Woman's Hour - Dental health and menopause, Lisa Nandy, Police disclosures, Joy of stationery

Episode Date: August 17, 2021

Hot flushes are probably the first thing you associate with going through the menopause. But Radio 2's Liza Tarbuck had an interesting angle on it she wanted us to investigate - gums! Decreases in oestrogen can have a significant effect on your dental health including bleeding gums, burning, a dry mouth and even tooth loss. But the link to menopause and perimenopause is often missed. Dr Uchenna Okoye, Clinical Director of London Smiling Dental Group and Dr Louise Newsom, NHS Advisor for the National Menopause Programme, discuss the signs to watch out for and things you can do to help.Today the government is pulling together a specific plan to help Afghan refugees come and settle in the UK. Girls and women will be especially helped. Women's rights activist and Nobel laureate Malala Yousafzai has called for world governments to open their borders and take 'bold stances for the protection of women and girls' in Afghanistan. But what might that bold stance look like? Emma Barnett speaks to Shadow Foreign Secretary Lisa Nandy.Rape prosecutions have fallen dramatically - to the lowest ever level since data started being collected. But to what extent is this a result of intrusive requests by police and the CPS to access victims' records? Rape crisis centres around the UK are telling Woman's Hour that requests for everything from counselling records to school reports can deter women from taking the case further. Denying access to records may also lead to the case being dropped. Melanie Abbott reports on the burden women feel to prove a perfect life history in order to move forward with rape prosecutions.It's August and for lots of parents, it's time for back to school supply shopping. But it's not just kids that want all the latest products. In 2020 alone, households in the UK bought £3.52 billion pounds worth of stationery and drawing materials. And today, we're looking specifically at pens - buying them, trying them out and even watching videos of people writing with them. Pen TikToker and hand-letterer Jenna Meyers and mum Rhiannon Morgan, who runs mummy of four YouTube channel, join Emma to discuss all things pen-related.

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 Emma Barnett and welcome to Woman's Hour from BBC Radio 4. Good morning to you. I thought we'd start today's programme with the words of someone who knows firsthand what it's like to come up against the Taliban. Malala Yousafzai, the Nobel Prize winner and women's rights advocate, has been talking about her fears for the people of Afghanistan. Now the Taliban have taken control. She was shot in the head by Taliban gunmen in Pakistan on her way home from school in 2012 before finding a home in this country. Have a listen to what she has to say. We are living in a world where, you know, where we are talking about advancements, about equality, about gender equality.

We cannot see a country going decades and centuries back. We have to take some bold stances for the protection of women and girls, for the protection of minority groups, and for peace and stability in that region. I think every country has a role and responsibility right now. Countries need to open their borders to Afghan refugees, to the displaced people. I have not yet made contact with Prime Minister Boris Johnson, but whoever can hear me right now, I think it's important for them to remember that they have such an important strategic leadership role to play right now. And they must take a bold stance for the protection of human rights right now.

It is important not just for peace in Afghanistan, but for peace globally. Malala Yousafzai talking to Seema Kotecha on Newsnight. Bold stances for the protection of women and girls. What does that look like from where you're sitting? What would that mean? Send me a message, let me know. 84844 or on social media, you can get in touch with me in the programme at BBC Women's Hour or email me through the Women's Hour website.

What does that mean? How to help? A lot of you getting in touch yesterday when you were hearing the voices of Afghani women saying, what can we do? What can we do? Well, what should this country be doing? And what do you think countries around the world should be doing?

Reports today of a quiet Kabul, women and girls off the streets, not knowing whether they can keep going to school or to their workplaces. One woman talking to reporters said she felt she would die if she wasn't allowed to go back to work. It's her life, her existence. A reporter for CNN, you may have seen this, Clarissa Ward, was told to stand aside by the Taliban while reporting from Kabul simply because she is a woman. But a member of the Taliban did talk to her and told her that women can't work with men, will need to cover their faces except for their eyes and that they would need to wear gloves.

Yesterday, when we did hear from those Afghani women who were able to talk to us, if you missed it, catch back up on BBC Sounds. It was incredibly brave and powerful and it was important to hear what they had to say. I should say when we heard what they had to say, it's sobering, it's chilling, but it's also one of those things where you think, well, what are we going to do? And that's what I want to turn our attention to today. But I also wanted to let you know that we invited many more women on yesterday. And as always with producing and making programmes, sometimes they get back to you after the programme.

And we received one text from one of them, of course we won't name her, saying, apologies, my family and husband are under risk. My home was raided by armed men. I can't speak. Bold stances for the protection of women and girls, to echo what Malala Yousafzai had to say. The attention has gone today towards refugees and what specific countries can do to help. The Foreign Secretary, Dominic Raab, speaking on the Today programme earlier on Radio 4, refused to say how many this country will take as the details will be coming from the Prime Minister and Home Secretary in short order. But what should our

response look like? In a moment you'll hear the vision of Lisa Nandy, the Shadow Foreign Secretary but I'm very interested in your views and your take on this. Do get in touch, use the usual numbers and ways to do so. Rachel's already done so on social media. She says safe passage for refugees should be agreed between all the countries who had a hand in Afghanistan. This includes women, children and men. I've seen criticism on social media of the men trying to flee on the American plains for, quote, the abandoning of women and children. It has to be all of them.

Where are you on this? Let us know. Perhaps there's also some experiences that you wish to bring to bear and stories you wish to share. Very open to hearing those as well. Also on today's programme, Challenge Accepted. Lisa Tarbuck on Radio 2 challenged us here at Women's Hour to talk dental health and menopause. It's happening. I hope she'll be listening and all of you too, of course. I'll be speaking to a top police officer about the delicate balance between privacy and justice in a special report. And we'll be talking pens. I'm a big fan of them.

I'm not sure I'm this big a fan. Are you part of something called Pentalk? We'll explain that. Do you love the humble pen so much that you could sit for hours watching others use them? All that to come. But first, today the government is pulling together a specific plan to help Afghan refugees come to the UK and settle. Girls and women will be especially helped. We know already that the resettlement scheme will be based on how the UK has helped Syrian refugees in the past. And we've been told more details are coming from the Prime Minister. Last night, the Home Office said the UK had admitted more than 3,300 Afghan interpreters, staff and their

families to the UK for resettlement already. The Home Office said, and this is a direct quote, it will be guided by the capacity of local authorities when deciding how many Afghan refugees can come to the UK. We did invite a member of the government on the programme this morning, but no one was available. Lisa Nandy is the Shadow Foreign Secretary and MP for Wigan. I spoke to her just before coming on air. Dominic Raab, the Foreign Secretary, has been giving interviews this morning, speaking on the Today programme earlier, and has yet to say, because he said it's for the Prime Minister and the Home Secretary to announce how many refugees this country will be taking from Afghanistan. How many do you think

it should be? We've had numbers from Germany at 10,000, Canada 20,000. Well, I know this is the sort of thing that drives journalists mad, but I am reluctant to put a number on it because we don't yet know the scale of the refugee crisis. What we're absolutely clear about is that the UK must do its bit. We have an obligation to the people of Afghanistan. We've spent 20 years in Afghanistan. We have a long history in the country. And we know that there will be a significant refugee crisis. We've already seen around three and a half million people moving internally within the country. I spoke to a friend in Afghanistan last week. He said that around 30,000 to 40,000 people were leaving the country every day.

But the scale of the crisis will depend very much on what we do next. And that's why we've been saying there has got to be some process of dialogue, as unpalatable as that is, with the Taliban to try to minimise the human rights abuses. And we've got to get some aid and support into the country which is complicated now that there is a Taliban regime in place but nevertheless that is incredibly important if we can minimize the scale of the humanitarian crisis we may see less fallout in terms of people having to flee the country so all of these things are very uncertain and unknown at the moment but we certainly want the UK to step up and to take similar action as we did with the Syrian refugee crisis when we set up a specific scheme to process people and resettle them here in the UK. We've absolutely got to do that.

It's just if it's going to be tens of thousands, and I presume that's where you would put the figure. I recognise you might not have the exact figure because, you know, we've got a lot of people getting in touch with us here saying, what are we doing? And not least, you know, with the words of Malala Yousafzai in people's ears, specifically around girls, women and girls and children. We need bold moves. We need to be bold, she says, says a girl who was shot in the head by the Taliban. Yeah, and I absolutely agree with Malala about that. And in fact, I think there is very strong support from the British public too. My inbox is absolutely full of people from Afghanistan asking for help at the moment. But there was one email that was slightly different yesterday from a woman who said her husband had died recently. She had a big house. She wanted to offer help. I think the

British people are really stepping up and showing what we can do. And I very much hope that what we'll hear from the Prime Minister tomorrow will certainly be pressing him on this, is a bold and generous offer to the people of Afghanistan. Minimum numbers, yes, that would be helpful. But we shouldn't be putting a ceiling on the number of people that we can help and support until we know the scale of the crisis. Do you think we should be matching Canada? Well, Canada, as I understand it, is saying 20,000 over a number of years. It's not at all clear whether that's going to be sufficient. I think we need a Europe-wide agreement about how we're going to handle this, and we need to be working with regional partners as well. I think countries like Pakistan are likely to see the first impact of the refugee crisis on their doorstep. And so it's absolutely in their interest to work with us as well.

And what we really want to see in the Labour Party is safe legal routes for people to get here. Don't forget, just a few months ago, the Home Secretary pushed legislation through Parliament to say that anybody even assisting somebody to seek and claim asylum here in the UK was going to be criminalised. That's the backdrop against which we're operating, a government that has dragged its feet even at providing sanctuary

to those people who supported us over the last 20 years and are now being targeted by the telecoms So we need to hear a complete change of approach. Sorry, the Foreign Secretary has stressed this morning that in order of priority will be those who have assisted this country in Afghanistan. That is the priority at the moment. And also with the Syrian refugee model being the model,

it's just resettled just over 20,000 refugees. There will also be people listening to this programme who will of course have the people of Afghanistan in their hearts, but will also be concerned about more pressure, potentially on local councils, some of them such as Kent, which are completely subsumed with the challenge of resettling refugees. Well, that's right. There's got to be a coordinated response.

And that's one of the reasons why we've been saying to the government for weeks now, we're seeing what is happening and we've got to make sure that we deal with this properly i mean in my own constituency whenever there's a uh a spike in the numbers of refugees coming to the uk circo the private company that is contracted by the home office to house asylum seekers will buy up wholly unsuitable accommodation with asylum-seeking families confined to their rooms for days on end and local people not warned or informed about the fact that this is about to happen. I mean, this is just a recipe for disaster. So we really do need a coordinated and proper response. But

could I just say to you, Emma, as well, that even in the last few days when the government has said that we will support those people who supported us there is there are still caveats on what that support will be the home office website is still saying that you can apply to that scheme if you worked for the british government with only a few limited exceptions there are more people who supported us they supported the british media as you'll know there are photographers journalists. There are people who worked with the British Council and with our NGOs, and they are being deliberately targeted. The government has hours, not days, to sort our airways. I haven't heard much from him during these last few days with the shame of the West over Afghanistan. He was here, of course, and the Labour Party put us in Afghanistan. Yeah, I think there are lessons to be learned from the political mistakes that have been made

over 20 years by successive UK governments, including Labour. I don't think it was wrong to want to degrade the capability of Al-Qaeda after the 9-11 attacks. Don't forget, of course, that the UK was the biggest victim of the 9-11 attacks after the United States. And this was a real and present threat. But I think the Labour government, in my view, wholly underestimated at the time the challenge that would then follow once al-Qaeda had been degraded in terms of its capability of building a secure and inclusive Afghan state. That's what the UK and the US have been trying to help the Afghan people achieve for the last 20 years. And we completely underestimated the challenge that that would face. And then from then, we've seen

successive political mistakes, including Cameron and Obama signaling that the time in Afghanistan was limited, which gave the Taliban a real morale boost. It said to them that this was just a waiting game. And we're seeing the consequences of all these mistakes playing out in Afghanistan at the moment. But what happens next is not inevitable and we are not powerless. And there are things that we can do to help the Afghan people now and we ought to do it. But we've just heard from Joe Biden saying, you know, it's not a mistake to get out. If they won't fight for themselves, why should we? And, you know, specifically because we're talking on Women's Hour, Kamala Harris as vice president has tweeted saying ending US military involvement in Afghanistan is the right decision. She is a great advocate for women's rights. And we're going to watch the clock on those go back.

Well, I agree with you. And I think we have an obligation to the people of Afghanistan. It's not for other countries to tell the United States whether they withdraw troops. They're a democracy and that is up to them. But it cannot be right to say that whilst we're withdrawing troops, we're also walking away from the people of Afghanistan. And I've been critical of the speech that Joe Biden made last night. I think that approach is the wrong one.

And I hope that the UK government will make that clear as one of America's closest allies. We have an obligation to speak up when our partners are getting it wrong. And I think in this case, the US is getting it wrong. Lisa Nandy there, the Shadow Foreign Secretary.

Many messages coming in, just a couple to give you a flavour. I think all Afghan women and girls should be declared legitimate asylum seekers and offered the protection of the UK, EU and US without question. That's what Britain and other countries could declare as a bold move to acknowledge that all women and girls are at risk of persecution. Jim's got in touch, That's from Bridie.

Jim's got in touch to say set up female protection forces. And another one here saying how can accepting tens of thousands of refugees help? There are already hundreds of thousands in camps on the Afghan borders. God knows how we can help as every single person. A Western country accepts an unknown number are encouraged to try and come. And others saying, do they definitely want to leave or do they just want their country back it's not for us to decide so many messages coming in about the response and what that response should be please keep those messages coming in

you can text on 84844 now hot flushes is possibly the first thing you associate with going through the menopause but radio 2's l Lisa Tarbuck had an interesting angle on it that she wanted us to take a look at. This week I have been having, I have been mainly having, a gum specialist in my mouth. It's true. Apparently your gums change particularly after menopause for ladies. It's a very interesting topic,

which I am hoping to push into the minds of Radio 4 Woman's Hour. Lisa, I hope you're listening. Did you know this was a thing? Apparently it is. Yes, your hormones can have a significant effect on your dental health and cause bleeding gums, burning a dry mouth and even lead to tooth loss. To discuss this with me, Dr. Uchenna Okoye, Clinical Director of London Smiling Dental Group and Dr. Louise Newsome, NHS Advisor for the National Menopause Programme.

Dr. Uchenna, if I could start with you, do you see this a lot? Hello there. Yes, I do. And I do and I'm so thank you Lisa for highlighting this because it's a huge passion of mine everybody's used to the hot flush and all the rest of it but people forget that I always say that the two ends of the body the top you know your mouth and the lower end they're highly connected so everything that affects it affects the mouth as well like dryness and etc so it's great to be having this conversation and I said a few of the the symptoms there can you tell us a bit more what what have you seen so basically what tends to happen is you you have more of the symptoms that you normally would anything to do with hormones women are susceptible

to so bleeding gums gum disease toothache dry mouth because your mouth is dry you produce less saliva you get a very distressing condition sometimes called burning mouth which is to do with oestrogen receptors you have a lot of oestrogen receptors in your mouth. So when the oestrogen goes down, as happens with menopause, there are challenges as a result. So what I say to women is to go into training. So anytime you have what I call hormonal episodes, puberty, pregnancy, menopause, go into training. And what do I mean by that? You need to almost compensate. So you need to work really hard with your hygienist, you need to kind of do all the things that we need for great oral care, and just be aware that you're more susceptible to disease,

more susceptible to problems. Let's bring in Louise to this, Dr. Louise Newsome. What is that connection between the hormonal changes, the menopause and your mouth? We have oestrogen receptors all over our body. There's not one cell that doesn't have an oestrogen receptor in it. So when our hormone levels start to decline, actually during the perimenopause, which can occur for decades before the menopause, our oestrogen levels drop. And then when we're menopausal, the hormones drop and stay low forever. So that means most of us have low levels for a third of our lives. So the oestrogen is very important on the supporting structures of our teeth, the ligaments, the bones, the gums, everywhere. And so as we've heard, people can get lots of symptoms. And I certainly speak to a lot of women who have excruciating burning mouth, dry mouth.

Their taste changes as well. And it can be really uncomfortable. Sadly, a lot of women don't know that these symptoms can be due to the perimenopause and menopause. And I was reading a study yesterday and only 7% of dentists knew that the menopause actually can affect the mouth. So we need to know as women that it's happening. So when we go to see a hygienist or a dentist, we can actually be talking about our hormones, but also we should be getting the right help. So replacing our hormones with the right dose and type of HRT actually will improve the symptoms because we're treating the underlying cause. I was going to say, will that mean once you're

through that bit or you are taking something to help that it will go? So no one's ever through the menopause because it's a hormone deficiency that lasts forever. So whether someone has symptoms or not, they still have a hormone deficiency. And symptoms can really change. So some women might start with hot flushes, and then they go and think, that's it, I'm through the menopause. But of course, they're not, they have no hormones. And then they might come in their 60s, 70s, I've seen women in their 80s with other symptoms, such as memory problems, sleep problems, or mouth problems as well, or vaginal dryness, because the tissues are exactly the same in our vagina as our mouth. So it's very important that we look at hormone replacement, because also, there's a risk of diseases without our hormones.

So heart disease, diabetes, osteoporosis, dementia, really important women health diseases that actually are costing the economy a lot of money to treat. Let's come back to hormonal replacement in just a moment. But to come back to you, Eugenia, when you treat women for this, is it more important to treat the hormone side of this or actually treat the issue itself?

Which way round? I think it's a combination. For me as a dentist, it's the issues. So as Dr. Lewis said, there are actually studies that HRT, that women that are using HRT have a low incidence of gum disease. So it does have a significant impact. I don't know where the study about the seven percent of dentists when that was done but a lot of dentists are much more aware of the link between you know perimenopause than they were before and i feel that most people see their

dentists much more regularly than they do their doctors and even for me having oh i don't know about that i saw saw a friend yesterday confess they hadn't been to the dentist in three years. Anyway. Well, we did have the pandemic in the middle. But your dentist is in a unique position to be able to recognise certain symptoms. And for me, myself personally going,

you know, because being perimenopausal and I was prescribed with antidepressants. So when patients come in now and I'm asking about their medical history and things like this flag up, it's, it's wonderful to be able to ask them, have they thought about the menopause and they talk about the symptoms and being able to, to help them with this. So all the, the connective tissue, and even for myself, I do a lot of cosmetic dentistry so often I get

women at this age coming in because they kind of it's not the thing such as dryness or gum disease but it's aesthetic stuff and they're like suddenly I wake up and my teeth are crowded and you know everything's falling apart and again it's because the collagen is unraveling, teeth move. This is a significant time. So whatever brings them in, then it gives me the opportunity to be able to educate them and teach them about the lifestyle choices with the brushing, the flossing, what they eat. Even the type of toothpaste makes a difference. So if you use toothpaste with SLS, that can exacerbate and make your mouth, your mucosa much soarer. And also, just to pick up very briefly on something you said there, you know, about

anxiety, perhaps as well in perimenopausal women, you know, people grinding teeth, and that also being a part of it. We just had a message from Catherine who says, so that's why I have a burning mouth much of the time we are educating live on air which is probably very good for you both to know and why I'm sure you agreed to come on Louise just to come back to hormone replacement you mentioned that of course that's not not an option for everyone or they certainly not necessarily want to do that for various reasons which we've explored at length on this program but are there any other treatments available that you would say if you are going through this but you don't want to go for HRT?

There's no treatment that will replace hormones. And so we also know from the NICE guidance, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence guidelines, that the majority of women benefit from having their own hormones back. There's never been a study that show that body identical HRT, which is available on the NHS, has any statistically significant increased risk of breast cancer, and it reduces the risk of disease as well. So the majority of women actually can take HRT, yet we know less than 10% of women in some areas actually take it. So there's a big disparity. We need to think about how we can replace these hormones because it improves our health. But I think as women who are perimenopausal or menopausal, before we think about treatment, we need to think about diagnosis. So I think we need to empower ourselves with the right knowledge and information. So then we can get the right treatment and support

pertinent for us. So as you know, we've got a free app called Balance, so women can download it, and then they can print off a health report, which they can take to their doctor with all the symptoms on it and say to their doctor or healthcare professional, these are my symptoms. I think I'm perimenopausal. Now can we talk about the right options of treatments that pertinent for me? Well, thank you very much to both of you. And I suppose we should thank Lisa Tarbuck for having difficulty with her mouth and then using it to set a challenge and educate us or help educate us. Many messages coming in with people kind of having a realisation moment as they listen to it.

And because I really do listen to what you have to say when you get in touch and we read through so many of the messages and try and incorporate them in some way, shape or form, either into the live programme or a subsequent programme. I have to say a real trend since I started here on Women's Hour in January is a question around the impact of the COVID vaccination of various COVID vaccinations, all of them,

and the risk of miscarriage and fertility. And we've been keeping an eye on developments for you. And there is an update I wanted to share. The MHRA, the Medicines and Healthcare

Products Regulatory Agency, has been gathering data and has said yesterday that there is no evidence that vaccines increase the risk of miscarriage, stillbirth, congenital anomalies or birth complications or that Covid vaccines affect fertility and the ability to have children. The agency also say that from the cases reported to their yellow card scheme quote pregnant women have reported similar suspected reactions to the vaccines as people who are not pregnant. Now, obviously, they will keep collecting data, we'll keep across that story.

But there is a clear update for all of you who have written in asking about any known risks. But coming on to a special report for Women's Hour regarding rape prosecutions, we do know that the number of rape prosecutions has fallen to its lowest level since the data began being collected. Figures revealed around two weeks ago showed over three years, over the three years, excuse me, up to May 2020, prosecutions and convictions for rape more than halved. Rape crisis centres around the UK have been telling Women's Hour one reason is increasingly intrusive requests to access victims' records. And we are not just talking about mobile phones. Authorities are asking for everything from school reports

through to counselling notes. They say that this can deter women from taking cases further or if they do not agree to the requests, the case may be dropped. Our reporter Melanie Abbott has been looking into this. Melanie, what have you found? Yeah, this was raised first by the Centre for Women's Justice with me. That's a campaigning charity. And they told me that they'd been hearing of lots of women who were receiving increasingly blanket requests for all kinds of what you might

consider the most personal information. This happened to Nina, who I spoke to. She has agreed to waive her anonymity, though we are not going to use her real name. She had already been asked for two downloads of her phone after she reported a rape. Then the Crown Prosecution Service came back for more data. This is when they requested a lot more information from me. I mean, at this point, it had been about 18 months since I first reported the rape. They also wanted a list of every address I'd ever lived at since birth. They wanted to check in with local authorities, like social services and things to see if I had ever had any involvement in social services as a child and as a teenager. They wanted contacts for all the schools I'd ever been to. So

including like primary school, they wanted like, you know, school records and things. They wanted full access to my medical records from birth to see, you know, had I ever been diagnosed with depression or anxiety? Had I ever been to counselling or therapy? They wanted my notes from every sort of therapy session I'd ever been to. They wanted all this information to see if I was of good character. What did you make of that? At this point, I'd kind of lost faith in the whole process already. Obviously, with the school records and stuff, I was pretty horrified. You know, what does it matter how I was at school? It's got nothing to do with what this man did to me.

And what's equally frustrating is that this level of data and information to get a sense of me as a character is not requested from the accused you know to get his therapist note to see if he's got anger issues to see if he's got a history of this kind these kind of thoughts but they are investigating me as an entire person to see whether or not I could potentially be a liar or to see whether or not I could potentially be a bad witness just opening your life up to something very I don't know something that you don't trust and something that makes you feel very vulnerable and you already have been as a rape victim a particularly vulnerable person. Were there things in your records that you were worried about the police or the defence knowing? Not in terms of my character as a person I know I know I'm a good person I know I'm an honest

person I know I'm not I know I'm not a liar um I have ADHD and they were particularly interested in this one of the symptoms is poor working memory they were particularly interested in how my ADHD might affect my moods and my memory and uh would it make me a bad witness I understand wanting to know about it that I mean I've medicated for it so that I've had treatment for it. You can't say that because of neurodiversity, a neurodivergent person could never be a witness in a crime. How relevant is it that I have ADHD? How relevant is it that I might have had a detention for not doing my homework? You feel like it's a bit like that song, you feel like you're fighting the law. And I don't want to fight the law. I want the law to fight for me because I'm a victim it's uh it's very frustrating what did you ultimately decide to do when the police called that night and they requested all this data it was 8 p.m on a Sunday and I had said I want to speak to my ISFA the independent sexual violence advisor just to understand what are my rights the CPS are basically insisting that they wanted the full access and that they weren't going to back down on this and my my solicitor was insisting that

they had to do it this way that followed the guidelines eventually after a bit back and forth the cps wrote me a letter to say that they weren't taking the case any further the reason they dropped the case was because we weren't agreeing to just let them have at it with all the data of my entire life. We can't know for sure that the decision to drop the case was linked to your pushing back on not handing over all of this data because of course it is very difficult to get rape cases to court anyway. Yes, it's incredibly difficult. But having been through the process myself and having spoke to other survivors and having spoke to a lot of the network of support people behind that, like the solicitors and the ISPAs I was talking about, I have to say, I think a huge amount of people are dropping out of the system because it is soul destroying,

because it takes over your life, because you are fighting against the very system that you grew up your whole life feeling was there to protect you you feel like you're having your heart your life ripped out of your body and and laid bare on a table but you haven't done anything wrong and there are just so many people that will be giving up on this because they need to move on you can't be a rape victim being investigated as a liar for years of your life I would rather go through the rape again than ever go through reporting the rape again wow that's quite a strong thing to say and I'm not joking when I said my situation of rape it wasn't a stranger in a dark alleyway and you know it was a different type. The process of reporting the rape has been far more soul-destroying to me than the rape that I went through. It has stuck

with me a lot longer, it has destroyed my sense of self, it has destroyed my trust in the system, it has left me empty and broken. That was Nina's experience and the force which handled her case told me this wasn't a routine request and that the case was Nina's experience and the force which handled her case told me this wasn't a routine request and that the case was dropped because it was decided there wasn't a realistic prospect of a conviction. I have been in touch with two other women though who told me that they had had requests for similar data which they have reluctantly agreed to and they're waiting to hear if their cases will proceed. And Mel, I know you've also been speaking to rape crisis centres about this. That's right. I rang 20 in the UK.

That is about half of the total. 17 got back to me. 11 of those said that this was a problem they had regularly encountered. One told me that they have refused every request for data because they don't think any were reasonable. Another told me that this trawl through records means that anyone with, say, additional learning needs, a mental health condition, a history of addiction or sex work, or who's had subsequent contact with that abuser, can then be assorted with impunity under this current system.

That's what they thought. And she told me she would never report sexual violence with maybe the exception of a stranger rape. And one told me that you just can't be Mary Poppins, but some forces do seem expect you to be that. Now, rape crisis centres said that police didn't pursue one case because a woman had been accused of cheating in a university exam. It's an extraordinary insight. We'll put that to a top police officer very shortly. These kind of requests, are they increasing? It's hard to know. The centres aren't keeping any stats, but anecdotally, yes.

Now, this could be a response to the case of Liam Allen. You may remember that was a rape trial. It collapsed in 2017 when text messages from the alleged victim, which had been sent to Liam Allen, were finally disclosed. And they did undermine the whole case, as I say, it collapsed. And it led to a review of thousands of other cases all over the UK to ensure that all of the information had been given to the police and then was disclosed to the defence. Thanks, Mel. I know you're staying with us. I want to talk now to Lucy Hayton from the Women and Girls Network, which helps rape victims in London. Good morning. Good morning. Thanks for inviting me. It's a delicate balance, this, isn't it? It's very

important, of course, that all facts are on the table. Yes, absolutely. We have to have the facts on the table. But those facts have to be facts. It can't be professional speculation. And those facts have to be relevant to the case at hand. And as you've just heard from the report there, that is often not the case. So yes, we need fairness, we need balance in the system. But as over a decade's worth of reports have now made clear, there is undue scrutiny placed on survivors without the same scrutiny being put on perpetrators. So yes, we need fairness and balance, but we don't have it yet. How big do you think this trawl through the person alleging that they've been raped

past could be having on either people coming forward or cases being able to proceed? Yes, it certainly is playing a part. I don't think we have good enough data with regards to that, but we know that it's playing a part because we see survivors in our centres either being told that their cases won't go forward when they resist such intrusions, or we have survivors themselves dropping out because they can't be assured that their most personal records relating to their welfare, counselling, health, mental health won't be used by the defence to undermine their credibility or won't actually be seen by the perpetrator themselves. They just don't receive that sort of reassurance. And furthermore, I think what's really important to make clear is, and the report alluded to this, is that there's a really strong

equalities issue when it comes to this, because we know that survivors who have experienced greater levels of adversity in their lives, or survivors who've experienced oppression based on race, class, sexuality, immigration status, have more to fear. They may have more records about them, for example, social care records, or they may be concerned that there could be bias or prejudice within their records that could then be used by the system to discredit them. So I really think it's important that we urgently review this and look at this from that equalities perspective, because the impact is really wide ranging. Thank you very much. Lucy Hayton from the Women and Girls Network.

Melanie Abbott, our reporter, is still here. Any examples of good practice? Well, yeah, I was beginning to wonder as I did my ring round. It was becoming rather depressing until I spoke to Essex. Now, here there's a specialist service. It's worked closely with the police and the CPS since 2015 and has seen massive improvements, they say, in the type of requests they receive. They appoint an independent sexual violence advisor, that's a specialist known as an ISVA, to work with the CPS and the police right from the beginning whenever a rape report is made. Rebecca Brandt from the service, it's called Synergy, explained it to me. Sometimes victims and survivors have a lot of complex needs and a lot going on in their lives at one time and to sign a consent form to consent to your records from social care, from police,

from schools, from counselling services, Sometimes it may be difficult to understand the criminal justice processes. So having an ISVA in place immediately helps victims and survivors understand probably an alien process that's going on for them. You do still get requests from the police then, do you? Of course. It's our policy not to discuss the details of the investigation or the incident. Councillors keep memory prompts. So that might be a brief note on our system in terms of the work that has been carried out in that session. But has that been done deliberately? So there's not too much to hand over if those notes are requested?

We explain that we are only keeping brief notes and that we will not be discussing the incident. Do you still get those kinds of requests perhaps for social services records going back? We're told even some police are requesting school records. I think probably up to five years ago we were receiving those kind of requests. But again, we've worked really closely with Essex Police and the CPS to understand proportionate requests for records around victims and survivors. I think we're extremely fortunate here in Essex that the police and CPS are committed to not making disproportionate requests and keeping those requests in the line of the law. I do understand that these requests are happening in many other places where those partnerships may not be as strong. We've introduced a number of different meetings, trainings, partnership working, feedback processes to enable

our CPS and police to understand the impacts of some of those requests. We're extremely disappointed that this is happening in other areas. I think it's very important that organisations like the Centre for Women's Justice are challenging these disproportionate requests. I think we're making small inroads in Essex to improving victims and survivors' experiences and we're really proud of our best practice models in Essex but we're making small inroads in Essex to improving victims and survivors experiences and we're really proud of our best practice models in Essex but we're certainly not all the way there yet and ultimately the whole criminal justice process needs restructuring in terms of its responses to victims and survivors that are reporting sexual offences. Rebecca Brandt talking to Melanie Abbott

there the Crown Prosecution Service is revisiting the guidelines surrounding this and told us that they are clear mobile phones and other personal data should only be requested where absolutely necessary and seeking therapy will not damage a prosecution case. The CPS added no victim should delay accessing therapeutic support and it's committed to working more closely with the police from the outset of rape investigations so relevant lines of inquiry are discussed at an early stage balancing the complainant's right to privacy with the suspect's right to a fair trial. Chief Constable Sarah Crew is the National Police Chiefs Council lead for rape and sex offences. Good morning. Good morning.

Rape crisis centre workers have told this programme that victims, some victims, will not report rapes because they fear their records, all sorts of records, being poured over and being judged. This has gone badly wrong, hasn't it? And Nina talked about the police needing to fight for her and feeling that she was fighting the law. We do really want to fight for victims and to hear some of the analysis, which I have heard before, underpins the need for really radical change and improvement. But if you've heard it before, even if our listeners may be coming fresh to it, and this has been going on for some time, twinned with the fact that the figures are at an all-time low, why isn't it changing? It is changing. The good practice that you heard in Essex, we have joint work nationally with the Crime Prosecution Service,

a joint national action plan. One of the first things that we introduced was a framework for police, CPS, prosecutors working with independent sexual violence advisors in the way they do in Essex, but across the country. And that's been launched and it's being implemented. When was that launched? It was within the last couple of months. The last couple of months, that's my point. I mean, you've known about this. It's all very well saying we've got one good place in Essex and in the last two months you've launched something.

So you started out the interview by explaining the scale of the challenge here. And some of these things haven't come to fruition until relatively recently. I think Melanie talked about a case in 2017 where the police and prosecutors failed in disclosure. And in order, and I think the intention has been there by officers and prosecutors up and down the country to get cases to court I think we've taken a far too cautious approach to disclosure not wanting cases to fail and the pendulum has swung from that place in 2017 to a place in 2019 when the scale of this challenge became apparent where we're hearing about digital strip searches and the kind of stories that we've heard today it's since 2019 that we've had to really think the whole thing needs transformation and

I think that's what Mellon has talked about and what Lucy's talked about. And I completely agree. And there is a root and branch transformational approach that we're taking to this. So just so it's on the record, do you think the police went too far and the CPS with what's been requested? Absolutely. I think the police have gone too far. I think the prosecutors have gone too far. I think the prosecutors have gone too far. I think a number of different inspections and reviews and helpful reviews that we've asked for have identified that. And that's given us recommendations which we're actively following because we want to fight for justice here to get us back on track. So this pendulum actually lands in the vertical where it should be.

The right to a fair trial is a fundamental right. And it does sometimes engage the right to privacy. But as others have said, and the CPS statement has made clear, the right to privacy, we should only be exploring this type of material, whether it's on a mobile phone or in a social services record, if it's strictly necessary, if it's following a reasonable lines of inquiry, if it's proportionate, and even then, by the least intrusive method at all. So there are very strict guidelines on how we can go. And in answer to your question, I think we swung too far

and now we need to swing black into the right place to get cases to court. But in that window, if I may, in that window, you could have lost women, thousands of women, from feeling like they can trust the police to not judge them on other areas of their life if and when they come forward with this. Absolutely. And that's why it's so troubling to hear. That's why. So we need to be bold and transformational to be able to overcome this. I've met with the Centre for Women's Justice.

I've seen their dossier last month of a number of these cases. We are working together to build that into the training that we're doing jointly nationally with prosecutors and investigators to turn this tide. Even at the beginning of this year, there were new guidelines that we work to and every police officer and every prosecutor works to now from the attorney general which gives very very clear guidance on how this interface between the right to a fair trial and the right to privacy is balanced so already we are working to those guidelines but there needs to be further work to embed it further. Do you feel that now, I mean, what is your confidence like yourself in if a woman walked into a police station tomorrow in this country and reported a rape?

Are you confident that her exam results and her university records, let's use that as an example here, which will stick in people's minds, that someone cheating in an exam was used against them. Are you confident that that will not be requested? I'm 99% more confident than I was 12 months ago. Since the beginning of January, when new guidelines came in, and every police officer and every, for every case, actually, and every prosecutor is working to them. But turning the tide around when a pendulum has swung as far as it did does take time.

It needs relentless focus and it needs continual professional development. It needs continual scrutiny from people like me, but also people like Lucy and others who are partners in the voluntary sector to work with the Centre for Women's Justice to actually tell us what's happening in different pockets, if it is is still happening so that we can address it. As I said, transformational approach. Lucy made the point around. Actually, we shouldn't be investigating victims. No, we absolutely shouldn't. The scrutiny needs to be on perpetrators. We know these are repeat, often perpetrators and where our focus needs to be and where I'm trying to drive change is actually much more scrutiny on into the the behavior of of the those committing these offenses and not those reporting it and that does actually taking that approach opens up the the the privacy of those suspects much more than we've been doing up to now. I'm sure we will talk again. Thank you for your time this morning. Chief Constable Sarah Crewe, the National Police Chiefs Council lead for rape and sex offences. As you imagine

messages coming in on this, Kate says, this is shocking to listen to. No wonder rape convictions are so low. Truly appalling. Vicky says just listening to this section now and appalled to hear just how much information was requested by the police as part of your guests report of rape. Primary school reports seems unnecessarily invasive with question marks there. And so crew having answered some of those questions, of keep your messages coming in and just to say another message saying that you had no idea for our previous discussion about health that what could happen with one's mouth during the menopause thank you for having this discussion says Trish about the menopause and the ongoing symptoms due to the loss of oestrogen this was news to me about the effects on gums and mouth oestrogen loss affects so much of women's bodies and GPs need to be educated so we are not fobbed off.

And of course, some data there that we shared with you about how many dentists know this as well. But I did say right at the outset, remember when we began this voyage this morning together, that we would talk about pens. Stationery, of course, big business. Last year, households in the UK spent just over three and a half million pounds on it. And it seems we're buying more of it, whether it's for the children going back to school or just ourselves. business. Last year, households in the UK spent just over three and a half million pounds on it. And it seems we're buying more of it, whether it's for the children going back to school or just ourselves. We can't seem to get enough of it. And it's a big deal for women. A survey carried out by stationery brand Paperchase, for instance, shows 65% of their customers are women between 35 and 40. And it's like that across the board board but pens breaking out on digital here on tiktok if

you're on there apparently there's something called pen talk i only found out about this yesterday the hashtags had 13.2 million views it consists of not only recommendations of videos of people using their pens but also demonstrating them different colors what is it about your pen already messages on this. Someone's saying their pen is their companion for life. Jenna Myers is a TikToker and hand letterer. I think I'm saying that right, who creates content about her favourite pens and handwriting and stationery enthusiast Rhiannon Morgan, who runs Mummy of Four YouTube channel. I'm also going to be having a chat with you, but let me start with Jenna. Jenna, tell us what we see if we go to Pentalk. There is such a wide variety of pens that as a

lifetime lover of pens, once I got on Pentalk, I was totally unaware of how many pens truly existed. That love explode. What is it about pens for you? I mean, I'm holding one right now. I'm actually rarely never holding one, but it's a very plain blue biro. So I feel very strongly about pen to paper writing, living in this digital world and how powerful it is to put pen to paper. You just process things so much better. So as you're writing, when you find the perfect pen, it just makes that experience so much better. Okay. What're writing, when you find the perfect pen, it just makes that experience so much better. Okay, what's your favorite as a pen expert? So my top two most used pens right now are Bic Gelocity and Pentel Energel. I'm a huge lover of gel pens. Talk to me about colors.

I stress about choosing a color. So most often when I'm just writing in my journal, I go towards black. But for videos, I have two daughters, they're five and six. So a lot of times I just let them pick the colors that I don't have to worry about it. Is there a favorite at the moment? I love pink. So pink is the one I have to say, because I can see you. I don't know where you are in the world. You can tell me that as well. But I can see you on video here. And what have you got behind you? So I'm in Fargo, North Dakota. This is my home office. So behind me here is my pen cart,

which you can kind of see. Oh, my gosh. How many pens do you own? A lot. I do a pen test series on TikTok and I've done 111 packages of pens. So the collection is huge. And then the wall behind me is stickers that I sell in my Etsy shop. Okay. And people tune in to what you're doing what? My handwriting. So handwriting has been a hobby my entire life. I have really nice printing. And so that's kind of what started my TikTok account is sharing my favorite pens. And then from sharing my favorite pens, I've discovered this world of pens like the Bic Gelocity and Pentel Energel. I didn't even know existed until the comment section started blowing

up of everybody sharing their favorite pen. So I just go to the comments and buy more pens and people love to see the different colors in a pack of pens. And they like watching me write because of my handwriting. So it's just been such a thrill. As someone who has terrible handwriting, who is left-handed and honestly does stuff to pen lids that shouldn't be done in terms of chewing them, you would not approve of anything. But I am never without a pen. Here it is. I probably need to up my pen game.

Are most of the people engaging with you, would you say they tend to be women who are talking to you? Is it a female sport, pen watching? Yeah, definitely my market is more women than men. I love that. Big time. I mean, pen watching, watching people use pens. We're really doing it all now. Let's bring in Rhiannon at this point.

Do you watch people online with pens or are you so busy with your own? Yeah, I'm kind of busy between running between my I've got four children and I have a blog and a YouTube channel so that kind of keeps me that's my kind of full-time job but I use a lot of pens between what I do with work and planning and things a lot of my content's about organization and obviously a lot of the moments about back to school and getting all the stationary supplies and things ready for all four children I've got from a 17 year old down to a four year old so we have lots of different types of stationary needs. But it's an interesting thing this is still it's still majority female preserve whether it's the purchasing of this

pens and broader station we do not wish to leave erasers, paper, whatever else. No. But what do you make of that? Well, yeah, I mean, my husband just would pick up any pen lying around the house and he would chew it as well, much like you. But I've got to say, erasable pens are something I did not discover until my mid-30s and they have been a game changer. Why?

Because you can rub them out when you make a mistake it doesn't ruin everything you've written can't you just spoil the page cross it out oh well that would be upsetting because it would make it look messy and especially for like two of my children have autism so well that's that must be very homework yeah yeah if they're doing a piece of homework or something and they make a mistake that could be really really stressful i say it's okay i can just rub it out so all these pens i don't know if you've got a lovely part yes very pretty um so i buy the erasable pens especially for them if they're doing a piece of work and there's a mistake we say it's no problem we can just rub

it out and start again and it just it solves so many stress issues honestly i i once recently wrote i'm a big thank you card writer and i I once recently wrote one with, I think I had four errors in it. I had to cross them out. There was no attempt to do anything else. You would not be happy with me, Rhiannon. Yeah, just get a reasonable pen. It solves every problem, pen-related problem. It won't help anybody read what I have to say.

Do you get a sense of peace from it all though as well? Because I'm seeing that come through with some of our messages. Yeah, I think if you've got a nice pen when you're writing things down, I think writing things down as much as I'm very much a digital planner, writing down things like notes and things as I'm going through editing videos, as I'm kind of creating content, it's a bit more creative. So whereas I plan digitally for like where we've got to be and what we've got to do. Ideas and things, when you put pen to paper, seem to flow a lot better,

seems to get things in order in your brain when you get them down on the page. We are getting so many messages on this and I'm sure that won't surprise you, Rhiannon, and it won't surprise you, Jenna. Good point here. If it's a biometal pen, you can refill. There's enough plastic in the world already.

Thank you for that. Sarah says, a companion for life. This is a woman after my own heart. Clearly never worked in a hospital then. I count myself lucky if I keep my pen all day. Very good point. Another one here. As an art teacher, I'm working with several primary schools

to teach year four pupils to draw. They start by using a ballpoint pen to learn to draw. And the pen is fantastic for mark making and help pupils to be OK with this. And talking about that companion thing as well and what you can learn. And another one coming in from Craig, who just wants to point out some men do also like stationery. It really works for me. And it's great to hear more about pens again.

But a plea about the plastic. Just in terms of sheep drawing by Henry Moore, I've been told, sheep drawing in pen by Henry Moore, says Jay Angel. That's what you need to go and look at to see how wonderful pen drawings are. And another one, my favourite pen, Emma,

is a silver Parker fountain pen. I've had it since school. It's seen me through university. I love writing letters with it. It leaves an inky blue blot on my finger, which makes me smile. I hope it's a companion for the rest of my life. Thank you, says Hannah. Jenna, I'm going to give the final word to you as someone who, I mean, is pen talk your life now? This is your world. It is a big part of my life, definitely. Handwriting is my business. And so I spend a

lot of time on pen talk because I love handwriting are you into the eraser thing as well yes I have some of those erasable pens fun fact if they get warm the ink disappears and if you put it in cold you can get the ink to reappear with those erasable pens pen magic pen magic okay I need to improve do I need to improve my handwriting most people have given up on that should i try jenna i think it's a great hobby i think it's a mindfulness activity that's what i always try to promote is the mental health aspect of just slowing down learning something new and picking up one of these pens jenna myers rihanna morgan thank you so much

and thank you to you for your company we'll'll be back tomorrow at 10. That's all for today's Woman's Hour. Thank you so much for your time. Join us again for the next one. Hello, I'm Pandora Sykes and just before you go I wanted to tell you about a new podcast Pieces of Britney. My attempt to piece together the life of Britney Spears

and the forces that have forged it. A huge fan, yeah, absolutely. A fan of not just the performer, but the person. I think that a lot of people were rooting for Britney to fail. And there's this sort of assumption of, you know, this is what you wanted, this is what you're going to get. In this eight-part series for BBC Radio 4, I've spoken to cultural thinkers, lawyers, psychologists and key players in the entertainment industry to get their perspective on Britney's remarkable story and enduring legacy. I used her as an example of somebody who really got what was required to do that kind of work. We're also using drama to help us look behind the headlines

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