Woman's Hour - England's netballers - the Roses, School exclusions, South Asian women in WWII, Rape survivors and therapy, Women artists

Episode Date: August 5, 2022

This time last week we were looking forward to the big match: The Lionesses at the European Championship Final at Wembley. We hoped, but we just couldn't predict what would happen, but what a great moment when they won against Germany! But don't let the success of women's football overshadow the sport that's been with us all along: netball. At the Commonwealth Games, the English team - known as the Roses - are in the semi-final tomorrow, up against Australia. If they win, they'll be in the final on Sunday. And don't forget: the Roses WON at the Commonwealth Games last time around, four years ago. We speak to ex-Roses captain, Ama Agbeze.In the last normal academic year before the pandemic, 7,894 children were permanently excluded from English state schools. However, the data shows that certain groups of children are more likely to be excluded than others. Boys are three times more likely than girls, children on free school meals are four times more likely than other children, and Gypsy Roma, Travellers of Irish heritage, and black Caribbean children are all significantly more likely to face school exclusion than white British children. To explore why these disparities exist, Anita is joined by Dr Amelia Roberts, deputy director of UCL’s Centre for Inclusive Education; Jason Arthur, CEO of Mission 44, a charitable foundation which aims to support disadvantaged young people; and Lisa Smith, chair of the Advisory Council for the Education of Romany and Other Travellers. When we think about the World War II war effort, Indian women in saris are not the first people that come to mind. Social historian Kiran Sahota has been researching the role of Indian women in the war, and has curated her research into a documentary and exhibition, which is currently on tour in the UK. There’s been anger from counsellors and psychotherapists about new guidelines around access to rape victims therapy notes. The changes introduced by the CPS were first reported exclusively by Woman’s Hour back in May when solicitors raised concerns. Now five leading bodies representing psychiatrists, psychologists and counsellors have raised their own concerns. Newsnight reporter Anna Collinson has been looking into the story. We also hear from Dame Vera Baird, the Victims Commissioner for England and Wales.According to the art market, men are 10 times better at painting than women, with men’s art valued ten times more than women’s. Now, a new Radio 4 documentary, 'Revaluating Art' explores why. Its creator, Mary-Ann Sieghart explains.Presenter: Anita Rani Producer: Kirsty StarkeyInterviewed Guest: Ama Agbeze Interviewed Guest: Dr Amelia Roberts Interviewed Guest: James Arthur Interviewed Guest: Lisa Smith Interviewed Guest: Kiran Sahota Interviewed Guest: Vera Baird Interviewed Guest: Anna Collinson Interviewed Guest: Mary-Ann Sieghart

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BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, I'm Anita Rani and welcome to Woman's Hour from BBC Radio 4. Good morning, welcome to Friday's Woman's Hour. Now last Friday we had a very interesting discussion on the programme around whether children who misbehave should be permanently excluded from school, the thoughts behind it and how various agencies deal with it. If you missed it and would like to catch up, then head to BBC Sounds where you can hear any women's hours

that you may have missed during the week. Well, today we're revisiting the subject, but looking at who gets excluded from schools and what impact it has on their lives. Here's a couple of stats. Boys are three times more likely than girls to be excluded and children on free school meals are four times more likely than other children. So gender and class have a part to play, as does ethnicity. But we'll be discussing that in depth

in a moment. I'd like to hear from you on this this morning. Do you have any experience of school exclusion? Were you excluded? what was the impact on your life how did you feel about it at the time maybe you're a parent of an excluded child what's the situation at home how has it changed your life the life of your family and of course the life of your child or maybe you're a teacher listening this morning we would love to hear your thoughts and your experiences of school exclusion get in touch with me in the usual way. Text me on 84844. You can also contact us via social media.

It's at BBC Woman's Hour. But if you'd like to send us an email, then go to our website. And remember, you can get in touch and remain anonymous if you don't want to give us your name. We'll also be hearing this morning about a new touring exhibition looking at the role of Indian women during World War II. Women in saris, not the first thing that comes to mind when you think of the war effort, but they were absolutely part of it, as we'll be finding out shortly. And are men better at painting than women? The reason I ask is because artwork painted by them, men that is, sells for a lot more than art by women you'd

think the progressive art world would be more progressive progressive not when it comes to valuing art and remember you are more than welcome to comment on anything here in the program 84844 is the number to text and i'll try and read out as many of your messages as i can but first this time last week do you remember we were looking forward to the big match, the Lionesses at the European Championship final at Wembley? We hoped, but we just couldn't predict what would happen.

But what a great moment when they won against Germany. Get in. But don't let the success of the women's football overshadow the sport that's been with us all along. I am indeed talking about netball at the commonwealth games the english team known as the roses are in the semi-final tomorrow up against australia if they win they'll be in the final on sunday and don't forget the roses won at

the commonwealth games last time around four years ago and ama abuezé was captain of the Roses that time and joins us this morning. Very good morning. Tomorrow, they're up against Australia. You beat them four years ago. Just take us back, Ama. How special was that moment in 2018? Good morning, Anita.

It was absolutely incredible. So I have had a 20-year England career and they've been talking about winning a major competition since before I got there and we'd never won. And so to win that match in the last second on Australian soil was absolutely incredible. I still get goosebumps now, but it felt like a miracle, but it happened.

And I think we saw an increase in participation with netball in the years subsequent to that. And so it was just an amazing feeling at the time and had such amazing repercussions afterwards. Well, exactly. That's what they're talking about with women's football now, aren't they? The repercussions off the back of it. And you absolutely felt it after 2018. Did more and more women come forward to want to play? Yeah, they really did. But then also I do a lot of speak engagements and more men were playing. Men were telling me that they felt like they had recognition for their

daughters because they didn't know how to engage with them. But now they take them to netball matches. And I think it was just the fact that netball's always been there, but it just got a bit more recognition. And so, so many more women felt validated and so many more girls felt that what they were doing was worthwhile and acknowledged by other people. OK, well, let's let's talk about the game that's coming up. Australia still favourites to win this weekend. So tell us how how we're looking for tomorrow's semifinal. Yeah, it's quite interesting. So tomorrow's semifinal is a repeat of the final from last time. Australia and England have met several times, over 100 times,

and England, we've probably won about seven of those meetings. And so I think Australia, they actually have quite a young, inexperienced side. They have a new coach since the last games. But during COVID, they couldn't travel domestically even because they're very state-based.

And so it's odd that they're the favourites because they've not really, they've played three games in the last two years England are the most experienced team but Australia somehow always managed to pull it out of the bag so I think it's probably good that England are going in as underdogs but the crowd at the game yesterday were absolutely incredible and so I think if the game's in the balance hopefully the crowds will get England over the line. So give us a progress report how have we been doing so far? So in the early stages of the competition the games have been against lower ranked nations and so England have managed to get lots of combinations out and I think dust off the cobwebs. Yesterday they played New Zealand for the final pool game to see who would be placed at the top of the pool.

And that was going to be their biggest test yet. Both teams started incredibly nervously, but England ran away with it towards the end. So I think they're looking good. They still got a few combinations out yesterday. So it'll be interesting to see who Jets the coach starts with. And hopefully, if they're going to play Australia, they need to get a really good start. So they can't start how they did yesterday. And there's been a headline or two saying that netball might have been overshadowed by women's football.

Do you think we've forgotten how good the team is? I don't think so. When I saw that headline, I thought, of course, because of course women can only have one sport. We can't have more than one. Exactly. Your cynicism is brilliant. And that's the thing. So we're not competing. I think actually at the moment, women's sport is reaching a massive crescendo. And actually, I think if the Roses succeed as well, it would just basically jump up and down and shout out and tell people women's sport is here. We can do anything. We can do any sport. So it's not a competition for there's only one spot and it's who's going to take it.

And I think once the team start doing better, people will start paying attention. It will be on BBC One or BBC Two. And so I think more eyes will be on the game and people will remember what happened in the Gold Coast and hopefully will back the team. And I imagine the women's footballers will be supporting the In Roses now because we're a collective and actually we're just trying to progress together yeah absolutely and everyone listening to women's hour today is going to be all over it um just this is just my own little research um i loved a bit of netball when i was at school um scrappy in the center i felt i had a height disadvantage though can i ask you how tall you are i'm just over six foot and people do think you have to be tall to play netball if you're not playing elite netball you can beat any height and actually even if you are

playing elite netball netball's brilliant because all body shapes all sizes all heights can play there's a position for everybody and you just have to adapt to your skill set so I'm tall but I'm not very agile when I'm playing against a shorter player they frustrate me because they're here they're everywhere they change direction um goal shooters are six foot six I'm only very agile. When I'm playing against a shorter player, they frustrate me because they're here, they're everywhere, they change direction. Goal shooters are six foot six. I'm only six foot. So I have to be athletic. I have to be able to jump.

So netball is a sport for everybody. So don't let anyone tell you you're too short. Yes. Great advice. Amma, thank you so much for speaking to us and go the roses. We'll be all over it. You're welcome. Thanks, Anisha.

Now, 84844, by the way, is the number to text if you would like to get in touch with me about anything you hear on the programme today. Now, in the last normal academic year before the pandemic, 2018 to 2019, nearly 8,000 children were permanently excluded from English state schools. It's something we talked about on the programme last week. However, the data shows that certain groups of children are more likely to be excluded than others. Boys are three times more likely than girls. Children on free school meals are four times more likely than other children. And Gypsy Roma travellers of Irish heritage and Black Caribbean children are significantly more likely than white British children to face

exclusion. To explore why these disparities exist, I'm joined by Dr Amelia Roberts, Deputy Director of University College London's Centre for Inclusive Education. Jason Arthur, CEO of Mission 44, a charitable foundation launched last year by the racing driver Lewis Hamilton to support disadvantaged young people with a particular focus on school exclusions. And Lisa Smith, Chair of ACERT, the Advisory Council for the Education of Romani and Other Travellers. Good morning to all three of you. Welcome to Woman's Hour. I'm going to come to you first, Amelia.

Let's unpick these figures, starting with the gender difference. Why are boys three times more likely than girls to be permanently excluded? Yes, we have to be careful about generalising across the piece because every child is different. But boys tend to share their unhappiness in a louder, more extrovert type of way. So we know that girls can be equally unhappy, but they are more likely to internalise that pain in terms of things like anxiety, whereas a boy is more likely to externalise it in terms of behaviour that might be aggressive or violent. And it's those types of behaviour that leads to exclusions. Jason, let me bring you in. So we've got there that

the boys are more likely to externalise their behaviour. Why do you think Black Caribbean children are more than twice as likely as white British children to be permanently excluded? Well, I think you've got to separate two different forces here. So one is discrimination, the fact that young black and black Caribbean pupils often face negative stereotypes about their violence or aggression, low teacher expectations, a curriculum that often doesn't meet their kind of needs in terms of interest. The workforce within our schools being very undiverse, only 1% of teachers in our schools are black Caribbean, 2% black, and only 1% of our head teachers are black.

So I think there's a real challenge within our schools. There's discrimination that those young people face in broader society. But also black Caribbean peoples are more likely to face a whole range of disadvantages as well. So having families in low income brackets, suffering from poor housing, mental ill health within the community. So when you add that disadvantage and that discrimination together, it's very easy to see how vulnerable learners can then not fare well in an education system, which often isn't as inclusive as it should be. Amelia, you're nodding. This matches up with the research that you've been doing. Yes, absolutely. And I've actually got some new findings that are in the process of being

published. So this is a research project led by Professor Claire Cameron and analysed by a colleague, Orsa Villardson. And what we've done is we've studied the Millennium Cohort data, which tracks 19,000 children who were born in the year 2000. And the point of this is to see what early life events have, what kind of impact they have on future life events. And what we found is that children age seven who report low school connectedness. So that's in response to questions like how much do you enjoy school? How interested in school are you? Do you feel tired at school? Children who report low school connectedness at age seven are more likely to be excluded at age 14 so everything that's just been said if you're

in a group of children whose needs are not being properly met you're going to report this lower school connectedness and that is what's setting you up on the pathway to exclusion and that's why we have to take school Connected as much more seriously and enshrine it better in policy for boys, for Black Caribbean children, for mixed heritage children and for Traveller children and anybody who's at systemic disadvantage. School Connectedness, as young as seven. Your thoughts, lots of you are getting in touch already.

I'm just going to read out your messages as they're coming in. Someone wants to remain anonymous. My daughter went through a tricky time at school behaviour-wise. Exclusion was the response of the school. This resulted in a nervous breakdown, non-school attendance for now two years, and two years later, a diagnosis of autism. It's incredibly traumatic and stressful for the family unit as well. Someone else who's remaining anonymous.

I'm a social worker and having worked with several teenagers who've been often repeatedly excluded from school, it's very damaging. It's the less advantaged pupils who tend to be subject to this kind of treatment. And if you would like to send an email, go to our website. I'm going to bring Lisa Smith, who is chair of ASA, in here now. Lisa, let's talk specifically about the community

that that you look at the Gypsy Roman Travellers of Irish Heritage two ethnic groups that have the highest exclusion rates tell me what you think hi there good to be on the show um so we see from quite a dated piece of research now but the piece of research done by the children's commissioner um into schooling conclusions in 2012 we found out that um gypsy roman traveler children were four times more likely to be excluded than any other ethnic group and they did a piece of research across 28 authorities to examine the rate of appeals and on that they found 100 of appeals were successful in the case of gypsy roma and travelers and there were recommendations to try and investigate that more onto why that would be the case so when when the when parents back went back to the schools

they they won their cases they did in the case of support so it points to something i think a bit more systemic going on and just to echo the points that have already been addressed I think this feeling of belonging and school connectedness is absolutely crucial because what we see in British schools is often there's a lack of visibility and representation of Gypsy Roman Traveller of Irish Heritage cultures and this feeds into this lack of belonging or feeling wanted or included, I would say. In our casework that we do with many different families, the same kind of issues are echoed again. For example, we will have being negatively labelled or judged or predetermined assumptions being made about what that child will be like in

the case of my own family um both my brothers experienced uh temporary permanent temporary exclusions uh in one case they were told by a teacher well there's no point in teaching you because you're only going to grow up to tarmac drives i think there is a often as well in the case of my other brother i think racist and offensive language towards Roma communities are often not seen or not taken as seriously as incidents of racial hate because there's a lack of understanding or awareness from the part of sometimes teachers that these groups are ethnic minorities and are recognised as such under the equalities

legislation. But I think when we talk about these presumptions, one thing that tended to come up a lot in our casework was the presumption that Romani people, traveller people, were more likely to be bullies than to be on the receiving end of that. And I think this is a bit more symptomatic of a wider systemic issue because we found reports back in 2018 from the police. They did research across 43 different police forces and found that actually in the police,

they were more likely to presume that Romani and Traveller people were perpetrators of crime rather than victims. And I think then this impacts on our communities with disproportionate policing, especially when it comes to stop and searches. So I think when we're looking at the issue of school exclusions for all children, it's taking into account structural issues

and societal assumptions that we're under as well when we take into account the outcomes of disadvantaged children. And Jason, you nodding along to all of that as well I mean this is something that you've looked into within the black African and Caribbean community. Yeah absolutely this view of black young people and black young Caribbean people as being somehow more adult there's been a lot of discussion recently about adultification, particularly in the case of Child Q. Including right here on Womansower, absolutely. And so not giving young people from those communities the benefit of the doubt,

not recognising the vulnerabilities that they face and instead going to more punitive approaches in terms of behaviour management, school exclusions and then outside of the school setting, stop and search and arrests, I think is really negative. And all of those issues combine, I think, to lead to the poor outcomes that we're seeing for young black Caribbean peoples. So then what is the impact once these children are excluded from school, permanently excluded? So, you know, the system has put them on the outside.

What does that lead to then? What potential does that space, does that lead to then what what what potential does that space does that open up for the child you are much less likely to get a good gcse results so leaving with five good uh gcse results including english and maths the levels are incredibly poor you're more likely um to be unemployed you are more likely to have a mental ill health, you're more likely to end up in prison to be incarcerated. The impact of exclusions on society, on our economy, and obviously very specifically for those young people can be hugely detrimental. And Lisa, what happens to children from the Gypsy Roman travel communities when

they're excluded? Just to carry on all of those points that have just been raised, really, there's a disconnection from education and often it will be the end of any type of formal education. And when you haven't got proper access to education, then unfortunately, what we see then is a higher rate of younger people going into youth offending institutions, which is a very negative impact for society as a whole, for all the issues that we've just talked about. And there's just this disconnection from society. Amelia, I'm going to bring you back in because you've done a lot of research into this and we're talking about two communities here but what are the interesting differences between various ethnic groups that you found? I think if you look at say Black Caribbean people the Windrush scandal just exemplifies the stereotypical disadvantage that can happen to certain groups.

So it's not as if being in a certain group is inherently a disadvantage. It's not. That's a thing to be celebrated. It's a wonderful thing. But what happens is that certain groups get associated with poor housing or poor maternal mental health or poor parental occupation. So you're looking at a disadvantage um raft rather than it being about a particular category of people but i think the crucial thing here is what a school can do about it so if you're a um a traveler child but you've got a really good um electronic system so the local authorities got all your records right there so that the school can go right oh here's here's so-and-so.

They're brilliant at maths. They're really interested in dinosaurs. They've got a real strength here. So they come into school and are known and they are supported with making friendships. Then you can make a huge difference. It's the same with children from different heritages. If you bring that into the curriculum, if you make teaching and learning powerful and interesting, then you're going to make a difference. So we're not looking at a world where we are in a situation we can't do something. We can. We can have joined up school thinking, we can have better policy, we can have better lessons, and although I've never had experience of excluding a child, I've taught my fair share of disruptive children. They make it very difficult for the other children to learn and a teacher to teach. Amelia?

Yeah, I'm going to dive right in there because I have worked with so many teachers who structure lessons really creatively. So if you start a lesson with an exciting, open activity, get children talking to other children, use thinking skills activities, use really good group work, use your teaching assistants in really creative ways, then you can have great lessons. So it's just wrong to say this child is a problem. It's all about great teaching and great support for teachers that makes the difference. Jason? So I went into teaching, I taught for four and a half years as a black man.

One of the reasons why I wanted to go into teaching is because I wanted to bring my lived experience and hopefully be able to connect with students who looked like me and had an experience like me. And I think we want to support teachers to be able to maintain, you know, the right behaviour within their classrooms. But we also have to ensure that teachers have that cultural sensitivity to recognise, is this behaviour that I'm looking at actually disruption? How am I interpreting what's happening here? How am I providing support to that young person? I think it's very easy, given the pressures that are on teachers to say, okay, no, it's not about all of those wider issues. It's just this is a naughty kid, so let's get him or her out of my classroom, my lesson. I think we need to be much more

sophisticated in how we think about groups of young people than that. Well, as I'm sure you know, Jason, the report by the Government's Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities, which came out in March 2021, known as the Sewell Report, suggested that the exclusion rate in the Black Caribbean community was a result of certain culture within the community. And that was a government report. What was your response to that? Well, I think the Sewell Report has been widely condemned and rightly so. It's not to say that culture isn't important and we should look at that. But I think to place culture above the discrimination that groups face, the disadvantages that groups face, I think is wrong. And we should also realise

that cultural attitudes are shaped by those forces. So, you know, there's reference to Windrush earlier, for those black Caribbean communities who came in the late 40s and 50s, who had to see no blacks, no dogs, no Irish on shop fronts, who weren't to the police and employment, etc., means that understandably there is now some hesitation, I think, some scepticism about whether our schools actually care about black Caribbean pupils. So culture is important, but we shouldn't be dismissing discrimination and disadvantage and placing culture above those forces. Amelia, just to come to you, you've done all this research into school exclusion and you've really looked into the intricacies of who's being excluded, why they've been excluded.

What's your conclusion that you draw? We asked this question last week on this programme, whether children should be excluded at all. What do you think? I think there are so many cases where it's wrong. I was hearing about some children who were excluded on the last day of the summer term. So whatever those problems were, it means that they then come back in September five days later than their peers. How is that going to help anything?

It's really, really not. So I think it's less about exclusion. It's more about how are we creating the school connectedness? Are we getting children engaged and interested and motivated and if we put our energies into these positive things then we're going to diminish the pool of children that are at risk of being excluded so I would like the narrative to be shifted into how we make schools welcoming inclusive exciting places for everybody and we move far away from here's a naughty child,

should they or should they not be excluded. And what about the safety of children and teachers, which is what came up last week? Yeah, absolutely. It is really tricky. And a lot of it is, I think, that we're not supporting teachers appropriately. So if you're in an immediate situation

where somebody's at harm, then you think about people being kept safe. Now, whether that's moving a child into a different room. So, of course, you need to think about safety in the immediate moment. But does that child then need to be excluded? Maybe, maybe not. But I would say that we could do so much before we reach that point. We can do lovely walks and talks.

I used to walk along outside shoulder to shoulder with children, just talking through things, giving them space to calm down. We need to try everything before excluded is even discussed, even put on the table. I'd like to thank all three of you for joining me to talk about this this morning. Dr Amelia Roberts, Jason Arthur and Lisa Smith. Lots of you getting in touch. Anonymous, I teach in a men's prison. 90% of my students were excluded by the age of 15 and yet they are in my classes learning people's behaviour can change. And we've had a Department of Education spokesperson has said to us, as the most recent data shows, permanent exclusions are rare but a necessary way of managing behaviour so that all pupils can learn in a calm, safe and

supportive environment. Schools cannot discriminate against pupils on the basis of their race, including when deciding to exclude. Our recently updated statutory guidance sets out clearly when to suspend or permanently exclude, as well as advising governors on how to challenge decisions as needed to be confident that permanent exclusion is only used as a last resort and does not mean exclusion from education um once again 844 is the number to text now when we think about world war the world war world war ii war efforts indian women in saris are not the first people that come to mind but social historian kieran sahota has been researching the role of indian women in the war and has curated her research into a documentary and exhibition. Her work recognises the role that South Asian women played in the military, coal mines and in building infrastructure and is currently on tour in the UK.

And Kiran joins me now to tell me all about it. Welcome to Women's Hour, Kiran. So why did you want to research these women? Let's get into this. Tell me a bit more about your research. Well, first of all, thank you so much. The Queen Anita Rani. I never thought we'd get to BBC Women's Hour with these sorry stories.

Absolutely, where these sorry stories need to be. And she said Queen because Rani actually means Queen. Queen, yes. Yeah, I just started researching. So I'm not a historian by trade. Eight years ago, I was working in corporate and people have given me this title historian. And this is such a history overlooked. And when we think of like military history, especially Indian military history, we think of men and we lessen the women and so starting this project back in 20 end of 2019 and it's only supposed to take 18 months but it's taken three years in the making um i came across stories i was always interested in first world war why didn't we know about women

we knew about princess of fire delete sing for the listeners that don't know, you know, goddaughter of Queen Victoria. She visited Indian soldiers in Brighton hospitals. And I was thinking about my own family, like my grandma, my nanny, my maternal grandmother and my grandfather couldn't read or write. And I was like, there must be other stories where they they are like reflection of the people that I live with and I couldn't find that in First World War and I found letters about men in my last project in 2018 where men were comparing Indian women to European women and it was all from that angle so my whole history has been through a female lens and so when I saw like trickets of um like stories of Noah and Iqbal Khan the the spy and she was a SOE agent a special

operatives executive I was like well where were the other women then but it shifted onto second world war and then I found that women were serving in saris and that was the norm in Second World War so I made a major shift from First World War to Second World War and I never thought I was going to uncover any of this history so I said what do we do with this and we created a documentary and a touring exhibition. So where were these women so we're talking World War II so this is pre-partition India so India,, Pakistan and Bangladesh, all one nation. And we've never seen this kind of movement before. We've seen it in Britain, the Auxiliary Territorial Service, sorry about that, known as the ATS. And Her Majesty the Queen served in that when she was 18,

when she was a princess. So we've seen some units set up in Britain, but never in the UK. And this has happened because 2.5 million men had signed up for Second World War. And there were... 2.5 million Indian men. Indian, yeah, Indian soldiers from India had volunteered. And so there were gaps in the market

and Indian government at that time didn't know what to do. So, you know, working as clerks and loggers and coders map reading so 1942 the king gave permission the king in england to say yes the indian government can set up the army regiment which was called the the wack eyes and it was british women at the time settled in india so the wives or the daughters of British soldiers British officers sorry um stay like living in India who had set this up and then they had a process of application and what was funny about the application is we talk about men's for those that don't know about men's recruitment they were forced to sign up come from any village you know we've seen a lot of like northern indian

um men sign up that's where most of the recruitment drive was and but for women you had to talk about whether you're married you had to give your father's name if you're married or not married what was your husband's name what is he doing and so i was interested in that and i said there must be more and then we see 1944 um the RINs which is the Women's Royal Indian Naval Service the RINs yes that was set up and again this was a huge movement so it was an umbrella from the WACIs and that changed my um project completely because no one has ever researched this and I've worked with the greats of like jazdeep singh and you know dr yasmin khan had been on this project with me and they said

there's no experts so this is the first time you're going to be seeing a project in your face where women are wearing saris and how many women are we talking about? So all in all, by 1946, there was approximately around 10,000 women who had joined up into the Wack Eyes and the Winds. And it is in documents, actually, that had the war, well, had Partition not been in talks in 1947, had that not been in talks, this would have been a unit that people should have been afraid of because more and more women were signing up and what was different about the rings whereas the wackos were made up of um it was modeled on the ats and more british women two-thirds of the women in the rings were indian women so from southern india and we've never seen that or heard about recruitment like that before.

I wonder what impact it had on their lives then, once they'd signed up and were part of the war effort, what they went on and did afterwards. Well, this is where it gets difficult because there's no trace. And this is the holes in our history. So those that are not familiar with Indian history or South Asian history at all, we're not always going to get the documents.

So I had thousands of thousands of photographs and there were British women named. Some of them were and some some weren't. And so when I saw the photographs, I saw lighter skinned women and darker skinned. And I'm talking about Indian women. And I was like, well like why is one tying her sari like this and the other but we've got no names and it's a mystery who they are. And then as part of the research you actually spoke to South Asian women who are serving in the armed forces currently didn't you why did you do that? Yes yeah like I didn't get to know about this history at school and I was a C average student and since I've come into this industry, I wanted to connect the past to the present because we don't have the names of the women, we don't have their voices

and so working with the military, I'm also a consultant to Army army air force and navy outside of the project work um i was like let's get the women let's get them on board i want to know about you and it doesn't matter about people's view on war or service women these are everyday women from our community that we've never seen before and you've interviewed um harpreet chandi polar preets and she was on it we filmed her back in 2021 just before she went on the expedition. So to see her in a film saying we can be anything that we want to be, it was like going back in time because some of the documents come out that we want to sign up for money, not adventure.

Kieran, saying you can be anything you want to be, I think for me, this is brilliant work that you've done and incredible research. And I can't wait to come and see the exhibition myself firsthand. But you come from a corporate background. You said yourself, you know, I'm not a historian. I just recognised that no one had done this. And so you just went off and did it off your own back. So what is it like now being a historian and in that world?

Listen, I, you you know the segment before we're talking about education i was a high school teacher then worked in a prison service and then i just always filtered just to make money basically and corporate pays that money so to come into an industry that doesn't pay very well let's be honest don't be a historian. Unless you love the subject. Yeah, I mean, yeah, but opportunities are, you know, my story's unique because I found people, but to be in Oxford with, you know, Shobhani Basu talking about Noor and Ayat Khan and having private collections out for me,

working with Dr Yasmin Khan, who's guiding me, and she actually guided me on a story where I talk about the Waka'is and the Wns. There were also women that I found who were exploited and they were unregistered women and they were really, really looking for work after the Bengal famine. And these women were exploited by Commonwealth soldiers, had to lay the roads in the day in boiling heat, and then, you know, sold off by their husbands or fathers and brothers. And so the comparison of women like that made me realise my nanny was a cleaner, you see, and my mother was a seamstress. And so for them that I'm now in Oxford and I'm talking, like I'm here,

like I never thought three years in the making I'd be here and we're calling it the lemonade album because you know we're back and women deserve to be told and I love that like Sharon Daniel who created the film for me when she said on the day that we were going to launch at um House of Lords with Lord Singer Wimbledon who's shown great sport she said Beyonce just released the song and I was like if that's not our answer yeah to go big or go home with this project yeah um what you've done is fantastic and you never know Kieran there might be someone listening who knows a bit about the history in their own family who might reach out to you um Kieran Sahota thank you so much for speaking to us right this is exciting we are handing the editorial reinss of woman's hour over to you

starting on the 22nd of august we'll be running our annual listener week where all the items are chosen by you so if there's a strong personal story you want to share an issue you'd like us to explore an unusual hobby you've taken up or even an achievement you want us to shout about then get in touch you can even nominate a guest or their story. Just contact us via our website or via social media. It's at BBC Woman's Hour. Now, counsellors and psychotherapists say new guidelines allowing private medical information about rape victims to be passed to police and the defence will stop people accessing therapy. The changes introduced by the CPS were first reported exclusively by Woman's Hour back in May when solicitors raised concerns. Now five leading bodies representing psychiatrists,

psychologists and counsellors have raised their own concerns. Newsnight have been looking into the story. Their reporter Anna Collinson joins me now to bring us up to speed. So Anna, can you just remind us about this new guidance? Why was it brought in and what it says about accessing a person's therapy notes? Yeah, of course, morning. So until a few months ago, if victims felt they needed to access mental health support, the advice was to have something called pre-trial therapy, which is where sessions were restricted from discussing anything directly related to the case. But in May,

the advice changed, as you say, in the wake of a highly critical parliamentary report of rape victims' experience of the justice system. The CPS brought in a number of new measures to try to make the system less invasive. And one change was encouraging victims to seek therapy and to not delay that. But as a CPS spokesperson put it to us, a balance still has to be struck between a victim's right to privacy and the right to a fair trial. So while many campaigners had hoped therapy notes would become confidential, what's actually happened is the new guidance says they can be sought if they are deemed to be, as they put it, relevant. Now, you've been sent this letter from these five leading bodies who've written to the cps what are they saying yeah so these five groups represent a range of experts including the royal college of psychiatrists and they've written a letter to the cps as you say seen exclusively by newsnight and they claim the

updated guidance regarding pre-trial therapy for rape survivors is a risk to public health they say the new wording is too broad and has actually lowered the bar by saying therapy notes can be accessible if they're thought to be relevant. The letter says this will increase the likelihood of more victims' private medical information being viewed and that will damage trust, something that is already really difficult to establish in cases of sexual violence. Now there can often be a long wait between someone reporting a rape and it getting to court. In fact, it was reported a few months that serious offences are taking the longest time on record to go through the courts in England and Wales. The typical delay rose to a thousand days in 2021. Is there concern it will affect numbers and rape victims coming forward more generally. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, this group of experts say this may mean many people will not access therapy when they need it. And as for those that do,

the therapeutic process may be seriously compromised because these experts argue, how can a person comfortably discuss highly sensitive information when there's a chance it might be seen by others and potentially even used against them in court? You quoted a key stat there. There's just a few others that sort of paint a pretty damning picture of the current situation in England and Wales. In the year to September 2021, just over 1% of reported rapes resulted in a suspect being charged.

Figures for recent years in England and Wales show the number of rape prosecutions have plummeted, while the number of victims withdrawing support for cases has risen from 42% to 57% since 2016. God, they are shocking stats. You've spoken to two women, both rape survivors, who have got concerns, haven't you? Yeah, that's right. So first we heard from Annie, who decided to waive her right to anonymity because she wanted to raise awareness about what she calls a broken system. After she reported being raped to police, she was told she could have therapy but could not discuss what happened. While the police requested her therapy notes, they were never used, but she found the limitations on what she could talk about and the fact that they'd even

been viewed extremely distressing. Last month, she found out her case had been dropped nearly four years after she reported her rape. I was really struggling with depression and anxiety. I was having panic attacks. Everything was reminding me of what I went through and the person and thinking I was seeing him or thinking I was hearing him. And yeah, just really, really struggling. As time went on, it become really clear that actually, I just needed therapy. And I just needed to talk about

it with somebody and I wasn't being allowed to. They've changed their guidelines to include anything that's relevant, when actually the underlining issue here is that rape survivors note should not be allowed in court at all. That shouldn't be allowed to happen. And if there was a ban on that, then everyone could get the therapy that they need. How would you say the current situation looks? You know, a few years ago, it being said that it was at breaking point,

this isn't breaking point, this is beyond, this is broken. This isn't working and it isn't working for anyone. If the conviction rate is 1%, then essentially rape has been decriminalized in this country the only reason why I still speak out is because like all I have is my voice that's all I can do in this situation is keep talking about it because I tried so hard with my police case and it got dropped anyway. So I just feel like that I'd done everything that I could and it still wasn't enough. Yeah, so that's Annie there. We also spoke to a woman who didn't want to be identified.

It is, of course, very difficult to talk openly about these experiences. We've revoiced her words to protect her anonymity and are calling her Mary. Unlike Annie, her therapy notes were used in a rape and sexual abuse trial, and she believes contributed to her perpetrator being found not guilty. I thought that disclosing my therapy notes

to the court would be in my favour because it would show that I'd been telling the same story over and over, and working on different aspects of the damage that was caused by it. So I was really optimistic that it would prove that he was guilty. But Mary was shocked when the defence barrister brought up a conversation she'd had with her therapist about finding an aspect of intimacy with her husband difficult

because of her assault. It was something she hadn't told her husband yet. The defence said, are you truthful? And when I said yes, she said, well, you're not exactly truthful with your husband, are you? Would you like me to read out your therapy notes about what you're currently discussing with your therapist? I was just absolutely mortified. And I said, said no you don't need to read those please it was like a physical punch because I wasn't expecting it that someone would bring that up in a courtroom about my current sex life how how is that relevant that's what really got me my therapy notes were used solely to

discredit me it was violating like another trauma. Yeah, it's quite difficult to listen to those, isn't it? And what about the legal profession? What have they been telling you? Well, we've spoken to barristers who, while they can understand the sensitivities of these cases, are against the blanket ban of therapy notes in court. They argue experienced colleagues would never use therapy notes when they're not relevant. Kirsty Brimlow QC is the vice chair of the Criminal Bar Association. Prosecutors will only obtain therapy notes if this is a reasonable line of inquiry by the police and therapy notes

will only be disclosed to the defence if they might assist the defence or undermine the prosecution. An accused has got an absolute right to a fair trial so there can never be a blanket ban on disclosure of therapy notes. What is important and often doesn't happen is that there is clear communication with the complainant as to what will happen with their therapy notes and transparency on the decision making. And Anna, we contacted the CPS and did ask them to come on the programme, but they sent us a statement instead. What have they said? Yeah, so they've said the well-being of victims is paramount in every investigation and that court proceedings should not impact on them seeking support.

They also add that their guidance reinforces the importance of taking a measured, proportionate and reasonable approach to lines of inquiry, including requests for therapy notes so they're not intrusive. Anna, thank you very much for that. And you can hear more on that report tonight on Newsnight on BBC Two at 10.30 this evening. Listening to that interview is Dame Vera Baird, the Victims Commissioner for England and Wales. Good morning. Welcome to Woman's Hour. Now, last time you were on, Vera, we spoke to you about this, about the guidance. What do you make of the latest concerns by this coalition of psychiatrists and psychologists? A risk to public health and well-being is what

they're saying. Yes, I think rape victims will be very grateful to the Royal College of Psychiatrists and to the psychotherapists and psychologists for raising this. The CPS are causing a threat to public health. They have not for quite a long time advised against taking therapy. Indeed, in 2020, their rape spokesmen encouraged people to take therapy, and people have taken therapy all the way through anyway. And the point is they've changed the test for disclosure. So in the document that your brilliant reporter, Melanie Abbott, found in May, the change came previous to that. The CPS would not look for therapy notes unless there was a strong suspicion that the content would undermine the prosecution or assist the defence. A very narrow test.

And now this word, the wording has changed because they're saying it's about relevant. Relevant, simply relevant. A very, very wide test and a very, very subjective test indeed. And of course, what will happen is exactly what the Royal College of Psychiatrists is worried about, is that it will deter people from taking therapy at all. So why do you think they've introduced these guidelines then? I mean, the government has pledged to improve the situation for rape victims. If digital material from phones as they used to demand. They've legislated to limit that. They're going to legislate to limit the CPS seeking socialed the test to simple relevance. And that is the change that came in May. There was no change to the advice. It has been the case that everybody expects victims to take therapy if they can and if they need it.

But of course, this new wide test will deter. And that is what the Royal College of Psychologists and Psychotherapists and Psychiatrists is saying. Here are 70,000 women a year and some men who complain of rape, who will now be frightened of taking therapy because if it's relevant and in what case will a subjective test of relevance not be applicable it will be seized it will be read by the cps it will be read by the police it may be used in the trial as mary has seen yeah and i mean appalling and the whole point of therapy is that you feel totally secure in that space to be able to say whatever you want without fear of anyone else uh accessing that so you're calling for amendments to the victims bill you want us to follow the australian system can you

explain a little bit about that yes but just let me say the other please of course is that people will simply not take therapy. And the risk is that if they want to go for justice and they want to get a prosecution, they will be frightened of it if they need therapy. And consequently, a lot of people simply won't prosecute, simply won't go to court. And that's a massive public health risk of a completely different kind because we know that rapists are serial offenders and we know that although they prosecute very few, the CPS convicts 68%. So a lot of rapists will be free on the streets

because the CPS have themselves put up a barrier to prosecution. And very, very quickly, please give us a brief overview of what the Australian system is. The Australian system says only if there is a very narrow test achieved, a very high one, can you ask a judge to look to see whether this material should be disclosed to anyone at all. That's been the case for 25 years. It works well. You just learn nothing to impede justice. That must be introduced here.

Dame for a bird. CPS are doing a very serious disservice. I know we'll get you back on to talk about this and hopefully the CPS will come on and talk to us as well. Thank you very much for joining us this morning. Now, according to the art market, men are 10 times better at painting than women.

For every £1 fetched by a male artist's work, a woman gets only 10p, with the worth dropping even further if she signs it. Now, a new Radio 4 documentary recalculating art explores why we value women's art so much lower than men's and how to make the market fairer. Its creator, Marianne Sieghart, joins us now. Marianne, I read this and it made me spit out my tea.

Well, yeah, I mean, my jaw dropped to the floor when I discovered this statistic. I simply couldn't believe it. Ten times more. I mean, are men really ten times better than men at painting? No, surely not. So the idea for this documentary came about from a study by Renée Adams you found whilst you were writing your book, The Authority Gap. So what did she find? Tell us more. Well, she wanted to investigate whether men were genuinely better at art than women, because if so, that could explain this enormous difference between how much a work by a man fetches and how much a work by a woman fetches.

So she did two experiments. And in the first one, she showed the participants 10 paintings. Five of them were by men and five of them were by women. And she asked them to identify which were by men and which were by women. They couldn't do it. They ended up guessing. I mean, they might as well have just tossed a coin. They were 50% right.

In other words, it was completely random. So that shows that art by men doesn't actually look any different from art by women. It's not possible to tell the difference if it were if they were 10 times better at painting, it would show and it doesn't. What she then did was she generated a painting artificially by using AI and she randomly gave it a male or a female artist's name. And then she showed this painting to affluent men who frequently visit art galleries, which was a way of identifying the sort of people who buy and collect art. And if they were told that it was painted by a man, they liked it more and valued it more highly than if they were told it was painted by a woman. Same painting, same artist.

God, and you'd think that the art world is more progressive, that they would be on all over this, you know? That's the extraordinary thing, isn't it? I mean, you know, they really pride themselves in the art world, as you say, for being progressive and forward looking and modern and contemporary and liberal. But no, it's not the case. I have to say, I do conclude the documentary by saying things are starting to change from a very low base. In what way? How is it changing? How is it changing? Because what's happened in the past and still happens to an extent is that museums tend to buy many more works of art by men than by women.

And of course, if your art is bought by a museum, it goes up in value automatically. So museums are now starting to look at their acquisition policies and trying to rebalance their collections a bit. And the other thing that really helps the value of your art is if a museum does a temporary show of it. And that's starting to change. So more museums are now showing female artists, sometimes hitherto not very well-known female artists who are extremely good. And I think that's partly because more museums are now curated and run by women

and there are more female art critics. And in the past, because the art critics were male, the museums, directors were male, they just automatically tended to give more authority and value to male artists. And that meant that because men ran the show, sexism in the art industry was deep rooted. Are women still dropped by galleries if they get pregnant? Well, anecdotally, I've heard this.

Yes, women telling their gallerists they're having a baby and the gallerists just drop them and say, oh, no one's going to take you seriously anymore. They'll assume you're not committed to your art. You won't be committed to your career. So why will collectors want to buy your paintings? Do you have faith that things can change? I know you said that things are changing, but when you hear things like women being dropped because they get pregnant, it's just so shocking. I know. I mean, it should be against the law, but of course, these artists aren't employees of their galleries and therefore they don't have the sort of employment protections that the rest of us have. What I think may start to engineer some change is that the market itself is changing.

So although women's art is priced much, much lower than men's art, it's rising in price faster than men's art. And therefore, I think canny collectors will A, think, wow, I can really grab a bargain here, because this art is just as good, but it's much, much cheaper. But also, the value of the investment will rise faster. And therefore, there are some collectors now saying to auction houses and to galleries, I want to start investing in art by women, because they think they'll make more money out of it. Like the Scottish National Galleries, collecting 55% from female artists. Is that right? That's right.

But of course, I mean, 55%, it will take a very long time to redress the balance. I don't know about the Scottish galleries in particular, but most museums have roughly two to one male to female pieces of art. And therefore, if you only collect slightly more women, it will take quite a long time to redress that. Marianne, you've just whet our appetites. Thank you so much for that. And Recalculating Art is on BBC Radio 4 at 11.30am on the 11th of August. And just a word on next Friday's Woman's Hour, we have a special programme looking at what happened to women during partition

as we approach the 75th anniversary of the partition of India. We'll hear the rarely told stories of the violence to the women injured, including kidnapping, rape and forced suicide, but also the courage, compassion and survival of the women who somehow overcame their trauma to rebuild their lives. Do join me then. Have a lovely weekend. 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.