreciate them yeah brilliant thank you thank you for joining us charlotte now the wedding detectives is a program um that you will be able to hear it's available on now on bbc sounds or it

can be heard on bbc radio 4 at 8 p.m for the next three mondays there's one particular photograph that i really like which is I think it's the most miserable wedding couple that Charlotte found. You should have a glance. It is entertaining. That's all for today's Woman's Hour. Join us again next time. A new podcast series from BBC

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