Woman's Hour - Flexible Working, Brexit Party Tour, Australian Suffragettes

Episode Date: September 17, 2019

Led by Nigel Farage, the Brexit Party was formed in March of this year. In May it took 29 seats in the EU elections, more than any other party and nearly one third of all votes cast. Polls suggest the Brexit Party attracts the support of more men than women. But there are many women among the many voters who still feel strongly that the UK should fulfil the 2016 referendum result and leave with or without a deal. The Brexit party is holding a series of events as part of a national tour. Jane went to an event in Southport. The reality of searching for part time or flexible work. Just how hard is it to find good jobs - that make use of your skills and abilities - part time? We’ll be looking at new research from the flexible working consultancy Timewise, showing just how few advertised jobs there are for part time or flexible work, and asking why. We’ll also be getting advice on how to negotiate if you see your dream job advertised but at full time hours you can’t manage or don’t want - are employers likely to consider a strong candidate on fewer hours? And what can employers do to make part time or flexible work work for them?A few weeks ago we asked our listeners to get in touch and send us a picture that somehow captured them at their best. Not just looking your best, but feeling your best. Today Kelly Ford tells us about a reunion captured on camera.Historian Clare Wright on the overlooked history of the Australian suffragettes and their impact on the campaign for votes for women in Britain.Presenter: Jane Garvey Interviewed guest: Claire Fox Interviewed guest: Karen Mattison Interviewed guest: Sarah Hathaway Interviewed guest; Kelly Ford Interviewed guest: Clare Wright Producer: Lucinda Montefiore

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BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hi, this is Jane Garvey. Welcome to the Woman's Hour podcast, Tuesday the 17th of September. Today you can hear voices of some women we met at a Brexit party event on Friday night and then there's an interview with the Brexit party MEP Claire Fox. We'll look at the reality of looking for flexible work. And there's more on this subject at the end of the podcast. And there's more too about Australian suffragettes. Did you know that white Australian women got the vote in 1902? And then some of those Australian campaigners came to the UK to help the cause here. Much more on that subject in the podcast today.

Now for the next couple of days, all eyes will be on the Supreme Court as it hears legal arguments about the suspension of Parliament. And that hearing is likely to go on until Thursday. Yesterday, we heard from the President of the Liberal Democrats, the Remain Party, of course, effectively, that was Baroness Sal Brinton. Today, as promised, here are some voices from the Brexit Party. It is Friday evening. It's about five past six. And this is a Brexit Party event. It's not a conference. They're not having a conference. They're just having a series of these events across the country.

This is the Floral Hall, Southport Theatre. It's a venue I know quite well, actually. I think I saw the teardrop explodes here. There are 1,000 people expected tonight. They've all paid a fiver. Some are Brexit Party councillors. Some are supporters, just ordinary supporters. Some are prospective parliamentary candidates. Nigel Farage is the big attraction.

He's speaking at 20 to 8. But there are other prominent members of the party speaking as well. And there's a great little souvenir stand. I say great. that's if you're a supporter of the Brexit party obviously you can get a badge you can get a scarf you can even get a really cute Brexit party teddy bear so your Christmas needs are sorted if you're a supporter of the Brexit party and you're here tonight. I'm going to talk to women very different they've all got to the party through a variety of means but they are all really passionate about the cause as you're about to hear I'm going to start with you Julie because I think it's fair to say that you are someone who

before this, before this whole thing which seems to have been going on as long as any of us can now remember you were not really a political person were you? Not at all no no. No, but I've just got so annoyed. I voted Leave back in 2016 and I've just got so annoyed with things and a threat to our democracy and I thought I've got to do something about it. So here I am campaigning when the Brexit party came along. Why did you vote Leave in the first place? Where are you from? I'm from Bradford originally. I now live in Carnforth but I've always wanted out of the EU. Why? I've never wanted to be a part of it because I don't think it's good for us or the country. Why? I'm very

patriotic so I prefer to be out of the EU. It's better all the way around. I'm fed up of having our rules governed by somebody else abroad who we never vote for. And I just want the laws and rules and regulations coming back to us. And I want our country back. When you voted in good faith for leave in 2016, what did you think would happen? Well, I just expected we would come out of the EU. I didn't expect to be in this position, what we're in now.

I think it's utterly disgraceful how we've ended up. Who has let you down, if anyone? The government. They've not honoured my vote. So I'm out there campaigning for the silent majority who are too scared and frightened to come forward. What do you mean by that? Well, there's a lot of animosity out there

and there's a lot of people who voted Leave and they're too frightened to voice their opinion. So somebody has to do it for them because they're not all like me and these ladies here. So you know a lot of people, do you, who feel the same way as you? I know a lot of people who voted Leave and I know some who voted Remain. Because in my line of work with gardening, I work in pockets where there's Remainers with the odd Leaver mixed in.

And they get a lot of hassle because they voted Leave. And if they're living in a Remain area, it's very difficult for them to speak out freely. Leanne is sitting next to you. You're nodding at some of the things that Julie's saying there. Why are you here today? Well I'm an ex-conservative campaigner and I have been for many years, probably just over 20 years. I joined the Brexit party because I felt so let down by the Brexit vote and what had happened. Secondly, we've got so many issues in the country that do need addressing and I just thought I have to do something. Yeah you say issues that need addressing some people would say actually there's been so much emphasis on Brexit over the last couple of years that none of those really important

things have been properly addressed the whole thing has been held up by the fact that we haven't left the European Union is that what you're seeing around you? Absolutely. I think there's a lot of small towns, especially in the constituency that I'm a candidate for, that have got many issues that do need addressing. Brexit has taken over the agenda, but we shouldn't be in this position three years on when we're still fighting for the same issues and the same problems that we've had before,

which could have been sorted if they'd implemented the vote in the first place. They're now talking about a second referendum now, which is going to drag us into even a longer period of uncertainty. Why did you feel that you wanted to stand for this party? Because there's a huge difference between lending your support at the ballot box, which takes half a second, and actually being willing to stick your head above the parapet and put this work in. It's about having a voice.

You know, the people need a voice and somebody that is going to stand up for their democratic rights and to get things moving. And I felt so strongly about it, there was no point in sitting at home and doing nothing. I want to talk to you, Rachel. Tell me a little bit just about it. There was no point in sitting at home and doing nothing. I want to talk to you, Rachel. Tell me a little bit just about yourself. Obviously, the listeners at home will be interested in why you're here and what's brought you here. So let's hear about you.

So I was a Labour councillor. I began with Fleetwood Town Council and I was elected to Wyre Borough Council in May as a Labour councillor and I joined the Brexit party just over a month ago. Wow, so you walked across the... I did, yes. I walked across the floor and people don't really realise what walking across the floor means. People just, they hear it all the time

and they think that that just means that, oh, you've left one club and you've gone to another. It isn't that. It's your whole life everything your friends your the places you go the places you shop everything is based on the the party you're in and who you associate with and this sounds a real tribal setup you're describing it is it is um and it is try is effectively tribal. And I just couldn't carry on like that. For me, that wasn't right.

I stood up for local issues. I am a disability champion in Fleetwood. Now, you mentioned that you are a campaigner for disability issues. You do have a number of health issues yourself, don't you? Yes, I do. All the talk around no deal and the prospect of leaving the European Union without one and what that might mean for medical supplies, for example,

does it worry you? No, it doesn't. Medical supplies are not going to run out. Medical supplies are not in short supply. If that was the case, which it isn't the case, but if there was a remote possibility of that being the case, the medical companies and agencies and everywhere would not allow an entire country to not have the medical supplies they need the nhs would not allow that the government would not allow that it is the biggest load of rubbish so okay well that's interesting so do you buy i'm sure you read

the yellow hammer document did you read the Yellowhammer document. Did you see the line about food prices going up? It's likely to be the people at the lowest levels of earnings who are going to suffer the most. Doesn't any of that worry you? I live on tax credits and I live on personal independence payment. I am in the bottom bracket of the people in this country that live. In order for me to get to this conference centre today, I had to scrimp and scrape for fuel money and things like that. I am not worried in the slightest that food prices will be affected or any of the prices in any way. I actually believe the economy will be so much stronger

by us being out. Okay, well, that's interesting, because we don't hear all that much about how Britain is going to benefit outside the European Union. So give me an idea. Five years from now, how will we be better off? Five years from now, we will still be in a situation... By the way, I'm supposing we have left. Say we left today. Five years from now, we will still be in a situation where we are recovering. There will be a recovery period. But why is it the damage that's being done by the government now? Oh, I see.

So it won't be a problem caused by leaving the European Union. I wonder, though, whether people will see it that way, particularly the 16 million or so people who voted remain. OK, so the 51% of people that voted to leave do see it that way. And also the people that voted to remain, if you actually did a cross-section of those people, a lot of those people are saying, yes, I voted to remain, but we should have left, we should have had our voice heard.

And democratically, we were told that whatever we voted for, either way it would be honoured and it hasn't been. And that's a disgrace. Do you think that democracy itself is threatened at this time? I think democracy is in very big danger right now, yes. I think that if we do not honour the referendum, then how can we ask anybody to go to the ballot box at any time? Because they cannot trust us, and rightly so. Can I also ask, something that crops up a lot on Women's Hour

is that some people do think this debate is very male and men get a far too big a share of the... No, I know you're all shaking your heads, but you were here. What do you think about that, Leanne? Well, absolutely not. I'm on the doorstep week in and week out. For women as well, it is a very, very big issue. think about that Leanne? Well absolutely not I'm on the doorstep week in and week out for women as well it is a very very big issue women are talking about it in the playgrounds they're talking about it at their clubs I think a lot of it with women is that they want their children's

democracy to be upheld and I think that is such an important issue that with all the noise that's going on when it comes down to it it is about our vote and the honour of our vote. Just really, really quickly are we going to leave the European Union on October the 31st? I live in hope, but probably not. I would like to see it happen

but I doubt it very much. I doubt it very much as well. Very sceptical. Sceptical. Brexit Party supporter Julie, you also heard from Leanne Murray, who is prospective parliamentary candidate for the party for Lancaster and Fleetwood. And we heard too from Rachel George, who is a Brexit Party councillor for Wyre Borough in Lancashire.

Let's head to Strasbourg. And waiting there is Clare Fox, who's Brexit Party MEP for the northeast of England. She was elected in May and Claire you were there in Southport on Friday night weren't you? Yeah and actually listening to those women is very humbling because I think they articulate so well what I heard throughout the northwest campaigning when I was being an MEP and subsequently and isn't it inspiring that so many women have got involved in politics sadly they've been forced to because they feel that their democratic voice wasn't listened to

but yeah I was there it was exactly as they said a feeling of great frustration but also a determination to make politics mean something for people. Do you think your party realistically has a future it's interesting that of the women I met on Friday night, some had come from the left, some had come from the right. They'd all gathered in the Brexit party. They don't really have a lot in common politically. It's not going to last, is it? no but I think it's got that slogan change politics for good that's definitely appealed to people I mean I didn't come in to this party for any other reason a bit like um what uh Rachel and Leanne and Judy said which is I felt forced to because I was so shocked that they didn't honour the referendum results so it's an opportunity to potentially build a new movement but at the moment the immediate thing is that actually democracy is on the line i thought that comment about for women you know saying to their children i know a lot of teachers you know to look young people in the eye and say look the suffragettes

died for our vote the vote's the most important thing you've got to go out and vote and then to have that apparently trashed or set to one side as as we've you know i know that you discussed with the lib dems yesterday and so on it seems to me that we'll never be able to inspire a young generation of contemporary suffragettes ever again if we don't see that this is an important question you would honestly you would agree that democracy itself is threatened at this time in this country of all countries yeah that's that that's the only reason i stood i mean you know i'm i have no desire to be an elected politician i had no desire to be involved in any particular party i thought that and think that democracy is on the line you know if you remove the option of the ballot paper from ordinary people's lives what are they left with you know we constantly

and your program will do it we all do it where we say we want to get hard to reach you know we constantly and your program will do it we all do it where we say we want to get hard to reach you know audiences for the arts or we want to have access schemes to get more working class people to go to university you know endlessly we talk about how are we going to reach out to those people yeah well and for once they're given a voice they speak out loud and then everyone goes oh i don't like that voice go away you've You said the wrong thing. Well, I don't know what we're going to do about the toxicity in the current debate. I don't know how this country is going to progress and try to reduce it. I'm looking at the Woman's Hour Twitter feed now and the timeline and the comments coming in about the voices we heard in Southport on Friday night are not exactly supportive. And you would agree, Claire, you have played a part in this,

haven't you, to a degree? Well, I'm certainly at the receiving end of it. No, I'm talking about the toxicity. I'm talking about the tribal nature. It's horrible, actually. No, but honestly, I was sort of not joking. I mean, I can't believe the amount of toxicity. And I know it's on both sides Jane don't get me wrong but I

heard you know when you had a couple of MEPs on Women's Hour from the Brexit party a few months ago whenever that was and I looked at your timeline and people that I've known and respected I mean they were saying some vile things okay well how do we how do we go about and thick women and yeah I know and I'm seeing it myself talk about how do we how do we go about... Stupid women and sick women. Yeah, I know, and I'm seeing it myself. Talk about the sisterhood. How do we reduce it? OK, so the first thing I'd say is we all need to say that every single citizen has an equal vote.

The whole point of that fight for universal suffrage was to recognise that if you're a cleaner or you're owning the house that's cleaned, equally we are to be respected at the ballot box. And I do think there's a... I mean, it's a horrible kind of snobbery has emerged about working-class women and people who haven't got degrees or don't use the language that maybe, you know,

there's a kind of lingo that gets you in on the right kind of political person. So I think everyone's got to calm down. By the way, I think what was said was really true. Many Remain voters now are very sympathetic for democratic reasons to leaving. They still love the EU

but they think we need to get on with it. It's also the case, so I think in a way it's become a kind of hardcore cemented kind of toxicity. But I would like to say, I really don't think that I've tried to stir it up. I don't think it's unreasonable to say that you vote for something

that should be delivered. You are a successful woman. You are a professional woman. Your life will carry on much as before after all this is over. But Yellowhammer outlined the potential for some really difficult situations and challenges, not least for women.

I mean, the reality is we could be talking potentially about transporting drugs in cold storage lorries. We don't have the number of cold storage lorries we're going to need. Reduce freight capacity and food prices going up. And the poor will or could pay the price. Yes, so the thing that's really tricky for people to get their minds around, I suppose, is that during the build-up to the referendum, there was a huge amount of economic doom-mongering. Now, I'm not saying it wasn't true. I'm just saying it was doom-mongering.

People were told all sorts of economic issues would affect them. And what we've got to recognise about democracy is, despite that, people voted Leave. Yellow hammer comes out and people say, well, we might have to suffer, but it's worth it. Because historically, if you think about it, people have put themselves on the line and said money is not the only thing. You know, freedom, democracy, taking back control. Regardless of what the principle has been, we have been inspired historically by women who've said i won't just be either frightened by economic penury or put or bought off by a few you know sweet sweet policy options which will give you more money if you go along with us so we've got to

respect that i understand that potentially the poorest in society might be affected. But they themselves have that option. You see, the point is... They have the option what? To be affected by rising food prices? No, because they're saying, we voted for this. And what I'm saying is, think about what the option is. That we say, look, even despite the fact that you made a stupid decision and you voted for something we don't agree with,

so we know better, so we'll overturn that on your behalf because we know better than you. Now, every single illiberal authoritarian regime says exactly the same. They say we know better than you. Now, in a democracy, people are allowed to vote in a way that you think is a mistake. OK, well, let's then make a decision. I'm going to give you the opportunity, Claire, as a sitting Brexit party MEP to tell me about some of the tangible benefits of Brexit. So the most important thing is that the European Union was set up as a top down mechanism for protecting certain decision making from popular sovereignty. And I know that this isn't... To be honest, I don't know what that means, and I want to know about the tangible economic benefits of leaving the European Union.

I didn't vote for economic reasons. There is more to this than economic reasons. If you do not have full say over decision-making in your own country, then actually what you get is decisions made by someone else and you are constantly put onto the sidelines. Now, you know, for example, freedom of movement, just so that we have that one out. I am a supporter of immigration. I actually think that it's wonderful that you have a diverse society, but these things have to be argued for and fought about

in relation to the democratic country you live in. But you know, Claire... Freedom of movement didn't give people an option. No, Remainers will interpret what you've said as you basically saying we can be poorer, but we can be proud. Is it worth it? Yes, I'm saying to you, it's not up to your listeners, or indeed me, to decide what is worth it.

What I'm actually arguing is that a paternalism that says, we will look after the poor by undermining their vote and telling them that it doesn't matter, we'll make sure they're richer, but less democratically valued, is the right thing to do. I think that's an insulting, condescending decision. This is not about the economy. I'm saying I was sitting in a committee yesterday where they were basically proudly boasting of the diverse European Union and the outgoing commissioner from migration actually is explaining how they've outsourced the refugee crisis to brutal camps in Libya run by Erdogan's

Turkey. And then they have the nerve to say, oh, anybody wants to leave the European Union is a xenophobe. Well, I disagree that that kind of rhetoric is actually creating... I don't think anyone, no one would suggest the European Union is or ever has been perfect. That's not what this is about. But we decided to leave it. No, but we can't rerun the referendum.

I had lots of interesting conversations with lots of students, lots of young people, hundreds. I mainly work in Remain land, as it were, where people heard the arguments before the referendum. We took a vote. To many people's surprise, we decided to leave. And I'm simply pointing out that that argument about, well, maybe we should remain and reform reform was had out three years ago.

It doesn't matter now whether anyone believes that that was a good decision or not. A democratic decision was taken. It was said that it was a once in a lifetime decision and we have to enact it. And then if I'm wrong, then, you know, people can come and shout at me. Well, but to try and stop that happening. Oh, they do. Yeah, I know they do. Claire, thank you very much.

You did say as a professional woman I won't suffer. Just let me point out, I'm treated like dirt by my colleagues in the profession. So it's nice to have the opportunity to be on this programme. Thank you very much, Claire. Good to see you and good to see you on Friday and good to talk to you today. Thank you very much. That's Claire Fox. And toxicity on either side.

Criticism and far worse than criticism we know goes on on both sides of the argument. Nobody thinks that's good or in any way acceptable. Thank you very much to Claire Fox and to the contributors we met in Southport. You can hear yesterday's interview with Sal Brinton from the Lib Dem conference in Bournemouth on BBC Sounds as part of yesterday's Women's Hour podcast. Next week, we'll be at the Labour Party conference in Brighton and indeed at the other party conferences as they unfold over the next couple of weeks. Let's discuss flexible working. For the last four years, any employee with six-month service has a legal right to ask for flexible working. New research from the flexible working consultancy TimeWise is making headlines today. I've got the Times in front of me here. Headline is boom in flexible

working for highly paid employees. But the full story is, as you might expect, a bit more complicated than that. Karen Matteson is joint CEO of TimeWise. Welcome, Karen. And actually, the article in the Times, to be fair, does go on to point out that there's a shortage of part-time jobs for mid-range roles. And that, of course, contributes to the gender pay gap, doesn't it? But let's talk briefly about the difference between part-time work and flexible working, if you don't mind. So the broad kind of heading of flexible working includes part-time working. And the easiest way, I think, to think about it is if you have flexibility on where, when or how much you work. So where you work, working from homes,

remote locations, that sort of thing. When you work, start times, early starts, late finishes, flexing on your hours and the crucial one which many employers are finding more difficult is the part-time which is the how much you work and so that we it one of the challenges of this whole area is that when you say flexible working some people assume that means part-time some people assume it means you know remote so the times headline boom boom in flexible working is there a boom there is a boom in the sense that more more people than ever are working flexibly in that broader sense but um in but the research that timewise has just done uh launched today is actually looking at the jobs market so we know that you have the right to work the right to request flexible working if you're already in

a job but the biggest challenging the biggest thing that actually traps so many women in in part-time or flexible roles is that when you look at the vacancy market when you want to apply for a new job what we were told anecdotally and by the thousands of people on our job site timewise jobs is that there's nothing out there it's a desert there's hardly any flexible roles the question is is that true and the research that we've said today put out today shows they are absolutely right to feel like it's a desert. 85% of jobs make no mention of flexibility at all at the point of hire. And that's why it's so impossible if you're looking for a flexible or part-time job to know what to apply for.

Well, let's bring in a listener. Sarah, hi, good morning to you. Hello. Hi there. Now, you are in Newcastle, aren't you? And tell us just a bit about yourself. How old are you, Sarah? I'm 50 and I am looking for part-time work. And what in particular would you like to do? Well, my background is working in the media and the NHS. So that type of work, the difficulty I'm having is that any part-time jobs that you see advertised are very low paid and have no prospects.

Yeah. Can I just read out a paragraph in the email you sent to the programme? And it's an interesting point. This many of my female friends are in the same position as me. And in order to work part time are doing jobs in caring, data entry or junior admin. I must emphasise, I don't think we're above these jobs, but it is a waste of our education, experience and abilities. That's the nub of this, isn't it, Sarah? It is, and it's also about diversity, I think, because I think if employers are serious about including people and diversity rather than, heaven forbid, just showing lip service to it.

They really need to employ people part time because it does affect women mainly. And if they want women to be working in senior positions, then they really need to consider giving them part time work. What is the, is there, etiquette isn't the right word, but Karen, if you are overqualified for a role, but frankly, you need a job you need to pay your rent or your mortgage and the bills should you accept that job look I think if you want that job it's there's nothing wrong with you accepting it but might you get trapped there yes I think the evidence very clearly shows that people who work part-time and flexibly 77% of them say they feel trapped because the problem is you start off being

grateful for having that flexibility but then when you want to progress as we do we want to progress up the ladder either in the organisation we're in or externally because you don't see anything advertised you feel like you can't move up and you can't move out which is exactly the situation probably that Sarah is in now so essentially the market is forcing us to play it cleverly. And I think, unfortunately, many of us don't do that. Was this what you expected to happen, Sarah, when you decided to go back to work? No, I actually, I was working full time before I had my family

and I arranged with my employers to go back part time after I had my first child. And when I was thinking of going back to work after having my second child and thinking about whether to stay at home, a lot of women said to me, you must go back because you'll never get a part-time job at that level again if you're applying for it from being unemployed. And at the time I thought, oh, that's ridiculous. You know, I've got a good CV, I, I thought, oh, that's ridiculous. You know,

I've got a good CV, I've got loads of experience, etc, etc. And they were right. It's exactly the position I find myself in. Karen? So yeah, I think that's the experience of so many people. But I think there are some tricks to it. And I think, essentially, I think we've got two choices. If we want to look for a quality, progressed, part-time or flexible job, one is we can sit back like good girls and wait for the market to get better. And by the rate of change, you know, we've gone from 9% of vacancies five years ago to 15% now. So at that rate of change, you might see, Sarah, your dream job advertised in about 2040. Or your second option, which unfortunately is

what we need to recommend, is that you apply for roles. And where there is no flexibility advertised, you assume that that's something you can negotiate later. Because we understand now that you can negotiate salary, but we're not so comfortable with negotiating flexibility. And we end up talking about our childcare arrangements and things that actually aren't relevant to the role. So actually, the most, probably the most successful way of doing it that you can do it is apply for the role it's the challenge is it's like poker when do you show your hand if you do it too soon and the and the employer hasn't fallen in love with you yet you just become that annoying person who's talking about what they can and can't do before you've actually got the

job once the employer wants you then you're in a negotiation situation. And we know now that nine out of 10 employers are open to discussing some form of flexibility for the right candidate. So once you know you're the right candidate, that's a different kind of conversation. But I would also recommend that we're flexible about the kind of flexibility we're prepared to take. So it might be your dream scenario is a three-day-a-week job, but it may be you negotiate on a three-and-a-half days or a four days or a day from home. So be prepared to give something. Be prepared to give something and also give some...

I think one of the things we do wrong is we push the problem over to the employer, to the other side of the table and say, right, I want three days, what are you going to do about it? I would do it differently. I would say, I've worked in this way in this role, or I know how it can be done. I think the job could be designed more creatively.

And with that 20% salary saving, you could do this. So in a sense, you're bringing some ideas and some solutions, not just the request for flexible working. Do you have conversations with your friend, Sarah, about all this? I mean, you said in the email that you know other women in similar situations. Absolutely. about all this i mean you said in the email that you know other women in similar situations absolutely i've got loads of friends who are who are doing jobs um that don't fit with their education or experience simply because those jobs fit in with their family lives or their caring responsibilities or whatever um but i i i i get what um the the whole thing about

apply for a job full time and then negotiate. But to some extent, we shouldn't be having to do that, should we? Yeah, I totally agree with you, Sarah. But unfortunately, I think that is the reality. And that's why time wise, we're obviously working and supporting candidates and supporting them in the job market with really good, high quality advice and also a source of jobs to apply for. But we've got to do the flip side of it, which is work with the employers to show them the business benefits and things like that are very high on the agenda of employers at the moment, like the gender pay gap.

Don't lose the women in the first place, like you say, help them progress. We know that's why women are disappearing from the middle ranks of the ladder because they leave or they stay where they are. Really quick comment from Emma on Twitter, who says, I'd argue the chances of being offered that job are minuscule. this is a job for which you're overqualified

as the employer is concerned you're going to jump ship for something more senior so that's another aspect of it isn't it? So I think that's what I think it's there's so many issues that relate to confidence and I think we've got to have that belief in ourselves and be able to negotiate just like we would on salary yeah okay thank you very much um i appreciate your comments and your information and hopefully we can have a bit more in the woman's hour podcast and your thoughts on flexible working very welcome if you possibly can now um a few weeks ago we asked you to send us an image of yourself that somehow captured you at your very very best and you can see today's image on our twitter and instagram feeds it's kelly ford

she's 39 she's from london and she's talking about a reunion captured on camera this photograph was taken on the 4th of march 2018 it shows my good friend Kyoko and I under a cherry blossom tree in the park of Shinjuku Koen. I hope I'm saying that right. In Tokyo. The photograph was taken by my husband on a phone and then I printed it out and I see Kyoko and myself stood under some beautiful cherry blossom but I look so happy and we're holding each other so tightly. Normally the cherry blossom flourishes in late April, May so for the blossom to come out in the first week of March was unheard of. The fact we're swathed and backdropped by cherry blossom makes it next

level and it's beautiful. Okay, so Kyoko and I boarded at Penthulpe School in Ruddwick from ages 9 to 12 and we got up to all sorts of mischief. We shared a bunk bed. She was on top bunk, I was on bottom. I famously drunk her contact lens thinking it was just a glass of water. I mean, when she first came from Japan, she had never left the country and she was nine years old, suddenly in an English boarding school, you know, with little English but really good sense of humor always and quick wit and she also had

lots of delicious prawn crackers which I used to make the most of you know she we always had that kind of electricity between us so yeah I was very grateful that she came into my life and I guess our friendships were our coping mechanisms from being away from our families. Anything to kind of bring a sense of humour or sense of love and fun amongst sometimes quite difficult circumstances when you are nine, ten years old away from home.

From memory, I think we might have written to each other a few times once we left school and then that just kind of dissipated and then we left for secondary school and we lost contact and then you know life's kind of life carries on doesn't it you know you're trying to fit in especially as a teenager into your new school and we just went separate ways in life and I did think about her a lot because it's very rare when you have that incredible chemistry I think it was me that reached out initially just to kind of say hello how are you it's quite something starting up a conversation of like how's your last sort of 20 years been, you know.

So we recultivated a friendship via Facebook. And from there, it just cascaded all this information of like, this is what I've been up to and this is what I've been doing. And so then five years later, we managed to meet under the cherry blossom. And on the actual day this photograph was taken, it was the day after our good friend's wedding, which took place at the Meiju Shrine in Tokyo. And there was a get together on the day after in the park where everyone bought drinks and food just to celebrate and have a picnic. And it was a divine opportunity for me to invite my old friend Kyoko to come and join us. We were messaging each other like,

I'm coming through the gates and I'm under the tree and I've got a little toddler with me. And then we spotted each other and there was a real sense of electricity and we kind of just came together and just embraced and cuddled and might have shed a few tears because it was a big deal it'd been 26 years I think we both just felt really excited and lucky to be in that place at that moment together. That is Kelly Ford and our thanks to her.

You can see that image, you'll be able to see it very soon on the Woman's Hour website, bbc.co.uk slash Woman's Hour. Now last year, of course, it was the centenary of some British women getting a vote and we did a great deal of chat about that on the programme. The women of New Zealand famously got the right to vote back in 1893. You might not know, and I certainly didn't, that white Australian women got the vote in 1902. And the Australian historian Claire Wright is here, author of a massive tome called Daughters, New Daughters of Freedom. How many pages? 500?

It's about 550. Yeah, it's a whopper, this book. But it's a big and important story. The truth is, I knew about New Zealand. I actually had never given any thought to women's suffrage in Australia. I was surprised that white women got the vote as early as they did. And not just the right to vote. And this is what's so extraordinary about this story,

is that Australian white women got both the right to vote and the right to vote and the right to stand for parliament in 1902. Now, New Zealand women didn't get that dual right, which was full political equality with men until 1919. So Australia really led the world in progressive democracy and gender politics at that time. So why is that widely celebrated? It's not even celebrated in Australia. It's not even celebrated in Australia. I mean, this book has received just as much interest in Australia as here

because that is a narrative that we haven't celebrated, that we don't know. It's been eclipsed by so many other much more masculine narratives of achievement and of world domination than this one has. And, you know, I think there are a few reasons for that. But the main point is that it's really sad that we don't know our history well enough to understand that Australia did have this leading edge. And we don't think of ourselves as leaders anymore.

We very much think of ourselves as being followers in everything but, you know, maybe the cricket. Yeah, well, let's not mention that. 1902, yes, white Australian women got the vote, but indigenous people who had the vote, had it taken away from them. I was horrified by that. Yeah, this is what keeps it from being, this story, from being completely celebratory. And we can't claim this as a celebratory nationalist narrative, because the fact of the matter is that the very same piece of legislation that gave Australian women this global preeminence also disenfranchised all Australian people. Sorry, all Indigenous Australian people. It took the right to vote away from both Indigenous men and women. And so, you know, you can call it a sting in the tail,

but of course it's much more than that. It was a blow to the citizenship rights of Indigenous Australians that they wouldn't get back for another 60 years as part of the civil rights movement of the 1960s. Another 60 years. Another 60 years. And was there controversy about this at the time? Were there arguments about it?

It was fascinating to discover that there were more arguments about it than I thought there would be. But the only place I found them was actually in Hansard. So the politicians who were debating the franchise bill, who were recognising that what they were about to do was to give women these twin suffrage rights that was going to put them at the top of the pile, and there were certainly anti-suffragists who were arguing against that. But there were also people who were saying, hang on, hang on. We've taken the land away from Indigenous people. We've taken their culture away from them. We've dispossessed them of everything they had before British colonisation. And now you

say we're going to take away their citizenship rights as well. We can't do that. What sort of civilised white man's world is going to do that? How can we call ourselves good, upstanding members of the British race if we're going to do that? So there were some oppositional voices within Parliament, but they were very quickly drowned out, and the people who were advocating women's suffrage didn't want the bill to be scuttled altogether

in order to save those indigenous rights. And there's certainly no popular groundswell of support for them. And the uncomfortable truth is that the Australian suffragettes, many of them, and I'm not, by the way, in any way denigrating the work they put into this. But they came to England to help the suffragette cause here in this country. That's right. That's what the whole thrust of this book, You Daughters of Freedom, is about and why that sort of strange hanging you there, You Daughters of Freedom, because that quote comes from a letter that Emmeline Pethick Lawrence wrote to Vida Goldstein, one of the Australian suffragettes who came here in 1911.

She was an absolute leading light of the Australian suffrage movement and she was brought out here by Emmeline Pankhurst to be the kind of front woman, the inspiration, a leader to rally the troops in Britain because Australian women had gotten these rights and the whole rest of the world knew that Australian women had these rights. And everybody was looking to Australia to see what the results of this experiment was going to be, this experiment in women's suffrage. And so Vida Goldstein came out and she toured all of Britain. She filled the Royal Albert Hall. She had 10,000 people waiting for her at Victoria Station when she arrived. The papers said not since Kitchener has there been such a reception. And so Emmeline writes her this letter when Vida leaves about a year later

and she says, you daughters of freedom, you go back and you enjoy the rights that we are still toiling to receive here. So the fact of the matter is that Australian women came out here. They were not just Vida. There were many of them. And my book follows five of the most prominent Australian suffragists, women who I should say were household names in the day in Australia, in Britain and internationally.

And they came out here to be inspirational leaders of the British suffragette movement. And they said, we want to help our less fortunate British sisters. They could not give a rat's ass about their indigenous sisters at home. Claire, that's a very fine Australian way of putting it, I have to say. Can we just go back a little bit to something you said earlier about the Australian history being essentially the myth of Australia, being written by men and about men. Now, I know you're very keen to make clear that you in no way underestimate the terrible sacrifice of the young, very young men who travelled across the world, for example, to fight in World War I. That's right. It's just that that Anzac legend, as we call it, has come to completely envelop all other events in Australian history.

And there's also a mythology that the landing on Gallipoli of Australian troops in 1915 was the birth of the Australian nation. And subsequent historians wrote about that event in terms of Australians proving themselves on the world stage for the first time. And that's why there has been this narrative of a birth born through the blood sacrifice of Australia's young men so soon in the nation's history. Because we have to remember that Australia became a nation in 1901. So soon after that formative event, there's this catastrophic war, catastrophic loss of life. 60,000 Australians were killed in that war. And yet the problem is that if you look at the evidence, if you go back to the history, as if you look at the evidence, if you go back to the history, as I've done in the research for this book,

the fact of the matter remains that Australia had already proven itself on the world stage through its advances in progressive politics, through not only being the first country in the world to give women full political equality with men, the right to vote and the right to stand for parliament. But everything that also came from that, the fact there was so much social legislation that was passed, pure food laws, old age pensions,

things that women had been advocating for decades that they didn't get until the vote. And so suddenly things like infant mortality rates started to drop. There was a fair wage that started to be paid. And Australia had the first elected socialist government in the world as well in 1909. The British Labor Party were completely left in their wake and were looking to Australia, all these countries in the world were looking to Australia to see how they'd managed all of these progressive achievements. And that has been lost to Australian history.

That, of course, all historians have a view. That is your view. I imagine not everybody in Australia likes it very much. Do you get abuse? Look, I am not trolled. Sometimes I think that when I see how many other feminists who are prominent in public conversations as I am are horribly trolled, I'm not one of them. And sometimes that makes me think I'm not doing my job well enough. But I actually think that in some ways that because my research is based in

evidence, in archival evidence, and I can prove all of that, there is a way in which I'm not just kind of being a rhetorical warrior. People can see that there is an argument, but it's based on fact. And in fact, they're interested in it. I'm much more taken by how audiences are inspired by the story I have to tell and have said things to me like, suddenly we feel proud of being Australians again. Like that is a feeling they haven't had for a long time because we've had these incredibly conservative governments

who are locking up refugees in offshore detention centres and are doing nothing in the climate change space to prove that we are and have been a progressive nation. So Australians are really taking to this story because I'm not going to say it's like making Australia great again, because that would be a step too far in the wrong direction. But there is a sense of being enlivened and empowered by being able to understand ourselves in a new way. Thank you. It's really interesting.

And I mean, I often say, gosh, I've discovered something on the program I knew nothing about. But when I came across your book, I genuinely, I really, really learned something from it. So thank you very much, Claire. Stay with us. Melanie has emailed. Karen Matteson is still here from TimeWise talking about flexible working. Melanie says, this is an eye opener. I work in recruitment and will now check with hiring managers

what flexibility is available. I'm just about to fill a senior role with a brilliant woman who negotiated flexibility as part of her salary deal and we didn't once mention her childcare. It was all about securing the best person in the best way, which is how it should be. Harriet says

it's so tricky finding part-time work that's paid enough, flexible with freelance work and isn't totally unfulfilling. Zero hours contracts are most precarious which can let you down last minute. Nearly impossible to know how much you'll learn each month. Really stressful.

TJ says I'm currently stuck in a dead-end minimum wage cleaning job. I'm a trained office worker and getting knocked back for part-time office work and I feel it's due to my current job in cleaning. What do you do about that, Karen? That's a person who's trapped or feels trapped. Yeah, I mean, I think it's interesting

that the first comment you had was from a recruiter because I think the recruitment industry has got so much to offer to this debate and to and to move in the experience forward and I think they've been very late to the party and I think it's interesting that she talks about that somebody negotiating the flexibility without mentioning their child care because I think that's where we need to get to where the reason is not the reason is not relevant to the flexible working but the how you do it is really relevant. And I

think that's amazing. And I think TJ's point, well, TJ's point is, I think this is really interesting. TJ needs to work. I mean, I'm, well, we all need to work. Bills need to be paid. Cleaning is what's currently available. But they might feel, TJ might feel judged for doing that role. How do they get out of it? Yeah, I mean, I think it's very challenging. And I think but it sounds like TJ has got experience of office work. And I think they really need to find a recruiter to talk to face to face, I think, about that challenge and about positioning the CV. But I think it is a real challenge.

And I think this is what happens when people trade skills for flexibility and they can get trapped in that work. Another listener says, and this was really struck a chord with people, I gave up work to care for my mum who's since died. I am now 60 and I find getting employment impossible. A four year gap with caring responsibilities doesn't look good on your CV. Well, a friend of mine is caring for her mom at the moment. And the idea that she isn't working, by the way, is preposterous because it's 24-7 work, isn't it? But what does that person do, that lady do? I think that more and more we have to talk about, we can't just

leave a gap there. You have to talk about what you've been doing. And I think that has been one of the challenges for women of all sorts of caring responsibilities it has just been this unknown gap and I think she needs to really talk about it but I think her challenge isn't just about flexible finding part-time and flexible work that's around the older we get the jobs market is challenging and then you've got a gap there but in purely practical terms if that is you if you are 60 and you've been at home looking after a parent, do you simply what do you how do you phrase that on your CV? Caring responsibility. You know, I would I would be really straight about it. But again, could you actually celebrate it and actually say, you know, why the hell shouldn't you celebrate?

It's really tough. Exactly. And I think the other thing people who, you know, any career break for whatever reason, having children, being a carer, you know, mental health challenges, whatever it has been, comes with a drop in confidence. And I think what we have to do is to remember the things that we would have done before. And I think one of the things that we always advise at TimeWise is also recreate those networks. Talk to people you've worked with previously. Find out what they're doing now. Be very proactive. Don't just look at what's advertised out there.

Work your networks in the way you would have done five years ago. Okay, good advice. Thank you very much, Karen. And I think this is one we'll go back to another time because so many of you have got questions. We haven't got time for all of them today. A quick dash through some of your thoughts on our conversations around Brexit. Jules, I'm sympathetic to their issues, but I don't understand how those women can't see that they are coming across as ideologues who don't care about anybody else. And I think they're still telling blatant lies about how the EU works. From Floss, Claire Fox is right. The establishment cannot grasp that our vote was about democracy and not about economics. A vote in Northumberland must be worth the same as a vote in North London.

From Tracy, I thought that was a fascinating discussion with women from the Brexit party. What did the EU ever do for us? Well, only employment rights, environmental protection, action against climate change, anybody, but not a mention. From Douglas, please point out that Yellowhammer was a risk assessment. Risk assessments are by their nature a worst case scenario, so the risk can be identified and mitigated. And from somebody who uses the Twitter name Mother, democracy is not just counting. After the count, the majority have a right to see their decision implemented. But they have a duty to respect the attitude of the minority and to accommodate their views.

The only mandate was actually for a soft Brexit. Right. I could go on for hours reading out the emails and the Twitter comments about Brexit and everything else that's surrounding that conversation at the moment. Conversation is a very polite way of putting it, isn't it? But we are Radio 4. Claire and Karen, thank you both very much for sticking around this morning for this chunky podcast bit. And by the way, congratulations to you for getting the Woman's Hour podcast. It does make you one of our classier listeners, be assured of that. Jenny is here with the programme and the podcast tomorrow. You're Dead to Me is a new history podcast for people who just don't like history,

or at least people who forgot to learn any at school. In each of our episodes, I'm joined by a top-notch comedian and an expert historian to rummage through the most fascinating things you should know about the global past. You'll learn about Boudicca, Captain Blackbeard, Harriet Tubman, the Spartans, the history of men's and women's football, and so much more. To fill in the blanks in your historical memory banks, subscribe to You're Dead to Me on BBC Sounds. 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.