Woman's Hour - Dame Siân Phillips, Abuse of vulnerable elderly, Clemency Burton-Hill

Episode Date: December 29, 2023

Actor Dame Siân Phillips’ life and career are explored in a new documentary, Siân Phillips at 90. She joins Krupa Padhy to talk about some of her acting roles, including playing Emmeline Pankhurst in a BBC drama in the 1970s, what it was like being married to Peter O’Toole, and what she’s doing now.Clemency Burton-Hill MBE, is an award-winning broadcaster, podcaster, author, journalist and musician. She joins Krupa to discuss Journal of Wonder - the newest book in her bestselling Year of Wonder series - which takes you from January to December with classical music suggestions for every day.The power of attorney system can sometimes be abused to take advantage of older people. Krupa is joined by Carolyn Stephens, who shares her story of becoming estranged from her elderly father after he met a woman on a singles holiday. He later agreed to grant power of attorney to the woman, which resulted in him being placed in a care home without his family knowing. Journalist Sue Mitchell, who shares the details of the whole affair in an upcoming radio documentary, also joins Krupa to talk about why she wanted to tell Carolyn’s story. Co-founder of The Onion Collective, Jess Prendergast, tells Krupa how she and her friends created the social enterprise East Quay Watchet in Somerset after they were frustrated by the lack of opportunities in their local town. Plus local ‘craftivist’ Lyn Barlow tells us about exhibiting her textile art in the new gallery and what the new enterprise means to her. Presenter: Krupa Padhy Producer: Lottie Garton

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, this is Krupal Bharti and you're listening to the Woman's Hour podcast. Good morning and thank you for being with us. At the start of 2021, the award-winning broadcaster Clemency Burton-Hill joined us here on Woman's Hour for her first broadcast interview after she suffered a brain bleed and spent two weeks in a coma. Three years on, she's joining us again to share the story of her recovery and the role that music has played in her healing journey. Clemency will tell us about her new book, part of the best-selling Year of Wonder series, where she shares a piece of classical music for each day of the year. Also, there were no architects or consultants to get their projects off the ground,

but there was a lot of tea, biscuits and sometimes gin when four innovative and entrepreneurial women came up with a plan to rejuvenate their disadvantaged community. Watch it in West Somerset. The women call themselves the Onion Collective and they believe that what they've achieved is an example of how towns can reimagine a future they want to be a part of.

And I want to hear from you on this. What have you done to change your local area? How have you taken matters into your own hands? And what would you do if you had the resources? Send me your stories of women getting together to get the job done. This is how you can get in touch. You can text us. That number is 84844. Over on social media, you'll find us at BBC Women's Hour. Email us through our website or you can pop us a WhatsApp message or audio note. That number is 03700 100 444. We'll also be joined by Carolyn Stevens, who, when her elderly father found a new partner,

was stopped from seeing him and then left helpless as he vanished from her life. She will share her personal story and we'll talk more about concerns surrounding the issue of power of attorney and the elderly who might be vulnerable. But we are going to start with the life of one extraordinary woman. Her career began as a child radio actor at the BBC, aged just 11, after winning a speech and drama award at the National Ustedford, a cultural event in Wales. But it's her work on stage and screen for which Dame Sian Phillips is most remembered. Her role as Empress Livia in the BBC miniseries I, Claudius in 1976, for which she won a BAFTA, cemented her place in broadcasting history.

Now her life is the subject of a new documentary, Sian Phillips at 90. And to tell us more, she joins me live in the studio. Welcome, Sian. Thank you. The documentary is made in line to mark your 90th birthday this year but i understand you're not one to celebrate no i've never celebrated my birthday but 90 sudden everyone began to celebrate it so i had to you've just joined in and i got used to it and it was very upsetting actually for quite a while. I wasn't totally happy. I hadn't thought about it before. I hadn't thought about

ageing. But 90 somehow I realised was an event and I'm only just getting over it now. I'm over it now. Why was it an event? Why did it feel different? I don't know. Everyone started, people started to give me their seats in the tube and because I was on

the radio and various things about being 90 seemed to be some step, some great step. And people were being nice to me. And it's important to stress you are remarkably fit. We saw in that documentary how you do Pilates

better than most 18-year-olds I know. Well, I don't know. And you look remarkable as well. Let's talk about that documentary. We hear about your early days growing up in rural Wales where you had your first encounter. At the age of just six, you went home and you wrote in your diary, I am now resolved to being an actress.

It was always the plan. That was the plan. I didn't know what an actress meant, actually. I knew I wanted to be up there where the lights were. I'd seen the pantomime and I'd seen the red velvet. I'd seen the gold tassels and I'd seen the girls in their fishnet tights kicking their legs up in the air. I wanted to be up there where it was light. I couldn't understand it, but I knew I wanted to do that. And that's exactly what you did. And we're going to talk about the various milestones in your career. A large part of this documentary focuses on your 20 year marriage to the actor Peter O'Toole. You turned down roles as he saw your success as a threat, as you've put it. Well, it was more an inconvenience. It wasn't a threat to him in any way, but it was inconvenient.

Yeah. And what do you remember feeling about those days when you got on them? It was a long process of first of feeling very sad about it, of not understanding what had happened. And then I found out that my contract had been just sold, I mean, destroyed, you know, that I didn't have an income anymore. And then I realized that I wasn't allowed to go out so much. I stayed at home most of the time for a long time. And it was kind of sad. And I couldn't tell anyone. I felt it would be deeply disloyal because I did adore my husband to him for me to go and complain to anybody or explain why I was not working as much as I should be or doing the wonderful things that I was being offered. And so I was just stuck in the middle of nowhere.

I didn't know what to do. I didn't know where to go. Eventually, I realized the only bad thing that could happen to me was that I would become bitter and twisted about the whole thing. So I took a grip and I made a life for myself, which was possible. And I did work under the radar.

I became very clever at knowing what would attract attention, what would be wildly successful and what would just take over. So I had to keep working, obviously. So I just ticked over. Until I couldn't. But it sounds like a lonely time It was very lonely but I was an only child so it wasn't as much of a problem as it might

have been for someone else I could cope with it Ultimately you left Ultimately I decided to stop And you left with nothing really nothing material at least Yes absolutely so I started all over again but it was exhilarating

I was sad obviously but it had happened gradually over the course of about 18 months of talking toing and froing and when I did finally get away I knew the children were all right because they were getting grown up almost and that my mother was at home in the house,

so they would be well looked after. And so I didn't have to worry about them and I could see them at weekends. But otherwise, I just found it immensely exhilarating. It was just wonderful to be back at work. I told my agent, I can't be out of work for one day. I have to buy a house. So, and I did. She did and I told my agent, I can't be out of work for one day. I have to buy a house. And I did.

She did and I did. Yeah. During that time of being married to Peter, you played the suffragette Emmeline Pankhurst in the BBC drama Shoulder to Shoulder. That was with a cast of 50 women, a production team that was heavily female. What was that experience like and what did you take away from it? Well, I think I took away the germ of an idea from it. I think that's where it all started. I realised I could have a life. That planted seed. That is what it would cost. And looking back, I think it did plant the seed. I always denied this at the time, but I think it was true. So working with a group of shot women.

They were wonderful. There was a woman, the camera person even. And it was unusual at that time and extremely unusual for actresses to be working with people their own age because if you're in a play, you're playing the girl or the mother and you have a daughter and you maybe have a mother. But that's about it.

You don't meet women when you're a daughter and you maybe have a mother. But that's about it. You know, you don't meet women when you're working. Do you remember that moment when the penny dropped when you said you had one? No, I just realised now looking back that it did drop. Yeah, yeah. After you left, Peter, you talk about having to, in many ways, reinvent yourself, that you'd lost a huge chunk of what should have been the prime of your life yes it was so so I thought well I'll just catch up you know I knew I would I knew I'd never really catch up but I I just made the best of it and and I had a wonderful time

another significant milestone was your marriage to Robin Sachs, who you said wasn't going to work from the outset. No, I didn't want to marry him. I really didn't. No, I told him and I told anyone who was listening that it wasn't going to work. And I was so tired. I was exhausted because I was the breadwinner and I had bought a house. So I was working hard all the time and enjoying that very much. But I realized that he wasn't going to go away. It was just, it was. And is that why you married him? He was a nice person, but I didn't love him and I didn't want to marry him.

And so many will be listening thinking, why did you? Why did I indeed? Less trouble, I suppose. You know, it was a bit of laziness, I think, partly. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It didn't last anyway. It just lasted a few years. It went on. It existed for longer than it lasted, if you know what I mean. What did you take away from it, though? Was it a sense of rejuvenation? No, nothing of the sort. No, no, no. No, it was just had to be dealt with. You know, it was.

Let's let's let's talk about another significant role. One I mentioned earlier, the murderous and vengeful Empress Livia in I, Claudius. How did you find playing this role? Oh, it was lovely. I just loved that. We all loved doing that series. It like many series would involve death and destruction. It was it was fun all the way through.

It was it was wonderful to do. And Herbie Wise was a wonderful director. Yeah. You were cast as a baddie. And then you went on in the 1984 version of June. You were Reverend Mother. Was it fun to play these characters that were a little bit evil? It's just the same as playing somebody very good, actually.

There's no difference. Yeah, but clearly a point in your life that really brought you to the forefront. Yes. And you said another high point in your career was when you started to work in musical theatre. That was in your 40s. What was that transition like from broadcast to stage for you? Oh, it was a nightmare.

I tried resisting it, but it was the only decent, you know, I had to work, and there were scripts on the table, but the best script by far was Pal Joey by Rodgers and Hart. I had never done a musical, but I looked at it. I knew the musical, I had the record, and I loved it, but I thought, I can't sing and I can't dance. What are they thinking of? So I went into it as a learner. And it was only intended to be six weeks on the Mile End Road in a fringe theatre. And that was the end of that. So I thought, OK, I'll just do it for six weeks. And if it's a disaster, well, it can't be helped. Well, I was convinced it was going to be a disaster by the time we opened.

My mother, who was obviously supportive and lived with me at the time, said, well, I'm not going down there to see her making a fool of herself. So she didn't even come. You've said in the past, though, that theatre was one of the few places where there is freedom from prejudices. It's a place that you felt you were never insulted or threatened by a man. Never, never. Absolutely never. And why was that? And I was acting, you know, when I was a teenager. And I looked like a grown-up girl because I was tall.

And I don't know it just it I made friends with people and I worked for some very nasty supposedly violent nasty people you know people have a reputation for being nice or nasty and I found nothing but good manners and and and charm really I mean, I never felt threatened, never. Are you able to pin why that was, why the space of a theatre is different to that of broadcasting? Well, I don't know if it is different. Is it different from filming? No, not really. You know, there are great similarities. I can't account for it. But there are a lot of people like me in my generation who never felt threatened or anything. Yeah.

Your voice is one of your remarkable qualities, as we can hear now. And you move easily between speaking English and speaking Welsh, speaking different accented characters as well. How does it differ occupying those different spaces and identities in your work? Oh, I don't know, but you're right, it does occupy something different because I've lived in London since I was 20, 21, so I don't speak Welsh every day.

When my mother lived with me, we spoke Welsh at home all the time. I haven't spoken Welsh since 1985 at home so I've lost a lot of Welsh um and and it was difficult picking it up again in order to work I was offered a job in Welsh and it was much harder than I'd realized because the language has changed a lot since I was a girl but But that was interesting. So I did Duolingo. Oh, we love Duolingo in our household. Yeah, yeah. I did a lot of that.

And I had to learn the new vocabulary altogether and different slang. And I really enjoyed it, actually. I loved it. And then I was able to do this documentary in Welsh. You never stop learning, do you? No, you don't. And on that, you said in your 60s, you'd felt like you'd arrived at where you wanted to be as a little girl.

What about now you're in your 90s, wherever you arrived at? Well, it's much the same, actually. Nothing seems to change all that much. But I do think, I mean, I'm not silly about it. If somebody said, well, you're going to have to be acting now until you drop dead, which could be next year or six years from now, I would think, oh, OK. And then if somebody said you're not going to be allowed to act again after next month, I'd also think, oh, OK. So I do accept what's coming my way. I make the best of it. Absolutely. One thing I do want to ask you about is speaking openly about your struggles and your private life. You've chosen to make this documentary in which we learn a great deal about your private life.

But you come from maybe a time when people didn't speak so openly about their struggles. No, they certainly didn't. So how's that transition been? It was very, very difficult. Yeah? But, you know, I wrote two books. I wrote two books about biography about 20 years ago. And it's much easier talking about yourself when you're writing

than when you're talking. I find it very hard when I'm talking. But I just had to... I put certain boundaries and I never cross over those because I think other people in your life have a right to some privacy. If you're writing about yourself, you have to write about other people. But you don't, it's not license to kill. You know, you have to observe some parameters, I think, for other people.

And even for myself, I was brought up to think that talking about yourself was a bit rude. It was rather bad manners. So I had to get over that as well. There was a lot of getting over. It's been really insightful to learn so much about you. Just before I let you go, I must ask you about your love for London

because it is your home now. It is, yes, it is. And I know it holds a special place in your heart. Oh, I love London. I loved living in the country in Wales. I didn't like living in a town in Wales. I thought London is going to be hell when I get to Rwanda. I've got to get there.

But I'm going to be suicidally unhappy. And I got off the train in Paddington and it was dramatic. My foot hit the pavement outside the train in Paddington and it was dramatic. My foot hit the pavement outside the train, the platform, and I fell in love. And now you move every few years around London. I move every eight years, every eight years, yes. And I walk everywhere. Yes, I never take cars or anything unless I'm going to work. But I walk everywhere and I just adore living in

London. I love it. Dame Sian Phillips, thank you for joining us here on Woman's Hour. And that documentary, Sian Phillips at 90, will be broadcast tonight at 9pm on S4C. And you can catch up on S4C Click and BBC iPlayer. Thank you for

coming in. Thank you. Have you ever heard a piece of music so beautiful it stops you in your tracks? Or do you have a piece of music that has a special healing quality for when times get tough? Maybe you're looking for some inspiration. Well, Clemency Burton-Hill, MBE, is an award-winning British broadcaster, podcaster, author, journalist and musician who has just published the latest book in her best-selling Year of Wonder series called Journal of Wonder. It takes you from January to

December with classical music suggestions for every day. Four years ago in January 2020, Clemency suffered a brain hemorrhage and a massive stroke. She underwent emergency surgery and spent 17 days in a coma. In fact, one of her first interviews as she recovered was here on Woman's Hour in January 2021, just a year later. She now lives in the US, but I'm delighted to say she's back in London for the first time since her brain injury. And she joins me in the studio. Welcome, Clemency. Thank you so much. And welcome back to London. The first time you've been back and you are a Londoner born and bred. How's it feeling?

Born and bred. I was listening to that and I was thinking, oh, I feel like that as well. Like it's being born again. ridiculous to say I have been missing home so much because I've been missing so much since the four years almost since my brain ruptured. But it's amazing to be in London home, but also here in the BBC, which has been such a home from home. So thank you so much. No, thank you for coming in and making time for us. Is it a sense of feeling anchored, I wonder? I think so. I mean, I like to think that I'm a very international human being.

I don't think of myself as a British person or an English person. I'm partly Welsh actually and I'm married to a very all Welsh husband. So, you know, I don't feel that like the national identity, but I've always felt like a Londoner. And I think I wasn't letting myself really feel missing it because I couldn't be here. And also there was so much going on that was so dramatic. And what happened to me on January 2020, you know, then the world shut down. And so although I couldn't speak and I couldn't move, it was a strange corollary with what's going on outside my hospital window and and so I didn't let myself

feel how much I was missing it until I like got here and you know um landed at Heathrow and it just was like oh all the emotions come out yes but oh yeah I know this yeah and that knows me and that feels really wonderful to have that sense of yeah and I should stress that you have been able to travel now because you are well enough to travel? Yeah so what happened to me was called an AVM that actually ruptured and I had no idea whether it was in my brain and sometimes very unlike it's much more rare that it ruptures and also if you do have a ruptured AVM your likelihood of surviving is quite small so I was incredibly lucky for all of those reasons and they treated it with radiotherapy and then hoped for the best that the AVM would be shrunk and then gone. but then my unbelievable neurosurgeon Dr Kelner was happy that it had been gone

so that was the point where we were like okay we're coming back, we're coming back Well we are going to talk about that journey that healing journey and the role that music has played in a moment but let's talk about the book for those who don't know about the Year of Wonder series, can you just explain in more detail what it is and the inspiration behind it? So Year of Wonder, the idea was, I felt very frustrated that music is really for everyone. It's a common good in a way. It shouldn't have boundaries or barriers to entry, but particularly classical music, for lots of different reasons, some understandable, some not.

It often feels, people feel shut out. And I felt I was incredibly privileged that I sort of could be able to be in that space and also on the other side. I've been lucky to have music in my whole life, all through my life, but also many other interests and very many different pursuits. And I always felt this is so wrong, that there's a kind of fake barrier. Like if you don't know what a particular instrument is called or you know lots of the um uh sorry my this is aphasia and apraxia um uh at work um after a brain injury. The idea that somehow if you don't know the lingo, or you don't know what something means, you shouldn't be in the space of classical music. And that I found incredibly distressing and also also really absolutely not true. I mean, as in like it was not okay that people felt they're shut out

for these amazing sound worlds and being able to experience something that we have all always known that music is one of the kind of miraculous things that human beings can do and have done since they possibly even before they formed language verbal language human beings have been finding finding ways to make sound and music. And so I just wanted to make sure that everyone knew that there's not some fancy code. It's literally just music. So come on in. Accessible, making it accessible. Let's hear your suggestion from january the first clemency i am no classical music connoisseur what are we

listening to there by the way no one really has unless you're you know in a very small minority um it's bach and it's the beginning of the year and for my money there is no one like Bach and the kind of ability to put everything what it is to be human the joy and the sorrow and the wretchedness and also the unbelievable kind of just life force. And I think I'm not the only music nut who thinks that is, you know, that Bach is the sort of, you know, the pinnacle.

But lots of people also, it means nothing to them. It doesn't feel anything. And that's also just fine. You know, people often say, you know, I just don't think, you know, or something, maybe it's a Mozart opera or a symphony. And they're like, that's just not my thing. That's great. That means that you're having, you're beginning to understand your.

Yeah, absolutely. I'm with you on that. I don't listen to Indian. I don't listen to Western classical music. I listen a great deal to Indian classical music, but it's the vibrations, it's the pulse, how it makes you feel. And I know that you get into that a great deal as well. Can I ask about how you relate to music now?

Because when you last spoke to Emma, you talked about how you'd relied on music all of your life, but how that relationship was changed because it was a new you. Where is that relationship at now I have to say goodness I mean I'm so feel feel incredibly uh lucky but I feel like I'm it's back like that music is it never really went away but at the in the the beginning, after my brain ruptured, it was so discombobulating.

Obviously, everything was. But not being able to feel or hear music as I used to. And obviously, I can't use my right side really at all. So unfortunately, I'm not able to play the violin again. And I can't do many, many of how felt, how safe I feel in it. So that's a wonderful thing. That's really moving how safe you feel in it. Thank you for sharing that. I know there's a piece that has helped you, Max Richter, Spring 3, a reworking of the four seasons.

Let's take a listen. Clemency, you closed your eyes as soon as that came on. I can see how much joy it brings you. Yeah, it really does. And I could be in this very studio. I've interviewed problem of aphasia it's the fact that it's just beyond language and I I'm so ridiculously grateful to him I think he's such a humble, generous composer and human being. And I think you know that you can feel that, you know, sometimes think people think, oh, classical music is very like, like snooty and snobby. And actually the real human beings who are drawn to do this, they are not looking for, you know, fame or fortune or anything else.

It's like it's a sort of impulse that is very generous for other human beings. that we've been able to hear and re-created and re-recorded and play the music of very many different kinds of human beings from very, very different cultures and countries and societies. The fact that it can speak to you very personally and straight into the heart that's really you know what a what an absolute miracle so I always feel that with um many many pieces but particularly this one is something that you know it's always new and yet also very familiar and very comforting and also exhilarating you expressed that beautifully clemency burton hill what a joy to have you with us here in the studio thank you so much for coming

in and the journal of wonder is out now thank you thank. Thank you. I'm joined now in the studio. It is a day of wonderful studio guests by a woman who wants to share her very difficult experience of what happened to her and her father surrounding the issue of power of attorney. Carolyn Stevens has decided to talk about her ordeal to highlight what can happen if older people are taken advantage of in relation to their capacity to make decisions about their own life. I'm also joined by BBC investigative journalist Sue Mitchell who has made a documentary about what happened. Thank you both for coming in. Let's start with you Carolyn. Tell me what happened to your father. Your mum passed away

and then he went on a saga singles holiday. What happened next? Well, we were very happy. My mum and dad were married for 50 years. My mum died just before their 50th anniversary. And we were happy when dad met someone else. And then within about three months, we had an email. I had an email from the daughter of the lady that dad had met telling me that she was really concerned that my dad was being isolated and that she was trying to destroy my relationship with my father. And we didn't do anything at the time. We all managed it because my dad was independent,

even though he was getting more vulnerable. And when did you realise that this was a significant problem or was going to turn into a significant problem? In 2018, we were really concerned. Dad had moved to a small town where he knew almost no one. He was experiencing heavy falls. He was missing appointments. He was driving without his MOT or insurance.

And then I took him to a dementia assessment because I was really worried. What happened then? The day after the initial dementia assessment, my dad effectively disappeared. He was taken to the home of the lady he'd met. And then things happened really, really fast. And in just over a week, my dad's house was put on the market. He was taken to be married, which the registrar stopped due to my dad's house was put on the market he was taken to be married which the registrar stopped due to my dad's incapacity to answer basic questions and we later learned that within the same week my dad's power of attorney had been taken. And I should say for our listeners the power of attorney is a way of giving someone you trust a legal authority to make decisions on your behalf

if you are no longer able to and these can be decisions about health care well-being as well as financial choices and action were you surprised by this move yeah we were very shocked and it happened so fast i mean just over a week um my dad um we were worried about his capacity, but really, honestly, not even a person with full capacity, I think, would cope very well with in a week putting their house on the market, going to be married and giving away a power of attorney. It was a shockingly fast set of events. I know you tried for years to find him. I know you had no contact with him, not by choice, until you found out that his partner had died in 2022. in power of attorney gives attorneys the possibility of actually deciding where somebody lives and who they contact. It's a very broad ranging power of attorney, which I don't think

many people realize. And my father had signed both property and finance and health and welfare powers of attorney. When the lady who took my father's power of attorney died, we all wrote a letter to her family asking if we could see my father. And then we realized that he had not died, but he was no longer on the electoral register living at that property. And I was advised actually by the registrars to start looking through the electoral register so we actually went my husband and I to the British Library and went manually through the entire electoral register which took us just over a week and finally found my father, which was amazing. And it was almost exactly a year ago, just before Christmas last year. Where was he?

We found him in a tiny care home in rural Norfolk. And then we went, myself, my husband and one of our oldest family friends, and we really couldn't believe where he was. And when we found him, he was in a very small room with only one picture from all of his family possessions. And one of the things I think had worried me the most was that he wouldn't recognise me, but he did. And so actually it was probably the best Christmas present I could ever have had. And, yeah, we all were so happy. I can't tell you, his sister, my aunts and uncles,

all of us, we couldn't believe it. I'm delighted you managed to reconnect with him. It sounds like such an ordeal for you all. You kept on visiting him afterwards. Yeah, we... Various obstacles in place, though. Yeah, which I'm not able to talk about today, I believe. But you did manage to reconnect.

And I know, sadly, you did lose your father earlier this year. Yes, he died actually on Father's Day. I was able to be there. And, yeah, he's finally now buried with my mother, which is what he wanted. And we ended up, after almost five years of this, almost back to normal, our family, in a family funeral, and him with my mother. Well, thank you for sharing that, Karen, and I can see and hear just how difficult it still is to talk about yeah yeah yeah let me bring you in uh sue um you're an investigative journalist and your documentary talks about carolyn's story how did you find out about it well so i i've been recording a 10 part

series for the bbc it's called million dollar lover it's on the Intrigue strand. And it follows a similar story, but set in America, where a wealthy widow later in life had this relationship with someone much younger than her. He'd been homeless and the family saw themselves being pushed to the sidelines. They were worried about similar issues to the ones Carolyn was worried about, that their mother had a cognitive decline, that she was very vulnerable, and that these issues around bereavement, loss in later life, and desire to find love can leave people open to abuse. And so in researching that series, I'd been looking through the medical literature in Britain and came across a British medical journal article that Carolyn had written.

Now in that article, she'd been raising issues about power of attorney hadn't been she hadn't made any mention of her father. This is the first time she's talked publicly like this about her father's case. But I made contact with her and then during our telephone calls, she gradually opened up about what happened in her case. And we decided to make an additional one-off documentary. It's called Finding My Father. And that will be on on BBC Radio 4 next Sunday at half past one. But really, Carolyn was so amazingly brave because this is a very difficult story for her to tell. And since opening up about it,

there was something on News Online yesterday that's drawn forth an unbelievable response from people. So I think it's a really big issue, this, that families, it's not just families, actually. It can sometimes be partners, but these worries about often about inheritance. Obviously, older generations are sitting on property. You know, they've got wealth that their children expect to inherit, want to inherit. What happens when they get a new partner? How does that shake down in families?

I mean, often probably it does work and people navigate those. But on the extremes, these cases are so harrowing and people feel so devastated when things like this can happen. Yeah, there is the wider issue here in that the Powers of Attorney Act has recently changed it's gone digital in an effort to modernize it but there are some concerns that there won't be adequate safeguards in place to protect people like Carolyn's dad in that right. Yeah and it's something that's causing a lot of concern at the moment and it's partly why Carolyn decided to speak out about what's happened to her, difficult as though that's been, because there is this concern that people might sign this power of attorney

and not fully realise the implications. So what does happen, say you have a new lover and you sign over a power of attorney, your family could be left in the cold. And the other reverse is true. You could sign over a power of attorney to your family and your new relationship, your new lover could be left in the cold. You need to navigate these so carefully. And the advice that's coming out just isn't really clear about how people should do this, what advice people should take and who can help them make these very, very difficult decisions. And it's important to

stress that a solicitor cannot grant power of attorney. That decision is entirely down to the individual themselves. I wonder, Sue, whether you can put this into context for us if we have that data do we know how common stories like carolyn's are well we have in britain we have six million people who have signed power of attorney now i'm thinking that probably the cases like carolyn's are on the margins so but it's really difficult to know. Hourglass, the charity, have received a record number of concerns on their helplines from people in similar situations. So they feel or they're telling us that during lockdown more and because of austerity, more people are being exploited, more people are being abused. And the perception is usually the elderly people are abused by strangers, you know, scam callers.

But actually 70% of the cases are family members. They're people who are close to them, who they trust, and who are abusing them financially. So figures are hard to come by. But judging by the response we've had even yesterday to the BBC News Online piece, these are really shocking cases that people are living with and dealing with. And I think there are just more and more of them and we will see more of this. This will be a growing problem. The more people find love in later life, the more people start relationships as they age.

Carolyn, I imagine this is one of the reasons why you wanted to share what is such a difficult story for you to share. Yeah, I mean, I've had enormous help from my MP. But one of the reasons that we wrote the BMJ editorial back in 2021, when the Ministry of Justice first proposed this change of law, was because their specific aim is to make obtaining a power of attorney faster and easier. That's their main aim. And they have gone from an original enduring power of attorney in 1986 with two witnesses and three notifications, so people could then know that that was happening, to no witnesses,

one certificate provider and nobody notified. And I am just incredibly concerned that in our situation, even with the limited safeguards that were in place, one week after a registrar had stopped the marriage, my father's power of attorney was taken. If that occurred with the current safeguards we have, I'm really worried that the new act actually diminishes safeguards and that the government simply hasn't discussed this fully. I should say that we did reach out to the Ministry of Justice for comment, but we haven't had a response as yet. But for now, Caroline, Carolyn Stevens rather, and Sue Mitchell, thank you for coming into the studio, both of you.

And you can hear that documentary that we've been talking about on Sunday lunchtime at 1.30 where Carolyn shares her story. It's called Finding My Father. And if you're concerned about anything that you've heard here, there are support links on our website.

And we'll also be looking in more detail at the Power of Attorney Act next week here on Woman's Hour. I'm sure we've all grumbled about the areas that we live in but how do you make things better? Well you might want to take notes from my next guest Jess Prendergrast is a co-founder of Onion Collective in Somerset. In 2012 over over a pint in the pub, she and her sister Naomi Griffith, along with their friends Georgie Grant, Rachel Kelly, they dreamed up a plan to help their local community of Watchet in West Somerset. They were frustrated with the lack of opportunities in their hometown and saw the talent within their community. So they wanted to create a space where they could bring people together and offer employment.

So when a private housing development on the Quayside fell through due to financial crisis, they asked to take over the site to create a social enterprise instead. They bid for and won £7.2 billion in regeneration grants, which enabled them to build, £1 million rather, which enabled them to build East million pounds rather which enabled them to build east key watch it a purpose-built area filled with workshops studios a classroom a restaurant holiday apartments and even an art gallery local craftivist lynn barlow is currently exhibiting her textile art in the art gallery there and she joins me now along with jess welcome to you both hi take us back to the beginning jess if i could start with you.

What was Watch It like before and why did you want to change things? Watch It was and remains an incredible town. It's beautiful right on the West Somerset coast and it's full of energy and music and culture and it's just a really wonderful place. It has a kind of community that perhaps has been driven out by the prevailing economy in lots of other places. But that area also suffers from some quite significant problems. For example, it has some of the lowest social mobility in the whole country.

So that means that disadvantaged kids have less chance of changing their future than people from anywhere else. So it's not so much that what it needed to be changed it's that the opportunities weren't there for people there and um i guess we felt like as we kind of emerged from having small children and looked at what we wanted to do with our lives in some way um we felt that perhaps there was something we could do by getting together and try and find a way of doing community development where the priorities of of community the best traits of community around you know compassion and care and togetherness and all of those things that kind of make us who we are that if we could put those things at the heart of a development rather than you know housing and profits for someone outside of the place then then that would really kind of

drive the opportunities in in that area and just give some more support to people. And so you created the Onion Collective first of all why is it called the Onion Collective? It's really just because we didn't want to be called something like the Watch It Development Trust and we knew we wanted to be a collective because we operate in a really non-hierarchical way. So everyone brings their skills to the table and we all try and kind of share out the work and also the fun and the joy. Someone along the way said something like our new collective, but not so rural. And then we never kind of we never came up with something better. I think it's a great name. It's a great name. I did mention in my introduction that you received a grant of over seven million pounds.

But how difficult was it to get that money and get this process kickstarted? Yeah, I mean, I'm not going to lie. It was really hard going. You know, it took us a decade really to open East Quay. And I think that's one of the things that's frustrating like it shouldn't be that difficult for people in a community to say actually we want something to be a bit different and to try and raise the funds to do that so we had to um we had to climb an awful lot of hurdles and we had to get a lot of obstacles out of the way and we had to learn a whole load of skills that um you know that that take kind of energy and time so it was it was hard but it's also I think

it's kind of in the doing that you get the joy you know it's achieving something like that together and doing it with people in a community with your friends um that has made it valuable so I wouldn't trade I wouldn't make it too easy I think it's part of the kind of journey is where the power comes from so that's also important that's a good moment for me to bring in the many messages that we've been having in on this marion from kent writes i started gardening on the weed covered council flower bed in the summer it's now a mass of flowers which i grew from cuttings and i bought and purchased 500 daffodil bulbs which three volunteers helped me plant this autumn it should look glorious in the spring and brighten everyone's day. It's been really hard to get people to help and I'm moving out of the area soon.

So I'm worried it may go back to a four foot high thistle weeds. Thank you, Marion. And I hope that doesn't happen. And this listener wrote in to say, I'm proud to be one of three women, all freelance in the film and TV industries. He created an app to help making working to making the working place safer and fairer. We want to see change in our communities. I'll try and read some of the many messages that you've been sending in towards the end of the programme.

But I wonder, on that point, women coming together, working together in this collective, do you think that's impacted how you've been received Jess? Yeah I'm sure it has I think I think it's fair to say we've experienced a bit of sexism along the way and what's interesting about it is that you I think you get this in communities generally women doing something together as a business are often sort of regarded as slightly amateur and fluffy and we got a bit of that kind of you know do you really know what you're doing and can you actually run a business and then on the other side we got you know we were sort of calculated

witches who were doing something you know dangerous and so I guess those challenges often come if you're doing something and I think in a way it's a bit of a badge of honor I think if you are trying to challenge power structures and you're trying to do things differently and in our case saying you know the economy is not working really and there's a better way of doing economics and and here's how you might do it you know if you challenge what's the prevailing norm then then it's it's going to rile some people and And so we've kind of got used to it and just, you know, used the solidarity and friendship that we have from working together

to kind of try not to be upset by it and just keep moving things forward positively. Lynne, I'm going to bring you in here. You're a local artist and you have an exhibit on at the East Quay Watch It at the moment. Tell us how significant this is for you. It's been a joy, really. Overwhelmingly positive.

And the fact that it took place at East Quay and the ethos of East Quay was really important to me. And just explain why that is, why that issue of social mobility is so important to me. And just explain why that is, why that issue of social mobility is so important to you. Because I think with art in general or in particular, it isn't that accessible. And I think what EaseKey does really well is to give that accessibility.

So you can come along, you can view an exhibition or do a workshop or whatever and actually engage and be part of that community. That's important to you. And you personally, you've had quite a life. You were in care when you were 12 years old. You experienced substance abuse. You've been an activist at Greenham Common. You studied at Cambridge.

You're now an artist. And your art represents those journeys that you've had. You fit them all into these beautiful quilts. How do you do that? Well, this has been kind of quite a journey for me because when I was given the opportunity to create something for this exhibition, I came up with the idea that I really wanted to use the quilts to tell a story, not only my personal story but to reflect on on what was happening in the world and issues and whatever so each quilt um was a 20-year period of my life but but my story was only the thread that kind of linked the quilts together um what what was happening in the quilts together. What was happening in the quilts surrounding my story were kind of events

that were happening in the world or a particular, like the first quilt, a lot of it was about Sheffield and South Yorkshire and that landscape and decline of industry and whatever. So although I was telling my story, I was hoping to enable people to connect with that time period and reflect on what their lives were like in that period. And that's one of the reasons why you choose to call yourself a craftivist as well, which is quite the term. Yeah, I mean, for me, my craft is my kind of voice. It's become the way that I can articulate. I'm no longer, you know, I'm 60,

so I'm no longer able to be kind of that physical activist anymore. So my work is my activism. Yeah. Jess, just back to you. I know you're from a very entrepreneurial family and, you know, you've got a good education. You went to Oxford, you grew up on a zoo. We didn't get a chance to talking about that. But all of this inspiration around you um what advice would you give to women who are inspired by your story but may not know how to go about it um i think i think there's a couple of things i think firstly um figure out what your motivation is i was at a an event recently

with some brilliant community entrepreneurs from all over the country and someone who i can't remember who was it who said it which I apologize but somebody said that motivation is the bit between anger and hope and that's what makes us kind of get on and do things so I think that's really key like what is it that makes you angry and what do you want to change and then also where's the joy where's the hope where's the thing you're driving towards that's the bit to find and then the other thing I'd say is find some people to do it with you know everything we've done at onion collective we've done because there are because it's a collective and because we're doing this work with our friends um and there's always someone to rely on and i think uh that kind of lesson of everything is that much easier if you do it with do it together with other people is

really really critical jess prendergrast and lynn barlow we wish you all the best uh with that project and thank you for joining us here on women's hour and thank you to the many of you who have sent in so many messages about what you've been hearing on today's program but that is it for today do you join me again tomorrow at four for weekend women's hour where we'll hear from two young women who have been in the care system and why they want to share their experiences. That's Weekend Women's Hour tomorrow from four. Thanks for listening. There's plenty more from Women's Hour

over at BBC Sounds. Hello, this is Marion Keys. And this is Tara Flynn. We host a podcast you might like for BBC Radio 4 and BBC Sounds called Now You're Asking each week we take

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or the lack of anything really and apply our worldly wisdom in a way which we hope will help but also hopefully entertain join us why don't you

search up Now You're Asking on BBC Sounds thanking you Join us for Don't You. Search up Now You're Asking on BBC Sounds. Thank you. I'm Sarah Trelevan and for over a year I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there who was faking pregnancies. I started like warning everybody. Every doula that I know. It was fake.

No pregnancy. And the deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth. How long has she been doing this? What does she have to gain from this? From CBC and the BBC World Service, The Con, Caitlin's Baby. It's a long story, settle in. Available now.