Woman's Hour - Domestic violence prevention. Managing how our data’s used. Veteran journalist Hella Pick. "Freedom Day" postponed.

Episode Date: June 14, 2021

We hear many stories of domestic abuse but rarely from those who have been the perpetrators. John, who's just completed a 20 week domestic violence prevention programme at the Hampton Trust, speaks out to encourage other men to seek help. He's joined by Vicky Gilroy who's a facilitator on the prevention programmes at the Hampton Trust .In today’s online digital world everything we do now on our phones or our computers—everything we look at, click on or say online, becomes “data”. Companies and governments increasingly share and use this information. A small UK based team of experts called Foxglove is challenging how our data’s used . Cori Crider a Director at Foxglove talks about how amongst other things the group successfully challenged the A Level grading algorithm last year,Plus as we mark Refugee Week Hella Pick joins us to talk about life as a Kindertransport survivor. She went on to carve out a hugely successful career in journalism. In her 35 year career she's reported on everything from the assassination of President Kennedy to the closing stages of the Cold War. In her book " Invisible Walls A Journalist in Search of Her Life", she explores her life as a female journalist and her struggles with identity.And scientific experts have urged the government to consider delaying 'Freedom Day' from the original planned Step 4 date following a rise in cases of the Delta variant. This will be devastating news for many of those working in the hospitality industry. To discuss the reaction and implications by Kate Nicholls, CEO of UK Hospitality, and Kirsty McCall, a make up artist who yesterday announced the closing of her business after 15 years.Presenter Emma Barnett Producer Beverley Purcell.

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. Hello and welcome to today's programme. While the sun is shining for many and some of you may still be on a high from England's win at the Euros, there will also be nervousness for some about the Prime Minister's announcement later today. Boris Johnson, as you've just been hearing in the news bulletins, is expected to confirm that the final easing of lockdown restrictions in England will be postponed beyond the 21st of June, and that those current coronavirus restrictions will remain in place for another four weeks or so.

Last night on social media, phrases such as, I'm done, were trending as people vented their sheer frustration with restrictions which have seen people lose jobs and businesses or be on the cusp of doing so. Today, you're going to hear from a representative of the hospitality industry. 60% of its workforce is female and also from a business owner who's had to close her previously successful wedding makeup company after 15 years. This on the same day that the flexible working campaign is time-wise are warning the UK's 7.8 million part-time workers, most of whom are women, will be the ones to bear the brunt of job losses when the furlough scheme ends in September. As so-called Freedom Day is expected to be pushed back, how are you? How are you feeling? What is the impact on you, your job, your business? Text us here at Women's Hour 84844. I'm ready to hear from you or on social media at BBC Women's

Hour or email us what's happening with you via our website. Also on today's programme, you'll hear from one of the leading women taking on the government over its use of data and algorithms and winning. A rare interview with a domestic abuser who's been through a perpetrator's course and wants other men to hear his story. And you'll also hear from Hella Pick, a trailblazing foreign correspondent who came to this country alone on the Kindertransport.

But it is expected that the Prime Minister will confirm today that those final easing of lockdown restrictions in England will be postponed beyond the 21st of June. Scientific experts have urged the government to consider delaying so-called Freedom Day from the original planned step four days on June 21st following a rise in cases of the Delta variant. Under the last stage of the roadmap all legal limits on social contact will be removed. Nightclubs for instance will be able to reopen and there'd be no restrictions on performances, weddings and mass events. This delay will be devastating news for many of those working in the hospitality industry. Around £220 million of sales have been lost every day from April 2020 to March 2021

and 60% of that workforce, as I say, of the UK hospitality industry are women. To discuss that and the sort of wider implications of this, I'm joined now by Kate Nicholls, Chief Executive of UK Hospitality. And in a moment, I'll also be talking to Kirsty McCall, a makeup artist, who over the weekend has announced the closing of her business after 15 years. Kate, good morning. Good morning to you. Your reaction to this potential delay that we're expecting from the Prime Minister, first of all? Well, it's absolutely devastating for many in our sector. One in four of our businesses, that was their first date from

which they could trade. And for the remainder, they are trading under such heavy restrictions that they are trading at a loss. So the 21st of June for them was the date, the first date from which they could look with confidence to their businesses being viable to surviving and looking for a roadmap out of this crisis that has bedevilled the industry since March last year. And we really fear for a number of businesses that will be right at the end of the road and will have no additional cash to get them through that restricted trading. Although it sounds as though four more weeks is a small amount of time to last. If you've got no money coming in, if you are hemorrhaging cash with additional costs hitting the businesses,

then it is the end of the road for many. And that point that I was just making around part time workers as well, and particularly that affecting women, and I know the majority of the staff are also female, a point we'll get to in just a moment. How concerned are you about that, about jobs just going away in September as well? We are really concerned about that. So we still have 300,000 people in the industry whose jobs are protected by either full furlough because their businesses are closed and can't reopen or flexible furlough. And of course, the single biggest thing that comes out of today's announcement is increased uncertainty around the future of the industry. We can't give

our staff certainty around their staff rotas. Some of them will have to go back on furlough as a result of today's announcement. And we can't give them certainty around their hours or their salary. So that huge uncertainty in people's lives is having a real toll on mental health and wellbeing across the sector, where businesses and their teams have been struggling for the last 15 months to work out how they can get through this crisis. So, you know, about about one hundred and seventy thousand of those jobs are full furlough protected. The remainder part time and people are just working at the moment 60% of their normal hours. So it has a real impact on business profitability, business viability, but also individual viability of how you can survive with limited amounts of money coming in. But as the head of UK hospitality and speaking on behalf of your members, do you support the government?

Well, we understand why they are taking the decisions that they are taking. And clearly, public health has to come first. What we would ask is that as we're at the last, one last heave, as the Prime Minister put it today, one last heave to get these businesses through that is also needed. The government support to these businesses falls away on the 1st of July. So we have business rates bills hitting we have rent bills hitting we would just urge the government to have an extra extension of those holidays so that we're not forced to have to make decisions between tax costs that are coming through and hitting the sector and people give us some breathing space as the businesses have in Scotland Northern Ireland and Wales and allow us to be able to navigate this crisis over the next four weeks. Because you're listening out for that support.

And that's very important. But are there members of yours who just want to open now, regardless of the Delta variant, the data around that, in the sense of that channeling, that feeling that is very obvious on social media of I'm done? There's an awful lot of sentiment around that coming through from our customer base. We don't have the luxury of being able to act in that way

or respond in that way because it's our livelihoods that are on the line. If we do open without the regulations being changed, if we do try and open and trade ahead of that, that would be the end of the licence for those businesses that are caught up in that. So we can't do mass civil disobedience as a business. I suppose what I meant was, what are you hearing from those business owners?

We are hearing that they are at the end of their tether. They are running on fumes. They've got no cash. They've lost money for 15 months and they don't have any road left. They're fearful of hitting the road, the end of the road. So they are extremely fearful. What they would really like to do is to be able to open properly, open fully, trade their way out of this and go back to contributing what they used to do to the economy,

which is one in six net new jobs, £10 billion invested in their high streets and £40 billion of tax revenue that we desperately need to get the economy recovering. So we would love to. We don't want to hand out. We want to hand up and we want to be able to open and trade. We'll see what detail comes from the prime minister later today. Let me bring in Kirsty to this because we're just hearing there from Kate around the feeling of desperation there. And that's very real for you, Kirsty, because you've had to close. Is that right?

Yeah, absolutely. I had to close my business last week. I just couldn't take it anymore. I can't take the mental torture of it, the uncertainty, the panic. You get your hopes up and then it's dashed away in a second. It's a mental roller coaster and I really had to get off I feel so ill from what is going on and I am not alone I speak to hundreds of people other suppliers other businesses in the wedding industry and there are so many of us that are on the brink of closure there are people that have had to close but haven't had been able to tell their customers yet because the thing is when you close a wedding business you can't just shut your door you've still got I've still got 50 weddings that I want to do absolutely want to do in the next year um but I I if those all get postponed I don't even know what's going to happen

to my finances and my mental health why have you had to close why have you taken this decision now is it is it a purely financial one it's not purely financial I would say it's 50 50 between financially I can't survive losing two whole wedding seasons I do 100 weddings a year this is my main income I've been doing this for 15 years my business was my baby I've started it from nothing I care about it and I care about all of my clients and the government not only have I not been able to work but I've my mental health has taken such a battering and I feel like it's it's almost it's it's mean and cruel what they've actually done to us you know a lot Sharma last

year telling us that we just need to go and get better jobs because we're not viable I'm sorry but what is more viable than a wedding industry where we've got sitting bookings there ready to go we just need to be allowed to do them and by them opening us up to 30 it's their way I think of saying oh well you're open so we don't need to give you financial support we are not open with those numbers we aren't even um in even you know we can't make any money from that we're losing money by opening at 30. I've done three weddings this year. I should have done 40 by now. Have you been eligible for any financial support? How have you been existing? Yes. Luckily, I have been able to get the self-employment grant, but that is not the same as the furlough.

The furlough has been continuous and it has been something that you can rely on. The self-employment grants, we get forgotten about. There's been months that we have not been able to claim that at all, just because they forgot about us. August, September, we weren't open in any viable way, yet I couldn't get any support. We got our grant payment in November and then nothing else until April and my mortgage was still coming out every month my bills my children needed to be fed the winter was the hardest point of this pandemic it it got very very bad I got very low through the winter and I'm not alone in that it's been awful and then you see them all gallivanting at the G7, you see the football, you know, matches

and the fans, and they're all jumping and screaming and shouting and cuddling each other. And every time I see that, I want to cry, because I just think, why are you restricting weddings, even funerals, you know, of course, funerals, you should be allowed to have social distance capacity at that venue, you should be allowed to hug your loved ones. But the same goes for weddings. We are so safe. We have an inbuilt track and trace system. Before a pandemic, you know who comes to a wedding.

You don't get random people turning up. And all of those people that are at that wedding, you love and care about. You don't want them to get sick. You don't want your grandmother to catch COVID and die. There is an investment, an emotional investment for people wanting weddings to be safe. And that is the point that they are really missing here. You posted your story, which is how we came across you on Instagram. And it was an incredibly emotional post in which you urged people to be kind as you talked about why you've got to close your business what what has the response been to that and what made you feel like you wanted to share it in that

way I've known for a few weeks this has not been a decision I've taken lightly it's not been a quick decision that I've made I've been forced to do this I didn't want to um but I was going to wait until today until after the announcement to close my business. And then when they started last week saying, oh, unlimited numbers at weddings, I thought, oh, my goodness, we need to jump on this and make sure that they go through with this. So that is exactly why I released my video last week, because I thought maybe if they understand that they can't just dangle this as a carrot, there are already businesses closing. The damage is done for me. Just the uncertainty in the last four weeks has caused my business to that was my final straw. But you can't just dangle that carrot. So I thought if I put my video out there and I'm I'm a very honest person on my Instagram and my Facebook and everything anyway. And I wanted to show people this isn't, I'm just not another statistic. I'm a real person with a family, with a mortgage, and I put everything into my business. And the fact that I've had to close it,

it devastates me. It really, really does. I feel so emotional. I don't want to let a single bride down. And I will do everything I can to make sure that their weddings are fulfilled, the ones that I can't do. But I just needed to put it out there and basically let the MPs take that to the ministers and say, look, there are people already suffering. You really do need to give them this carrot that you've just dangled. If you're saying unlimited numbers, let them have unlimited numbers. You know, put other things in as guidance. People will be safe at weddings. If you put guidance in, a lot of people will follow it

and they will make sure they, you know, get people tested and do all the things. And as you say, we're wedding businesses. We've got public liability insurance. We have to act in a very safe way and we will continue to do that what what are you going to do now if you are going to go through as you say that you are with the closing of your business trying to fulfill those other contracts that you've still got have you got a plan um the the

50 weddings that i still have to do i will enjoy every single one of them and i will make sure that i do and i will see it through to the end that will keep me going for another year unless another wave of postponements come in which case I genuinely don't know what I'm going to do but afterwards I don't know because this has been my life since I was 12 years old was when I just I discovered that I loved hair and makeup my mum did a beauty course and I just wanted to get into it this This is all I've ever known. I've always said it's part of my personality to make brides happy, to make them feel amazing, to do hair and makeup for them, all the other extras that I do to make them feel incredible. And I feel like I can't do that now

because it is too upsetting. And the financial side of it, I cannot cope anymore with that. I mean, the finances are real. We have no money. I've spent every penny of my savings. I'm in massive debt and that is just to pay the bill. How much debt are you in, if you don't mind me asking? Well, it's a lot. It's over £10,000.

And I even had a bounce back loan of £8,000, which I still have to pay back. If they could change that to a grant, that would help a little bit. So these are the things that you'll be listening out alongside what we were just hearing from Kate Nicholls there. Kirsty McCall, thank you for talking to us today and voicing, I'm sure, for a lot of people who are either on the cusp of not being able to carry on or in your position, how they're feeling right now,

which is very important to make sure we hear on the radio today. Kirsty McCormack, thank you. And thanks to Kate Nicholls there, the chief executive of UK Hospitality, talking about support that she's listening out for today from the prime minister later today. A message here, such a powerful interview from Katie who's listening. Good morning to you. With a wedding supplier on women's hour right now, her business cannot operate properly. Quote, seeing hordes of football fans jumping around together makes her want to cry. with a wedding supplier on Women's Hour right now. Her business cannot operate properly. Quote, seeing hordes of football fans jumping around together makes her want to cry. And actually just building on something that you heard from Kirsty there,

and we'll come to the G7 in just a moment. Kirsty mentioned people coming together at the G7 and at the barbecue there, the Prime Minister's spokesperson said it was a COVID secure event. No rules were broken, but they were standing very close to those leaders without masks. And Cal's been in touch to say people would be less mad today about the extension of restrictions if it wasn't for those G7 pictures. Sarah says she mentioned the attendees at the G7 as well. And she's right. There are millions of women out there who are on the edge. The situation is utterly untenable. Another message here, I just want to say that my 24-year-old son,

unvaccinated, has caught the Delta variant, possibly at a COVID-insecure work venue. He's very sick with it, many symptoms. Good luck to people who say they're done with the restrictions and especially young people. Double vaccinations need to be up to a much higher proportion of the population

before full opening up. And I speak as someone who lost her slim 64-year-old husband to COVID-19 in January. That's Diana in Canterbury. I'm so sorry to hear that, Diana, but thank you so much for messaging. I'm feeling huge relief, reads this message from Jen,

at the prospect of a four-week delay to allow more vaccination. I know businesses are suffering, but without public health measures, there'll be even more damage to the economy. But businesses must continue to receive support. And Laura taking issue with this so-called Freedom Day moniker. It's an unhelpful media construct. It always was. The government always said data, not dates. And the data is clearly showing we're on track now for a third wave. How is it not obvious to people? In a couple of weeks now, it may stop

another full lockdown in three months' time, which would be far more damaging. The government should be supporting these industries rather than these industries undermining sacrifices we've all made by forcing us to open

before the country is safe. Laura, thank you for that message. Keep them coming in, please. Ready to hear them on 84844. But talking of the G7, one commentator described it as a weird wedding no one really wanted to be at. Others felt like the clock had turned back as the wives of the world leaders

played with the Prime Minister's baby on the beach, while the mostly male group of leaders got down to the business of the day. I am talking about that G7 which just wrapped up in Cornwall, which had mixed reviews after the former Prime Minister Gordon Brown described the group having achieved moral failure for not providing more vaccines to poorer nations, a claim that Boris Johnson has rejected. But what does my next guest think? She used to have a front row seat to these sorts of meetings and once had a group of male diplomats hiding from her in the loo. I'm talking about Hella Pick, the former diplomatic editor of The Guardian and a trailblazer for female foreign correspondents.

Now in her 90s, I hope she won't mind me saying that, she was also a child refugee, having come to the UK on the Kindertransport to escape Jewish persecution after Germany annexed Austria. These tales and more fill the pages of Hella's memoir, Invisible Walls, a journalist in search of her life. Good morning, Hella Pick. Good morning. Thank you for joining us today. I thought we could start with that G7 and what you sort of made of it with a slightly further back seat than you had. And then the idea of moral failure, strong words about the group of leaders coming together at this time.

Well, I think that there was a lot of talk and actually very few hard decisions. It was a great setting, of course, and I think you're very right to point to the wives playing with the baby and the mixed but largely male leaders sitting together, talking both together collectively and in tools. And very little has really come out of it, except great words and aspirations. Probably the most important thing to come out of it really is the fact that, as President Biden put it, America's back and is trying to take a leadership.

But it is trying to push the Western allies into taking a very antagonistic attitude towards China. And the Europeans are very divided on that issue and not entirely on the same wavelength. So that was one of the reasons. But of course, the other thing is the pandemic and the vaccinations and failure of the West, really, to grasp with the problem of Africa and the other third world countries, which are seeming to not getting the jabs.

Well, it's a major issue and we've talked about it. We even had Gordon Brown on this programme a few weeks ago and he continues to talk about it, of course, as do the world leaders. It's just interesting to get your take. I wonder, having been often the only female journalist covering these events, certainly when you began, what was that like? Well, it was always very exciting, interesting. And of course, there were usually far more journalists than there were leaders and politicians and officials present. We used to have a great thing on the Guardian, the diplomacy between journalists from the paper

covering the summits was even more complex than the diplomacy between the leaders themselves. And I don't think The Guardian was the only paper involved in this. Nowadays, by the BBC, which seems to be there in vast multitudes, most newspapers, given their economies, don't start the summits anymore with quite such large amounts of journalists. No, and it's definitely not the only change since you were doing this line of work, of course, and with the rise of social media and all of those different elements. But I just wonder, having, I mean, it's quite striking. People have been struggling to try and grasp exactly what you meant. But Boris Johnson also spoke of building back post-COVID in a more feminine way. Some people thinking about what necessarily that meant. But also it's been discussed.

Shouldn't we just do away with the plus ones at this event, at these sorts of events and not have partners there? And I was I was reading that you were sometimes mistaken for Nancy Kissinger, the wife of Henry Kissinger. I mean, you must have had some quite unusual moments being the only woman at these things. And often, as we still see, women are often the plus ones. Yes, actually, I don't think too many of the plus ones came to this summit. But whatever it is, I don't think these are really just social junkets and they shouldn't be taken as that and I don't think the whites should lend themselves to that

I can understand that President Biden is on a mega trip not just to this country his wife goes with him but the others isn't necessary yes they all want to be the queen and so on and so forth,

but this is really not what the summit should be about. Johnson tried to turn it into a sort of picture of them some of the time, but I think that was completely distorting the purpose of the meeting. Yes. Well, I was looking through your book, reading it with great interest, and some of the bonds that you made were fascinating. And there's many, many stories in there.

But it was a particular friendship with Willy Brandt, the former chancellor of Germany, that caught my eye, because I wonder how important that was for you with your background, having fled Austria because of what happened with Germany. Yes, for me, really, meeting Willy Brandt and fortunately for me, the friendship with him was very important, exactly, because I was a refugee in England. I came from this country, which is ancient in the transport, and was uprooted from my country, which was Austria.

And I think most refugees who fled the Nazi regimes and were saved from the Holocaust, they all feel they have problems in coming to terms with the countries of their birth. For me, on the amount of returning to Austria posed very little problems. I started going back to Austria quite soon after I had acquired my British nationality and freely travelled. And I have been back since then very often and also it was part of my since I covered Austrian politics

on and off for the Guardian so I had that connection too but I had far more difficulty coming to terms with Germany the key perpetrator of course of the Holocaust and it was meeting with Brandt and talking with him about his views, his beliefs, his thoughts about reconciliation, also reunification, his

way of dealing with Germany's history. All of that had a huge influence on me and somehow brought me now to not just accepting Germany but really coming to admire Germany and what it has achieved since the end of the war and also recognizing that it is making and continues to make a major effort to come to terms with the terrible things that were done in Germany and of course the understanding of what had happened. And I'm just talking of connection there. I just must say, I know we're talking on a Zoom line here

and it's slightly difficult lines, for which I apologise to our listeners, but we desperately want to hear what you're having to say. If I could just try to keep going for a moment, because building on that point, Invisible Wall Walls a journalist in search of her life why did you call the book that what do you think you you hadn't been perhaps confronting that you were looking for because I think every refugees retains a certain sense of insecurity. I have been marked by that insecurity all my life, trying to break away from it, trying to find the security that I really wanted.

And that's why I call it invisible walls. I never quite got there. I have achieved a lot professionally. I have achieved less in my private life. And I feel, I continue to feel, even to this day, there is a certain insecurity from which I cannot escape. And hence the title of my book. Well, I mean, you sort of say you're not done yet, which I also really like.

You want to keep going and keep searching and pushing. I was also very struck that you say you were a one-woman show in some ways and you didn't necessarily join up with some of the efforts to get women through the doors into journalism, but you were actually leading by example in other ways. I think so. I mean, I certainly, I hope at least that I led by example. I started off in writing about Africa as a new journalist. And there I was in West Africa, the only Western woman with a group of European journalists. And I learned how to be a woman amongst the men in the media and it worked. But I'm not enough of an organization person.

I regret very much that I did not join in much more actively with other women as they fought for equality and for women in journalism. He didn't altogether, but I did not involve myself enough in feminist causes and sort of acted as my own feminist, as we say, try to at least lead by example. Yes, well, I think a lot of people would agree with that. And it's lovely to be able to talk to you this morning. I wish we were in person together and hope we can meet in person at some point.

But thank you for coming on Women's Hour and also very interesting to hear your views on the G7 there. And perhaps it's time to not have the plus ones. Not all of them did go, you're right. And it's not a social affair, as you say, but interesting to hear also your take on what was or wasn't achieved at it. Hella Pick, the book is called Invisible Walls, a journalist in search of her life.

Thank you. Now, on Woman's Hour, we hear many stories from survivors of domestic abuse, but very rarely do we hear from those who have been the perpetrators of that abuse. Well, today you will. We all will. John, not his real name, has just completed a 20-week domestic violence prevention programme at the Hampton Trust. The trust helps people who have been abusive towards their partners or ex-partners to change their behaviour. John wanted to speak out to encourage other men to recognise their abusive behaviour and seek help. This year, the government announced an extra £19 million for domestic abuse schemes in England and Wales,

the majority of which will go towards perpetrator programmes. And while funding for perpetrators is important, these programmes must never come at the expense of funding of support for survivors, say some groups. But how effective are these programmes in changing behaviour? I spoke to John, whose ex-partner knows about this interview, and to Vicky Gilroy, who's a facilitator on the prevention programme at the Hampton Trust. And I started by asking John about his referral onto the course. I was adamant that I didn't belong on that course and I didn't need to be there. However, I did turn up to the first session and then I quickly realised after about 40 minutes into an hour that I absolutely belonged to be on that course, the ADAPT course for my abusive

behaviour. And what made you realise that? I literally just opened up and then I started talking about my actual behaviour. The way the course, the way they put it to you, the way they stripped it down, tore everything apart, made you realise, and whether you open up or not, that's your prerogative at some point, but I realised straight away that I needed to be on that course because I was abusive verbally most of the time and I was very toxic. Can you tell us a bit more about that? Without even thinking about the terms and the circumstances that I was in, I would literally just open my mouth before I engaged my brain and I would just let it go.

Just using dog-triff words, you know, like horrible words to a demeanan to women, slag, slut, bitch, all of those things, without even thinking what I was doing. And I was just so reactive all the time. I think that was my biggest trigger, was being reactive. So you weren't physical, it was all... Never physical, but even so, you know, however you dress this abuser up, abuse is abuse at the end of the day.

So it's still a horrible, nasty trait to have, being that toxic all the time. Just to get that detail of what you were doing you talked about name calling were you also controlling finances yep i was controlling finances as well yep um i guess i was using isolation as well in many ways and some coercion in many ways as well. Like I said, it never resulted to violence under any way, shape or form. I mean, that is violence, but in a different, it's not physical. Yeah, in a mental way, I was violent with, you know, with my stamping of the feet, with the cutting looks, with threats. You know, yeah, I was that way inclined.

And you controlled the money because you were the only one earning or you were earning more no I was the only one earning so yeah so everything used to go into my bank accounts there was a joint bank account but yeah I controlled all the finances yeah and when you say you used isolation what does that mean well because I had the only work vehicle so my ex-partnerner had a car and it finally come to a stage where I couldn't afford to insure it. So then I made her take it off the road until she earned her own money. And how far would that control go in terms of, I don't know, controlling movements, eating, food, everything? Because it can go very deep. No, I never went that far with it, obviously.

There was always money for food there was the bills were always paid um and my ex-partner always i get like i know it's shameful talking about this now but i also gave her an allowance each week as well and how long did you do this for and why do you know why you were doing it well for the whole time we were in a relationship so obviously the first couple of years are always like the honeymoon period as you call it but then after that yeah it just got it just got worse instead of better and no I was completely oblivious to my actions in denial of my actions right then I minimized it I blamed everybody else it's not me it's you you know all of those certain things and oh it was only a joke you know that that's that's what I was doing and

that's obviously you know a combination of also gaslighting as well where you're just pushing it onto somebody else and it's um yeah evidently it was me all the time. Did your partner seek help? She did eventually she was brave enough to go and get help and sadly for me my ex-partner and my children landed up in a refuge and it took her years to have the courage to do that but she finally did it and she you know absolutely got no regrets that she did that she did the right thing because you know who knows where this could have landed up it could have landed up in violence or I don't know I'm just saying it could have so she absolutely did the right thing. Did you keep being in touch with her? No, not for a couple of years then.

It all then landed up in court for seeing the children and stuff. So, no, we were absolutely not in touch. She wasn't allowed to be in touch with me under any circumstances. They actually moved her to a different county to keep away. I was just completely in denial of my actions and my toxic behaviour. I just had no idea at all. But surely the reaction of your partner, and I don't know what that was,

but she must have been scared, she must have had reactions. Did that never make you feel bad, feel ashamed that you should stop doing what you were doing and abusing her? At the time, no, I had no remorse, no shame, no embarrassment whatsoever. Of course, now I am embarrassed, I am ashamed and I'm completely devastated lost I lost my family you know I paid the ultimate penalty for it do people know around you what happened yeah I've had no shame in talking to people about what I've

done I think it's a very brave thing that I've done but I also think at the same time some of my friends and some of my work colleagues the way they talk to women have been quite derogatory. So now, you know, I'm at the stage now where if I hear them or see them saying something, I pull them up on it because it's yeah, it's out of order now. But I never saw that before. I was just used to roll with it, thinking it's fun and just a bit of banter. But, you know, it's not. Where did this come from in you? Is it something you'd learned? Is it something you'd seen? Was it from your friends?

Childhood, I guess. I had a very abusive upbringing. My parents, my auntie and uncle, should I say, who raised me, my parents died when I was very young. They were very toxic and abusive and very physical a lot of the time. And I took a lot of the brunt for that. So even if I saw my siblings doing anything wrong, I would take the blame for it

because I just became accustomed to it in the end with the hitting and the slapping and all the other things, the horrible things they used to do to me. So I guess that's where I learned it all from, really, which is sad in many ways. Did you have any violent streaks when you were a young man, when you were an adolescent and then going into your 20s?

I used to actually go out looking just for a fight, just because I just wanted to feel pain all the time. So I'd literally go and pick on the biggest fella I could probably pick on and I would get a good hiding for it. You went on this course and what did it open your eyes to? Just my toxic traits, my triggers, just how abusive I'd actually been. And yeah, it just made me realise, you know, that all I was doing over the years was being minimising, denying, blaming, controlling. So, yeah, it was always, you know, they do the two wheels. And the one I was always on was the power and control wheel.

And yet I never saw it. And, you know, it's just embarrassing now when I look back because of the fact that at my age I should I should never have been like that and I should have seen it my ex-partner kept telling me I needed help and still I just was in denial about it the whole time do you think you can say that you would never do this again categorically categorically I just I feel like now in a state of equanimity where i'm more composed i'm more reflective i will think about a situation i'm not reactive anymore and you know all those traits the way i put it is all those traits are in a box but that box is now sealed and it will never come out again where before it was always like a jack in the box before

where i'd be okay for a few months and then bang they would be back out again and before it was always like a jack in the box before where I'd be okay for a few months and then bang they would be back out again and I'd be off again and yeah you know since I've been on this course for the last six months no toxic traits have been released whatsoever and I've finally seen the light so to speak. Let me bring in Vicky at this point. Vicky I know you didn't work directly with John but you are a facilitator on these programmes. What do you do on them to make people like John realise that they're domestic abusers? Well, we don't do anything to make them. We are inviting them to look at their own behaviour. So sometimes men come to us and they are not aware that their behaviour is abusive. So we would explore that with them in helping them to identify behaviours

that they've used within the relationship and then explore if that meets the category of abusive behaviour. If it does, what do you do next? We present that back to the participant. We want them to understand, if we can, that some of their behaviours have been abusive and we want to move them forward in terms of accountability. So even if it's just a couple of abusive behaviours that they're owning, we can work with that. And then when we get on to group, we look at a deeper understanding of what domestic abuse is.

There's a misconception often that it is just physical. We then look at throughout the programme skills and strategies that men can use rather than using abuse. So they're often using an abuse for a reason and sometimes with intention. Sometimes it's not understanding the impact that it's having. And we explore all of that on group. We really want to support the men in opening up a group and not feeling that they're being judged. There's a real fear sometimes for people to actually own that behaviour, to be accountable for it. And we know that we have to support people to get to that stage before any real change can happen. So we have to work with the participants in a non-judgmental way, but still being able to challenge those beliefs and those attitudes and that thinking and that behavior so often getting men to consider a different perspective a lot of the men we work with have children and obviously by default a lot of their children are girls or females or women

and so it's helping to change that perspective know, when somebody is abusive to a woman, that's a wife or a partner or a daughter, a sister. It's just supporting the men to shift that perspective, really, in terms of understanding that impact. To bring you back in at that point, the discussion of children. Did you think about what you were doing to your children, John? No, shamefully, I didn't realise the impact it was having on my children at all. Not only on my children, but on my I didn't realise the impact it was having on my children at all. Not only on

my children, but on my ex-partner as well. And when you realised or took them into account, what was your reaction to that on an emotional level? Oh, just, yeah, in floods of tears, embarrassment, shame, you know, that I'd let them down. I wasn't being, you know, the father figure that they always needed and I wasn't supporting them, know, the father figure that they always needed. And I wasn't supporting them, obviously, because of my behaviour. And they probably regretted me in many ways that I was being toxic. What were the other men like that you were with? Did you recognise yourself in them? We were all very different in many ways. But yeah, you know, at the end of the day, we were all domestic abusers so the greatest thing I saw

on that course was not only the change in my behavior but watching some of the other men who were very reluctant to open up watch them start changing as well and being more reflective and then being more accountable and actually joining into the group and actually speaking about their toxic traits so yeah that's what the course does. Have you had a relationship since you've done the course? I haven't. How do you feel about going back into a relationship? I think I'm ready, but it's one step at a time. Even though the course is over, there's still work to do.

I'm carrying on, I'm doing that work. Vicky, if there are partners or men listening to this, partners of men who need help, but also men who are listening and perhaps recognise some of what John is describing, which is a big part of why we've had John on and wanted to hear John's story. Have you got any strategies that you can suggest to use for men if they get angry? It's really complex. It's not as easy as giving a one strategy fits all. And because of the nature of domestic abuse and the risks that are involved with domestic abuse, everything has to be handled very carefully. So skills and strategies that we deliver on group are delivered in a way that's suitable to that man and that circumstance as an individual. We talk a lot about pressure gauge. And for many men, when we first speak to them,

they feel that actually their behavior is very reactive and very instant and very quick. And what we do with the men is we explore with them everything that happens up to that incident. What are their warning signs? What are their internal warning signs? What are their thoughts? What are their feelings? How do they know that they're feeling that feeling? Are they getting hot? Are they clenching their fists, their hands, they're grinding their teeth. All those little indicators are telling them that things are building, that their pressure gauge is increasing. And what we try to do then with the individuals is once they recognize those warning signs, they having a plan in place with the partner and being able to remove oneself from the situation in order to de-escalate. We talk about taking an hour out, an hour from how to put that timeout plan into place carefully and be mindful of the risks around that. Vicky, can you say with confidence or what degree of confidence could you say that men like John who come on this course are not going to offend again, are resolved in some ways? It's a really tricky one, that one, isn't

it? Because it's hard to measure long term. So the information that we take and how we measure it is from the partner or ex-partner service that we have. So that's the confidential information that is shared between the ex-partner or current partner with our team of people that work directly with them and understanding what is really going on. So obviously there are occasions where we may have men on group who are telling us one thing and we may have a partner who is telling us something completely different. And we also have information from Children's Services. That's our highest referrer. And we would have information from them as to how the plans may be reduced in terms of risk and things like that. I think for me, having done this for a long time and working with men in my experience, you get a really good indication as to whether that person is taking on that change.

If they're implementing it into real life, you can see that shift and it's keeping it going. It is the hard bit once the programme completes. It's keeping that behaviour going and maintaining that motivation. But we see it. We see successful completions. We see positive outcomes. I couldn't do this job if that wasn't the case. This is where it starts. This is where it needs to change, really. And these attitudes and beliefs with the men that we work on have been so entrenched for such a long time that actually breaking those and changing those is a long period to achieve that. Vicky Gilroy there. And also we heard from John, which isn't his real name. Susie says it's such a difficult segment of the programme to listen to. I'm sceptical that offender programmes are effective, although very pleased that John has had his eyes opened.

But I am very sceptical still that exceptionally domestic violence offenders stop abuse following these programs another message here which follows a bit of a theme in some of the responses polly says it was very interesting to listening to the view of the abuser yet still he thinks that physical abuse is worse than verbal psychological or coercive or controlling behavior he's making out that he's still not as bad as some who were physically abusive three years out of an abusive relationship of over 10 years where the physical abuse was on only around 10 occasions. I'd like to point out that for me,

I'd take the broken bones over the mental stuff anytime. Despite two years of great therapy, I still hear his voice in my head. My bones now healed, only ache on rainy days. It was suggested to my ex that he attend the Turning the Spotlight course. He didn't. These men, and it is mainly men,

must be forced to have therapy and forced to attend. And another message here saying that was the most useful piece on domestic abuse I have heard, says Rachel. These rehabilitation programmes, excuse me, are so important to move on and understand offenders' behaviour. Look where the guy came from, his childhood, et cetera, and now he's an advocate calling out others' behaviour on the ground.

This is how to change perceptions and negative male behaviours. Thank you for this piece and to the guy for coming on and talking about his experience. Very brave. Well, those messages still coming in and I'll come back to them if I can. But to talk about how we share information then in today's digital world, everything we do now on our phones or computers, everything we look at, click on, post online becomes data. Companies and governments increasingly share and use this information to make decisions about our lives. And a small UK based team of experts called Foxglove is challenging how our data is being used.

And they've had some newsworthy successes over the last year. For instance, their actions stopped that algorithm used to determine grades in last year's A-level exams. And their latest target is how the government, over what they're saying is the biggest grab of patient data in NHS history, is planning to do there. The co-founder of Foxglove is Corrie Crider. She joins me now in the studio. Good morning. Morning. Thanks for having me. Just firstly, Foxglove? Yeah. So the scientist, I'm a bit of a gardener, if I may. As well as a lawyer and a data champion and fighter.

It's part of my transition into becoming a, you know, a kind of middle-aged British lady. But anyway, the scientific name is Digitalis. So there's a kind of pun there. But also, we thought that the foxglove kind of reflected the double-edged nature of technology, which is that it's poisonous, it's a toxic plant. But it can also be used to make a heart pharmaceutical called digoxin. So killer cure, really. And that's exactly how technology can go sometimes.

And before we get into your causes, your fights, you are a majority female team. We are. We were all four women until recently. I'm proud to say we've got a diversity hire. We have a fifth person who is a man now. But yes, we are woman-led. Was that by design or just happened? I think it's just how it happened.

Although it would be fair to say that when we went through the world and observed the way that, let's say, large technology companies had quite a kind of macho tech bro way of organising society, that there was a sense that we thought that that needed taking on and correcting and making much more inclusive in a way. I mentioned the algorithm, the A-level algorithm last year. Can you tell us what happened with that? I imagine some of your listeners had family members who were affected by it. But essentially, because of COVID, students couldn't sit their exams.

And so what the government decided to do was to distribute those grades by a computer program, by an algorithm. And it just turned out that the way that the algorithm worked was unfair. It systematically disadvantaged a child who had gone to, for example, a large comprehensive school that hadn't done well historically, even if that child was very bright and would actually have done very well in their exams, basically, because the school's performance is what determined their grade. They would get knocked down a couple of grades. Whereas if you were a bright student from a historically brilliant school, a small, perhaps private school, studying a small subject such as classics, you did fine and your teacher's assessment is what counted. So there was a huge

uproar about it. I think it's probably the first time that the idea of an algorithm being used to really determine people's futures punched through into the public consciousness. You had students with their placards saying F the algorithm and all this sort of thing. So we worked with a brilliant comprehensive student from Ealing to bring a judicial review and the government capitulated in seven days. We never even got into court. So it didn't go to court, did it? No, actually, all of the judicial reviews we've got through so far have involved the government capitulating before a judge can pass on it, which I think says something really quite concerning about the lack of reflection and internal debate before these systems are built or bought. Because if the moment there's some kind of independent scrutiny, it happened with the visa algorithm as well, the government kind of falls over.

Then it suggests they could have reflected a bit more earlier, doesn't it? Perhaps we'll come back to that if we have time, but I'm keen to bring you on to your latest focus, which is NHS Digital. You're calling it a data grab by the government of all our records stored by GPs. It's officially known as the General Practice Data for Planning and Research Data Collection. The legal action you started a couple of weeks ago, has that been the reason that the plan has been put on hold till September? I actually asked the health minister about this last week, and she said it wasn't her department. You'd have to ask them exactly why they decided, but I would like to think that, of course, it was partly the threat of the injunction,

which is what we were going to do for a whole range of groups, to be clear, the National Pensioners Convention, the Doctors Association UK, the Citizens, David Davis MP, a huge range of groups who were incredibly worried about this. So they have agreed to pause and give more time. But it's important to say that that's not the end of the road. We're hoping now that with this time, we can open up and actually have a proper reflective debate about what we all want done with our health data. Because you're not necessarily anti that you should be able to share your data for greater good. No, absolutely not. What we objected to was the idea that people would be bounced past this, that the vast majority of people hadn't heard of it. It was just bunged up on a rather obscure government website. And if you were, let's say, one of the 67% of pensioners in that association who aren't online.

If you didn't speak English, you would never have heard of it and didn't have a chance to make a choice. So what we really want to see is a public discussion about the benefits and harms of using health data. And I have to say, in the government's communications, there's been a slightly regrettable tendency to bung two things together into one messy concept. One, they just say data saves lives.

Frankly, I'm slightly tired of being governed by slightly empty three-word slogans. I don't know about you. But anyway, there's this concept of using information for planning health services. You know, I don't see how any of us could be opposed to the idea of the NHS having data to plan better. But then there's a second idea, which is that the data may have commercial value. And actually, I think that people might have different opinions saying, well, are you happy to give your information to the NHS to plan? Most people would say yes. Are you happy to give it to academic researchers to do a study about various things?

Quite a lot of people, I think, would say yes to that too. Am I happy for, let's say, the details of my fertility treatment to be given to Google to develop a product or service that they may then sell back to the NHS at great profit, then I think you get a few more people pausing about that question. Although if I was to put this to you from Simon Bolton, who's the chief executive of NHS Digital, in a statement he says, data saves lives at that point, has huge potential though to rapidly improve care and outcomes as the responses to the pandemic has shown. The vaccine rollout could not have been delivered without effective use of data to ensure it reached the whole population.

We're absolutely determined to take people with us on this mission. We take our responsibility to safeguard the data we hold incredibly seriously. We intend to use the next two months to speak with patients, doctors, health charities and others to strengthen the plan even further. That doesn't sound like the plan is going to change. And what would you say to people who say perhaps you're fear mongering by saying it could be sold to Google? They do make data available on their own website. They say this at cost price to third party commercial companies such as pharmaceutical companies. So it's not about they always say, well, we don't sell your data.

But that's actually slightly that's obscuring the real point, right? It's not about a USB stick going over to Google. That's not, of course, how it works, right? But actually, there already have been partnerships between things like DeepMind, the AI company that is a wholly owned subsidiary of Google, being able to access huge numbers of patient records to develop products and services that the NHS is now paying for, such as the Moorfields Eye Hospital trial. So it does happen. That's not scaremongering. And by the way, we are not even saying that there can be no relationship to companies necessarily. What we're saying is that the government needs to be open with people, that actually it's got a few objectives here. One is centralized planning for health research. And another one is pretty

different, right, which is about on what terms will commercial companies access the data. In 2019, there were some closed door meetings between your guests from last week, Dido Harding, other people in the NHS Digital, Amazon, Microsoft, AstraZeneca, which they kind of kicked around about nine different commercial models for access to NHS data. Now, it may well be that if you have that debate with the public, and you well be that if you have that debate with the public, and you say, should the NHS have a share of the intellectual property from a product developed, or should the NHS always get whatever the product is that is developed for free, that all of that would garner public assent. But at the moment, you don't think that debate

is happening at all? Well, no, there's just a kind of slogan, which says data saves lives. And actually, that doesn't get into any of the data can save lives. But it can also be used to make quite a lot of people quite a lot of money. And, you know, can I can I actually say something personal about this? Because I think there's been a slight regrettable effort to paint this as kind of researchers versus privacy bros. And actually, I'm not a privacy bro, my probably my proudest moment, as a young girl was watching my mother walk across the stage and get her PhD in pharmacology. So she's a scientific researcher. My father is a geneticist. Actually, we're not opposed to science. What we are opposed to is really consequential decisions about the future

of the health service being made without telling people what you're doing and saying, actually, you know, this is part of the post-Brexit industrial strategy. We'd quite like to, you know, allow some companies in here to develop a product and let people have a say about what the terms are that they want. And also, by the way, consent, right? At the moment, it was like, if you've heard about it, then you might have the opportunity to opt out. People who are wondering how to do that, there's a website called MedConfidential. And if you look at MedConfidential, how to opt out, you can figure out how to exercise your choice in this regard. But at the minute, it's a few people hearing about it and it's an opt out system.

And people are worried about the anonymization. And if they can trust the government, I'm just seeing some of our messages coming in on that. What do you say, just finally, very short of time here, but to those who say, well, even when they do publicize and even if they do publicise better, a lot of people just will not engage. I guess the question is this, whose choice should it be? This information came from us. It came from a health service that we funded. It came from our pain, our health troubles. And if the government wants to monetise that asset, it seems to me that there is a real question around, can they do that without permission? Corrie Cridey asked a big question. We'll see what some of the responses are. The co-founder of Fox Club and perhaps we'll talk again as I'm sure you've got other things in your sights that we'll want to hear about.

Thank you for joining us today on Woman's Hour. And thank you to all of you for being with me and for your company this morning. We'll be back tomorrow at 10 o'clock. That's all for today's Woman's Hour. Thank you so much for your time. Join us again for the next one. Welcome to Descendants, the series which looks into our lives and our past and asks something pretty simple. How close are each of our lives to the legacy of Britain's role in slavery? And who does that mean our lives are linked to? Narrated by me, Yersa Daly Ward, we hear from those who have found themselves

connected to each other through this history. Whoever you are, wherever you are in Britain, the chances are this touches your life somewhere, somehow. Descendants from BBC Radio 4. Listen now on BBC Sounds. There was somebody out there who's 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.