Woman's Hour - Girl Bands, Period Tracking Apps, Couples Therapy

Episode Date: May 16, 2022

After Little Mix said goodbye to their fans with their final show on Saturday before going on hiatus, it seems that for the first time in decades, Britain is without a major girl band. Emma is joined by Melanie Chisholm from the Spice Girls and music journalist, Jacqueline Springer.We discuss recent work from home data with Dr Jane Parry, Associate Professor of work and employment at Southampton Business school and Guardian columnist Gaby Hinsliff.In the wake of the tragic killings of toddlers Star Hobson and Arthur Labinjo Hughes, a government report is expected to be published shortly looking into what went wrong. Social workers had failed to act on warnings from relatives, which meant the children were not removed from their abusive homes. But a BBC One Panorama explores a different perspective - what about when children’s services intervene too far, too fast – and when they act unethically, even unlawfully towards children and their parents, causing lifelong trauma in the process? One local authority in Herefordshire has been severely and repeatedly criticised by a high court judge for breaching children’s human rights through what the judge called “appalling” social work practice. Woman’s Hour talks to Panorama Reporter Louise Tickle about her investigation. Women in the US have been raising concerns about period and pregnancy tracking apps on phones. BBC Technology reporter Shiona McCallum and Jillian York from the American digital rights group, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, join Emma to discuss. Relationships for many of us are just downright fascinating. Susanna Abse is a psychoanalytic psychotherapist and joins Emma to discuss her new book. Presenter: Emma Barnett Producer: Emma Pearce

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. I'm Natalia Melman-Petrozzella, and from the BBC, this is Extreme Peak Danger. The most beautiful mountain in the world. If you die on the mountain, you stay on the mountain. This is the story of what happened when 11 climbers died on one of the world's deadliest mountains, K2, and of the risks we'll take to feel truly alive. If I tell all the details, you won't believe it anymore. Extreme, peak danger. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.

BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, I'm Emma Barnett and welcome to Woman's Hour from BBC Radio 4. Good morning and welcome to the programme. Here we go again, another week. And if you have an office-based job, are you back in at the office or are you at home or perhaps a bit of both? Over the weekend, in an interview with the Daily Mail headlined, Working from home doesn't work, the Prime Minister had this to say. My experience of working from home is you spend an awful lot of time making another cup of coffee and then you know getting

up walking very slowly to the fridge hacking off a small piece of cheese and then walking very slowly back to your laptop and then forgetting what it was you're doing. Boris Johnson's on a mission to reverse what looks like a permanent mindset shift in the UK, according to data analysis in the Financial Times today, numbers I'll get into shortly. There was a big response to what the Prime Minister had to say with his take about working from home, with many women in particular talking about their experiences online over the weekend and sharing mainly on social media, but also people writing about their experiences online over the weekend and sharing mainly on social media, but also people writing about their experiences too.

I want to give you the opportunity today on the programme to say where you are with this, if it affects you. Of course, this is mainly about office jobs. Whether you have gone back in, whether you haven't, are you doing a bit of both? Have you been forced to go back in as it was before? And perhaps that's made you think differently about whether it's better, whether's not what works maybe you're not going to stay with the

work that you're with there's some data to show this if you have been forced to go in full time there's some information about that in some of the charts today saying that if you have been forced people will turn away from those jobs course, what Boris Johnson was also talking about is the need to revive city centres, to get commuting back up, and help, if you like, give the economy a boost, a shot in the arm, to use some of his words. And I'll give you a few more, if you like, very shortly. Where are you with this?

Text me here at Women's Hour on 84844. Do you think working from home works? On social media, it's at BBC Women's Hour, or email me through the Women's Hour website. Also on today's programme, why some women in America are now thinking twice about using period tracking apps. And this weekend, Little Mix said goodbye to their fans

with their final show on Saturday before taking a break. Now it seems for the first time in decades, Britain is without a major girl band. What does Mel C, aka Sporty Spice, think about that? We'll find out. And just to say, having written my own article this weekend about my experiences, I suppose, of being a woman at the moment and trying for a second baby, I just wanted to thank the many of you who've been kind enough to be in touch, offering advice and good wishes. I am very grateful, but also to many of you feeling like you could share your experiences too, and not easy to do so. So something I ask you to do every day here on this programme, and I'm always grateful when you do.

So let's get on with it. And today it is about where and how you might be working, because according to data in the Financial Times paper today, commuter numbers are still almost a quarter down on levels seen in February 2020 before coronavirus and lockdown restrictions. This makes the UK an outlier amongst most other advanced economies, with Germany only 7% below pre-pandemic commuter numbers, to do a comparison. Findings from last year from the think tank the Resolution Foundation found that half a million women increased their working hours from part-time to full-time during the pandemic as they were able to work remotely. And as I mentioned, this week, the Prime Minister has continued the push from certain members of government to return to the

office. But tell us how it is for you. Do get in touch. I really want to hear how it is for you at the moment. Already some of you doing that. I'll come to those messages shortly. But to analyse these figures more, Dr Jane Parry joins me now, Associate Professor of Work and Employment at Southampton Business School and The Guardian columnist, Gabby Hinsliff. Gabby, I'll come to you in just a moment, but Dr Jane Parry, good morning. Good morning. What do we know about the latest figures? We know that over a third of people are still working from home, at least sometimes. I mean, the kind of the centre of the discussion now is shifting away from working at home all the time to the hybrid forms of working. So what combination of working in offices versus home works best for different kinds of jobs. And in terms of, I suppose, the reason for that, is that being business led? Is that employee led? What do we know about that?

Well, the organisations that we spoke to in our research work after lockdown, it was trying to get that balance between the employer and the employee, right, because that's what needs to happen to make it successful, because there's been this huge building of goodwill and trust during the pandemic, which is a huge asset for businesses. They want to carry that with them in the next step and not alienate their staff, like some of the kind of more authoritarian messages about everyone get back to the office without kind of engaging in the nuance of what works best.

Gabby, let me bring you in at this point. I introduced you as a columnist, but of course, a political reporter for many years as well. What do you make of the politics of this? Slightly mad, I think. I mean, the Prime Minister feels very out of touch with what the reality of working life is now. You've got him saying, oh, everyone back to the office. And very clearly, the trend is the other way. People's desire is the other way where they can change their way of working. They want to. They absolutely see the advantage of that. And you have the prime minister and Jacob Rees-Mogg, you know, very stubbornly digging into this everyone back thing, which I think is partly driven by a sense of, you know, who are the economic casualties if we don't go

back to work? You know, if you work in Presse à manger or if you work for a commuter train company, you probably have a very different feeling about that than if you're going to benefit from working home. But I think it's partly that thing a lot of us have probably heard over the years from middle-aged male managers who just don't accept, if I can't see you in front of me, how do I know you're working? You know, there's this old, very old kind of lazy assumption that if you're working from home, you're not really working.

You're really skiving. But to have the prime minister articulating that, I think is incredibly undermining for a lot of, you know, millions of women who work really hard and well from home and are more productive, you know, when they work flexibly. It's kind of mad to have the prime minister repeating this kind of very lazy old trope about what working from home is. There's that element. There's definitely that reaction. And that has been definitely commented on by a lot of women. And I've certainly seen those sorts of responses across social media this weekend. But he claims it will lift productivity to be back together, revive town and city centres, and that he thinks staff will be more productive, more energetic and more full of ideas.

And while we have a lot of messages that I will come to about the benefits that you're talking about, Gabby, coming in from our listeners, I do just see a message that's come in saying that they feel very lonely and isolated. And I would look for another job, but I'll have to take a large pay cut if I do read this message. It's harming my mental health and I don't see a way out. What do you say about what the Prime Minister is trying to say, I suppose, about improved working and creativity? Well, the evidence on productivity is actually the other way. There's no mountain of evidence suggesting that companies that introduce flexible working increase their productivity. I think, I mean,

I know what you mean as someone who's worked from home a lot for years. I know what you mean about, you know, feeling lonely and isolated. If all you're doing is staring at your spare bedroom wall for you know all day long stuck in the house that's pretty demotivating but I think it's it's always about a I think Jane was right you know most people are going to want a hybrid they're going to want to be in some of the time not in some of the time it's about working out where you do the where you do the different bits of your job best for people who are being forced into working from home, when they don't want to, that's no better than being forced to come into the office

when you don't want to. And I think the sort of missing piece of the jigsaw, perhaps for people who are working constantly from home, is the setting, there's been a lot of investment in some places in setting up what's called co-working hubs, which are like remote offices where lots of people who, you know,

you can individually rent desk space and be around other people even when you're not in an office atmosphere. Because we all do need people to bounce ideas off sometimes and just, you know, get a bit of socialisation into your day. Yes. And the other thing you've been looking at, and I've been reading your article this morning, looking at some of the numbers, but also what's happening is that outside of London and the major city centres, this actually is helping people. Well, this is the flip side of, you know, yes, you know, the centre of London might be a bit emptier if more people are working from home. But that, you know, that tends to re-energise and reinvigorate the places where people are actually living. You know, local high streets, the suburbs, towns outside London, outlying London. What I was looking at is the possibility for red wall areas, places like Stoke, which is massively invested in, you know, this kind of

whole idea of high tech, work from home, remote working, would you have to, if you don't have to leave your hometown to get a decent job in a city, if you can do that job from where you are, you know, that's potentially a lifeline for those, for those kind of towns that have felt, you know, have suffered for years from bright kids moving away to get better jobs. So there's always winners and there's always losers. And of course, in any economic change, it's really tough on the losers. But it'd be better if government sort of engaged in this argument and tried to, you know, find ways of reshaping what's happening for the public good rather than just standing on the sidelines,

shouting everyone back to the office when that's clearly not what either business wants at the moment or what... Although you have also found, Gabby, some insights and evidence that there's not just shouting from the sidelines. There is engagement with this, with different parts of government looking at this. That's what's frustrating. I think there are parts of government that very clearly recognise, you know, the benefits potentially of having a lot of very frustrated Tory MPs

who would like to see the government move faster on flexible working you know a lot of parts of government concerned with regeneration a lot of serious work being done behind the scenes on how the world of work is changing but the public message people hear is this stuff about how if you work from home all you do is traipse to the fridge and back which i think says more about boris johnson and his approach to working from home than it does to most people's approach from working from home. There is a message here from PJ saying, I'm a writer, I work from home, I have a fridge. I also have self-discipline. That's Prime Minister, should acquire some. But there's another one here saying this narrative is absurd. Those working at home or some or all of the time are hopefully putting more money into their local businesses

and supporting a better high street. Doing this should be applauded not vilified to talking about the local area and if you like the town centre that's closest to you with a smaller t as it were jane to to bring you back into this dr jane parry i mentioned there that if you're being forced to go back in full time people are then going to look to change jobs that's what some of the data is showing, I believe. You tell us a bit more, but also, do you think this mindset shift is permanent? Yeah, it definitely is permanent because employers have had the one thing they've never had before, which is a whole set of evidence that it has worked most office-based jobs and you can now organise work in a way that you can do that kind of productive report writing in a much more efficient way.

I think the law firms that we spoke to in particular were getting quite worried about this mass resignation. And this is one of the first things that gets talked about in interviews now. What are your flexible working arrangements? So organisations are having to respond to this and the winners and losers will kind of sort themselves out naturally. I think another important point to make about this is the inequalities around it that are being raised. So, for example, you mentioned about women who've been able to shift to full time contracts because they were able to do this with flexible work. Older women, there's a third, a half a million older women, older workers have left the workforce because they haven't been able to work their work around care. So these are very real productivity losses that we will see and also people with limited long-term illnesses,

much more likely to be able to work when they're working from home. And it's just sad if these productivity issues will get boiled down to eating cheese when actually we have this huge opportunity to make work more inclusive and more productive it's it's a win-win for everyone yeah i mean if i could i don't do a job where you can eat live uh but but you know you could also be incredibly productive while eating a bit of cheese i think that someone's at pains to point that out as well on the message and there's a message from matt here who says i run a recruitment company i've experienced the change in attitudes of both employers and employees on a daily basis now all employees ask what the hybrid working policies of potential new employers are and will almost

without exception decline rhymes with no flexible working policy. The genie is out of the bottle and it cannot be put back in. Let me put this one to you, Gabby, specifically about women. Many messages along these lines. This is from Sharon. Yes, working from home means I can drop the children at school, work all morning and a half day and collect them again. If I had to commute into the office, I would either do fewer hours or I'd have to pay for childcare.

And this way suits our family better and I get the satisfaction of work. And there are more along those lines. Do you think there's something specific about the two highest profile individuals, I suppose, from the Cabinet, Jacob Rees-Mogg and Boris Johnson, of course, both being men in this respect

and talking about this in this particular way? I think there is. I mean, I think it's interesting because working from home is the one part of the sort of flexible working armoury that's always appealed more to men than women, interestingly. I remember years, a decade ago, when I was doing the research for my book, Half a Wife, that was what interested me in it because it was the one that men went for.

And why did they go for it? Because it's the only one for which you don't take a pay cut. It's not like going part-time. You for which you don't take a pay cut. It's not like going part-time. You know, you can go to a day working from home and you've not lost any money. In fact, you've probably gained some because you've saved money on a commute. So, you know, it does naturally,

it was the one that men went for, but the one that women now absolutely see the value of. I'd also say, actually, it's not just about, we're talking a lot about parents for obvious reasons, but I was really struck last year, I was writing a piece about women with extreme menopausal symptoms and I was really struck by how many of them said lockdown was a godsend because it meant that I could work from home and I could manage you know I wasn't having to cope with hot flushes or heavy bleeding or something in front of a room full of nosy colleagues you know you could just and it

steered those women through jobs that they might otherwise have had to give up and that really struck me because we don't think about flexible working in those terms and it might be a reason that people are embarrassed to ask for for flexible working but once a company just has a this is the hybrid policy for everyone you don't have to say why you can just you can do two days a week from home if you want to you don't have to explain yourself that makes it so much easier I think for lots of people to take advantage of it couldn't before and i wouldn't you know necessarily expect jacob reese mogg instantly to leap to that understanding of of working from home maybe but it's really important well i'd be very open to having mr reese mogg or mr johnson of course on this program uh invitations have been issued and

will be issued again gabby hinsliff thank you very much for your time and analysis and dr jane parry the same to you and a message here, nothing to do with how it feels or anything to do with caring duties. It's actually about productivity with regards to working from home. I think the productivity argument is true for some, but I am finding it more productive at home when I can take short breaks without feeling pressure

to look busy and also know I can switch off at the end of the day without facing a 45-minute commute. I think employers should have more trust in employees to decide what works for them. And working from home has reduced the time I am off because of fibroids and menopause symptoms. This message from Victoria, just as we were talking about, it's also incredibly helpful that as a single parent

for the reasons mentioned by others. Keep your messages coming in and your experiences too on 84844. That's the number you need to send me a message here or on social media. We're at BBC Woman's Hour. Now let me ask you a completely different question, but you can keep answering that one. Who was your favourite girl band?

I am asking because this weekend, the hugely successful Little Mix said goodbye to their fans with their final show on Saturday before taking a break, we're told. Now, it seems for the first time in decades, Britain is without a major girl band. Does that matter? What does it say about us, about society, if anything? Well, I really want to know what Melanie Chisholm, well, Mel C, as most of you know her, Sporty Spice from the Spice Girls, of course, thinks about all of this, as well as, of course, the music journalist and curator, Jacqueline Springer. Warm welcome to you both. But Mel C, good morning to you first.

Good morning. How are you today? I'm good. It's been a busy few days. I was very excited to see the FA Cup on Saturday, my team Liverpool winning, which was glorious. And of course, Eurovision. And I've been working throughout as well. So yeah, which was glorious. And of course, Eurovision. And I've been working throughout as well. So yeah, a great weekend. Well, yes. And of course, for some,

it's the last time they're going to see Little Mix, which is what we're having our conversation about. And I wonder, having been a member of the great British girl band for so many, what you make of the fact that there isn't going to be one now, a major one at the moment. What do you think of that?

Oh, well, I think first of all, to talk about Little Mix, what an incredible band. And they've done something quite remarkable because, obviously, being a part of the Spice Girls, so proud of what we achieved and the legacy that we've left behind. But we really weren't together for very long in that first phase of the Spice Girls. Little Mix have been around for over a decade. And I think for any pop band, female, male, you know, mixed gender, it's hard. You know, the schedule is tough. It's hard to maintain that success, that level of workload. And they've done an incredible job. So I'm a huge fan. My daughter's 13. So she's really grown up with them and she was very sad to see this little pause in the Little Mix proceedings and I think it's a shame you know it's a real shame but the music industry is looking quite different right now the landscape is different there's not

really a boy band out there at the moment either you know so these things are changing and the thing I hope for the girls from Little Mix is that they get a fair crack of the whip as solo artists because I think as a woman that's where it changes you know we have girl bands that have success but to go on as a solo artist as a female seems to be a lot harder for the girls as it has been for the boys oh why do you think that is I think it's for all of those reasons that the Spice Girls first started speaking about girl power. Because we were told girl bands don't sell. It's young girls that buy records.

Of course, now it's all about streaming. We consume music so differently. But I think when you're out there, as any member who's been in a band going solo, it's tough. But I think for those reasons reasons the boys do tend to fare better I think there's you know obviously there's a whole ageism situation that some of us more mature artists find in pop music but some of the boys will get played on certain radio stations where the girls don't get a look in when they reach a certain age so that's um another little discussion we should have at some point you sound like you're in the know about that. And I also wonder for you, I mean,

do you think we may have grown out of girl bands in some way? Because, you know, listen, I'm going to full disclosure, part of my weekend was organising my sister-in-law's hen do, which did involve a large pink party bus to my shame and pride. And we did play out Spice Girls at one point. And it was a great moment I didn't actually know we were going to be talking today and we all just came together and we were singing and it's such it takes you back straight away to where you were at that particular moment in your life but also you just feel connected to the women singing and I feel like every generation kind of needs that but maybe maybe it's not it's not right anymore I don't know what do you think you know I think with music like with so many things with fashion you know we go in cycles

don't we and the world is so different now you know I'm trying to view it through my daughter's eyes which is you know it's so different we're not really the demographic are we we're not looking out there for the next pop band but I think you you're right. You know, doing the shows with the Spice Girls 2019, we were lucky enough to do a stadium tour here in the UK and Ireland. And it felt like a golden age to be a Spice Girl because so many of our original fans from the 90s now were able to come back. It felt very nostalgic.

It felt very inclusive. And I agree, we all need those moments for the future to be able to come together and kind of relive those simpler times of growing up. Jacqueline let me bring you in at this point what do you think the gap's all about yeah is it about cycles there'll be another one or are we changing and we perhaps in the era of social media we can't kind of accept people being put together for the purposes of music? I don't think it's about whether a group comes together organically or are put together it does come down to timing it comes down to their look it comes down to you know the quality of the production it comes down to whether or not

what they're saying actually hits your heart hits your mind you know you know there's so many elements that there's there's a really therapeutic relationship we have with groups when we are maturing. And they allow us to have a conversation, even though it's one sided, seemingly. They understand things. So when your parents are resisting the idea that you're maturing, that you have crushes, that you want to stay out, that you want your own money. You have these groups creating these anthems. And this goes all the way back, you know, back to the 50s. You know, remember that? Admittedly, it was a male group, you know, that song Get a Job,

where they were actually mocking the parents' demands for chores to be met before you could actually go off and just be who you want to be. And I think in answer to your question, one thing that I think is really important, I absolutely understand that we're talking about pop groups here, but there are single sex groups of every musical genre already out there. And the idea of being pop is not necessarily the objective.

Being wealthy and being good and being popular to your peers, to your demographic is. And so it's very interesting to consider what constitutes a major pop group, because depending just like you're saying, in terms of your age demographic, your favourite group is your group and you take them on throughout the rest of your life. And you have a bond with them and also you, of course, go towards those who you feel represent something for you in your life and how you are. Yeah, you have a route with people about who's the most important, who's the prettiest, you know, and all of these things spill out. But I also think that, just as Melanie said, the landscape,

the media platform landscape is very different. There's a group called Flow who work with collaborators that little mix of work with like MNEK and others. And they're bubbling up on a number of different platforms on TikTok as well as having a really sly and nonchalant couple of seconds promo on Instagram before they even hit the screen. Well, I was also thinking about, I don't know, I was thinking about Eternal this morning.

I was thinking about All Saints. I was thinking about these different moments in my life that I could think about women and what they were saying through pop music. I take the point, we're talking about that particular genre. Do you think, just picking up a little bit of what Melanie was saying there, do you think girl bands are treated as seriously as other music artists? Is there a difference in how they're viewed? And perhaps there's still that concern they won't be as commercially successful?

Well, I think the whole vernacular of how we actually relate to artists needs a good bleaching, simply because they're called bands, and boy bands, many of them don't play instruments they're called girl groups these are women invariably and um so we have this idea where everybody's infantilized or um their their abilities are either minimized or suggestive of greater skill and the very idea that you don't make the kind of music you did when you were in the group of course not because it's you when. When Melanie collaborated with Lisa Left Eye from TLC, nobody expected that. When Mel B collaborated with Missy Elliott, nobody expected that. And so what you have with Little Mix, they collaborated with Missy

Elliott, with Nicki Minaj and others. these are things where you can actually actually speak up and say do you know what for the group group group thing group objective that's that for me i want to do x y and z and whether or not and then we also have the idea that the idea the fact that people age and people want to have families and people may not want to have families people don't want to do the record tour record tour schedule which is deeply damaging for the mental health as well and then our expectations as we grow why why aren't they making music for us and so in answer to your question no women are not treated the same way as they um when they when they when they emerge from from their from their group ranks and um but

then you do have these these surprises surprises with boy band members as well. Yeah, well, of course, and how they then move on. Melanie, to come back to you on that point, I think the other thing is that we don't like our, and I'm speaking collectively here, of course, I'm generalising as well, but typically we don't like our girl bands, and as Jacqueline says, women, actually, to age.

And we want them to stay the way they are. And then there's a lot of upset if there are changes because people do get fixed. Did you ever find that suffocating or difficult? I think it's kind of become like the new little mission, you know, post the girl power era. Obviously, I still love making music. I still tour.

I'm still active in that world. But you do find, you know, there's new barriers being put up at every turn. So that's, you know, but I feel like, you know, generally for women, we're coming into this time where, you know, middle aged women, which is, you know, what I suppose I have to admit I am these days, is I feel like it's our time. You know, we're speaking up now and we've got something to say. And I still love music. I love pop music. I and I still love music I love pop music I love very young artists I love older artists and I feel like there has to be an audience who want to hear what a more mature female pop artist has to say you know so I think we do we

have to kind of change the thinking behind that but I suppose when people come up to you in the street and I'm sure they still do is it is it frustrating or do you do you embrace it the whole sporty spice thing and they still want to kind of bring up you know you when you're in your 20s absolutely I completely embrace it now I went through many years of not I've had a journey but I think you know going back to 2019 again being back on stage with the girls it gave us an opportunity to really appreciate everything that we'd achieved and it gave you this moment to go wow I'm not either a Spice Girl or a solo artist or a mum I'm all of these things all of the time and that was like a light bulb moment for me and yeah yeah I completely embrace it and I'm so proud to be a Spice Girl and when people call me

former Spice Girl I get a little bit cross because I think proud to be a Spice Girl. And when people call me former Spice Girl, I get a little bit cross because I think once you're a Spice Girl, you're always a Spice Girl. So yeah, I'm very, very proud and always happy to see people out and about celebrating that. Well, I'm happy you didn't see me on Saturday.

Let's just put it like that. I wish I was there. That's quite messy. But I heard your voice. Melanie Gism, thank you so much for talking to us this morning. And good luck with all of your solo endeavours and everything else as well. And Jacqueline Springer, always brilliant to get your take on things. Thank you to you.

Some messages, of course, coming in about music and girl bands and what they mean to you, if you've even called them that. I'll come to those very shortly. And also messages coming in about working from home. When my husband works from home, he is far more productive, reads this email, and it means I've been able to start working again part-time because he can do more with childcare. I work in schools, so no flexibility. Now he's having to go back into the office more. This means he's less productive and therefore gets more stressed. It

also puts more pressure on me as I'm having to take on the extra childcare and work. I feel for us, we're taking a step back in terms of gender equality. Those remarks, of course, off the back of what the Prime Minister has been talking about over the weekend, under a headline saying working from home doesn't work. Jane says, I work front of house at a museum. It feels like staff that now work from home have lost social skills and have less and less connection to the museum itself. Team spirit is down, and it feels like there is to the museum itself team spirit is down and it feels like there is a hierarchy amongst the team very interesting perspective from jane there thank you

very much good morning to you well let's cross to the pond now across the pond i should say rather to the united states where women have been raising concerns about period and pregnancy tracking apps on their phones over concerns their data could potentially be stored, shared and later used against them should they ever seek to have an abortion. It follows fears that the US Supreme Court is about to overturn the landmark Roe v. Wade case, which guarantees a woman's constitutional right to abortion nationwide. If overturned, as we've been discussing, the US would move to a system of allowing individual states to decide whether to allow abortion, ban it or heavily restrict it. So how careful do women need to be with their cycle data who are concerned about that potential overturn as opposed to those who are hoping it will happen?

Well, in a moment, I will talk to Gillian York, who's from the Electronic Frontier Foundation, an American digital rights group. She joins me from Berlin. But first, let me talk to the BBC's technology reporter, Shona McCallum, for a bit of background on this. Shona, good morning. Hiya. Tell us just about what these apps are, first of all. Yes, so period trackers log dates, they calculate your average of your menstrual cycle and they predict then when you're going to start your next period.

Women put the data in, you know, when you started your period, symptoms like logging flow, how bad cramps are, and basically then the algorithm feeds you when your period is due. People might use them to be just aware of how their body's doing, understand their reactions to various parts of the cycle, be prepared for your next period to track ovulation and potentially get pregnant. It also informs conversations with medical professionals if you have something like endometriosis and also to track the perimenopause. So we know obviously periods typically occur once a month but you know with exact timing, flow, symptoms etc period tracker apps can be really

useful for women. And you know a lot of them here, of course, in the UK as well. But there's a particular element of concern that's being discussed in America at the moment with regards to that leak I mentioned from the Supreme Court. Tell us about that. Yeah, so quite bluntly, women are worried that their menstrual cycle data could be used against them by law enforcement.

If the individual states uphold those state laws, so they bring lawsuits and investigations onto people who are having abortions, then they may look into this data, you know, they may have a look at the data that women are putting in, because we know that there has been leaks to the big data companies. And obviously, when it comes to an abortion, you know, people turn to tech, you may Google abortion, what's involved, where to go, is it legal, those kind of things. And you'll also be inputting that information if you're using a period tracker. And so the worry is, yeah, law enforcement will take a keen interest in this data, and could reveal, you know, what intentions women have, and ultimately get them into trouble. Let me bring in Gillian at this point, as I say, from the Electronic Frontier Foundation, an American digital rights group. Good morning. Welcome to the programme. Thank you. Thank you for having me. How concerned are you about these apps and women's reproductive data?

Yeah, so we're absolutely concerned about these apps. But I think it's really important to note that our concerns about data privacy are far from limited to period trackers. So the way that I look at it is it's about all the different data that you're using. So it's period trackers, but it's also things like your location data, the phone calls that you make, your text messages, et cetera. So there was a case about two years ago that I just want to mention where a mother of three in the United States, in Mississippi, where a lot of this battle has been ongoing for a few years, was charged after having a stillborn birth. And part of the charge that happened there was actually about her internet search results. She'd been searching

for ways to induce a miscarriage, searching for things like buying misoprostol abortion pills online. And that, combined with some questionable medical evidence done by the state medical examiner, allowed the state to convict her, or sorry, a grand jury rather, to indict her on a charge of secondary murder for using all of that data that was combined. So it is a period tracker, perhaps,

but it's also a number of other things as well. And those charges were dropped in the end with that particular case. Yes. But the point I suppose you're saying is what can be used when a case is being built. And we don't yet know, of course, how this is going to play out with regards to abortion law in America at the moment. that women are therefore, just because we are talking specifically about this, are right to be perhaps pulling back from sharing such information? Because of course, there's also been a lot made about femtech, as it's called by some, and the benefits of, of course, being able to monitor those things. In fact, there was criticism of Apple when they launched their health suite that

they didn't include, for instance, a period tracker. Yeah, exactly. I mean, I think women are absolutely right to be concerned. We've seen research from groups like Privacy International in the UK that have shown that these apps are collecting a really large amount of data and storing that data for lengthy periods of time, perhaps unnecessarily so. And so, you know, I absolutely recognize how useful these apps can be, and I understand why people want to use them. And so, you know know really see it on being on these companies to limit the way that they uh they retain data and the data they capture in the first place but i also you know it's hard to say women just stop using these apps turn back to you know writing things in your diary um even though that may be a safe role yes alternative um it's really important we look towards holding

the apps accountable. Well, we did, of course, contact some of the most popular period tracking apps to see if anyone could come and talk to us. We emailed Flow, Period Tracker, Eve by Glow, My Calendar, Period Tracker and Clue. Clue, which has 12 million users in over 190 countries, did actually come back to us with a statement saying, we completely understand this anxiety. We want to reassure you that your health data, particularly any data you track in Clue about pregnancies, pregnancy loss or abortion is kept private and safe. Keeping Clue users' sensitive data safe

is fundamental to our mission of self-empowerment and fundamental to our business model too, because that depends on earning our community's trust. I just bring in Shona again for a moment here, because last year the Federal Trade Commission found that the Flow app had been sharing data from its period ovulation app with marketing analytics companies and Facebook.

Tell us a bit more about that because of course when data is then shared how is it used, women's data? Yes, so the FTC found that Flow had informed Facebook of in-app activity. So that's when a user is having a period or informed it of an intention to get pregnant. Not to get too technical, but that's done something through a bit of software development kit. It's an SDK. It's often incorporated into apps and it basically uses third parties.

So that's why the information that women were inputting got into the likes of Facebook. So basically, they're using that information to deliver targeted online advertising and looking at the data, looking at whether or not marketing campaigns had an effect, what conversations women were having online, what were the consumer behaviour, regional preferences, blah, blah. They said that they didn't give date of birth and they didn't give, you know, that type of personal information. They were only looking at the data as a whole. However, you can imagine the outcry when women find that, OK, my health information could potentially be with Facebook and Google. And, you know, it's deeply personal, this information, isn't it?

And then when you look onto the apps, you do see that some of them will share with third parties. Yes, and I think that's the other thing, just to give you the final word, Gillian, is how personal the nature of this data is. And I know what you're saying about other apps and other pieces of information, but this feels particularly personal and personal to women. Absolutely. It's very personal data. And, you. And I think women have a right to be concerned. There's a lot

of things that they can do to work to protect their digital rights around this. There's a lot of great tips out there. But yeah, I mean, at this moment, I think it's really important for us to look towards holding these companies accountable about the way that they store data. And also just to say there's the hope, of course, by sharing, which some have said in these businesses, that they can contribute towards understanding medical research. In fact, they would they would grant access on that basis because they want more information about, you know, conditions, for instance, that there isn't enough research on. But at the same time, I suppose you really have to make sure you've consented, check all your settings and and make sure you've read the small print, which I suppose, I'm sure you see this all the time, Shona, as a technology reporter, people just click through,

don't really read and say, except. Gillian, thank you very much to you, Gillian York, from the Electronic Frontier Foundation and to the BBC technology reporter, Shona McCallum. Now, in the wake of the killings that we have reported on, the tragic killings of toddlers Star Hobson and Arthur Lembinjo Hughes, we are awaiting a government report to be published shortly looking into what went wrong with those cases.

Social workers, you may recall, had failed to act on warnings from relatives, which meant the children were not removed from their abusive homes. Tonight, though, a BBC One panorama explores a different perspective, which we wanted to bring you early sight of today. What about when children's services intervene too far, too fast, and when they act unethically, even unlawfully, towards children and their parents, causing lifelong trauma in the process?

Well, one local authority, Herefordshire Council, has been severely and repeatedly criticised by a High Court judge for breaching children's human rights through what the judge called appalling social work practice. Panorama reporter Louise Tickle is here to tell us some more. Louise, your investigation into this council has taken more than a year. I know that you had to go to court a number of times to get permission to talk to the families. Perhaps we could start by you explaining why that was. Whenever parents end up in the family court, proceedings are held in private in order to protect the children's privacy.

But that can mean however badly children's services behave towards a family. And there are some truly shocking examples in our film tonight. The law is that they're not allowed to tell anyone, not their friends, not journalists, about the details of what's been revealed in court. So in the four Herefordshire cases that I was initially investigating, the judge, Mr Justice Keirn, he'd published very detailed anonymised judgments explaining how children and families had been harmed by poor social work practice right from the top to the bottom of Herefordshire Children's Services Department. And when you read that as a journalist, you want to hear from the people involved. So I had to make an application to the judge, but anyone who consented to be able to talk to me free of the threat of being held in contempt of court. I also had to ask for permission to be able to publish what they said and using their names and pictures if they agreed. Herefordshire Council, well, they fought aspects of my application,

but ultimately the judge upheld the right of the media to tell these stories because of the public interest in doing so. And what did the family tell you? Well, first of all, I had to find them. I didn't have any names or any addresses so I had to ask all the family's lawyers to send letters of introduction to their former clients. Then the judge even had to order Herefordshire Council to send my letters to two family members who I couldn't locate and when I was then phoned up by sisters who'd been treated appallingly while in care and met the adoptive parents of twins who had been unlawfully separated for adoption, it's a very, very different thing to reading a judgment. Because meeting them, you see and you hear the human impact of poor social work practice and you understand in a very visceral way how children can

be damaged. I mean how would you describe how they've been affected I know you go into this tonight but but what would you say? Well one young woman who we've called Gemma in the film feels incredibly let down that she lost her chance to be adopted thanks to Herefordshire Council inexplicably going against a court order that she and her sister should be adopted thanks to Herefordshire Council inexplicably going against a court order that she and her sister should have the chance of a family they could call her own and seeing her sadness at losing her relationship with the foster mother who had wanted to adopt her and then being moved hundreds of miles from her and her sister who she never lived with again it was pretty heartbreaking she she's got her own children now and she's such an

impressive mum. But for herself, she told me that she feels very alone and just lonely in the world. And, you know, the adoptive parents of twins who run lawfully separated by Herefordshire Council have been, I would say, in their different ways, traumatised by the way the twins and they were treated by social workers. They're also, they're angry and they're baffled and they went through hell over months spent in court. They've lost their trust in social workers to tell the truth and work in the best interests of children. And that's hardly surprising given that they discovered in court that an expert's recommendation that the twins should be adopted together had been deliberately altered, changing its meaning completely, so they were placed for adoption separately. And the human anguish caused by this kind of unethical practice has appalled them,

it appalls the judge, and the implications of it are destructive, and they are lifelong. Yes, well, I mean, there are important cases to hear the details of. There were cases from a few years ago. But I understand you've also interviewed families who are currently being investigated by children's services. Yeah, we had to get a court again to be able to interview a mother called Angeline and fight for the right for her to speak in her own name and voice about how she feels she and her children have been treated by social workers. She was being investigated by social workers amid accusations that she was harming her children by inventing or exaggerating illnesses and taking them to the doctors too often. But she told me that even when

she presented social workers with evidence about her children, she felt they didn't believe her. No findings have been made against her and her children remain with her, although the family is still being monitored by social workers. Well, you actually put us in touch with Angeline. I was able to speak to her before the programme and ask her the effect that this had had on her. Huge effect. It's left, they say about, I admitted being over-anxious, I was anxious as any parent is if your child isn't very well or anything. And I always felt judged because at the time we obviously had the LA involvement. So that's where the anxiety come from, which is why I admitted to it because I was anxious.

It's probably heightened my anxiety. It caused me to lose friends family work at times I remember putting my children to bed and looking at them and thinking the worst thing for them would be to ripped out to be ripped out of my arms and I remember just feeling to stop their pain I need to take my own life they need to be protected and it wasn't because i didn't love them i got to that point where i was just fighting a brick wall there was no support they were making life harder instead of better angeline talking to me before i came on air that's that's one family of course being affected by this children's services department louise are there others there are one of the other cases I originally got permission from Mr Justice Keirn to report involved a Herefordshire Council lawyer giving wrong legal advice to the then Director of Children's Services,

who in turn gave permission for the life support of a critically ill girl in care to be switched off. He knew her mother was minutes away from the hospital to say goodbye to her daughter, but he didn't wait and she didn't make it in time. That case continues in the family court. And though the mother and the surviving siblings didn't want to speak to me for the programme, I got permission from the judge to publish the fact that just last year, the council itself breached this family's privacy by uploading the deceased girl's name onto its website in a document they hadn't redacted. What does Herefordshire Council say about all of this? Well Herefordshire Council has told us

it wants to apologise to children and families affected by its very serious failings. It says urgent change is a top priority and that it's put in place a three-year plan to reduce social worker caseloads, to recruit more staff and improve leadership so children and families get the quality of support they need. Louise Tickle, thank you very much and you can watch Louise's BBC Panorama, Protecting Our Children, a balancing act at eight o'clock this evening on BBC One or of course you can catch up on BBC iPlayer. Now, talking about I suppose what you watch and what you want to spend your time thinking about,

I personally have been hooked on something called Couples Therapy, the docuseries on BBC Two where you do get to tune in to real couples therapy sessions. You know, they've consented, it's there, it's real and it's addictive, enthralling and I should also say maddening at times. I've had quite a few debates about it. I know others can get the same hit from, for instance, Esther Perel's podcast as well. Wherever you get yours, if you get yours, many of us do find the dynamics of relationships fascinating.

My next guest has made a professional out of it, or rather it's found her. So let's find out how this happens. Susanna Absey, a psychoanalytic psychotherapist who's worked in private practice with couples, individuals and parents for over 30 years. She's chair of the British Psychoanalytic Council and she has a book out, Tell Me the Truth About Love, 13 Tales from the Therapist's Couch. Susanna, good morning. Morning. Thank you for being with us. What do you hope to share with people who perhaps who don't watch or listen to such things or maybe have never even thought about couples therapy?

Well, I suppose you're partly trying to demystify the process, you know, help people see that the couples who come are ordinary couples with ordinary struggles. That's one of the key things I'm trying to do. And do you feel comfortable, I suppose, about people tuning into such content, like I mentioned? Because, of course, some say, is it a bit like, you know, what people call food porn? You know, loving watching people make food and then people don't cook themselves. You know, they then don't think maybe, what's my relationship like? They just love watching others. Well, it's complex, isn't it, about watching people from a sort of point of view, an ethical point of view. But I think that it's been done carefully in couple therapy. And in my

book, the stories that I write about are, you know, fictionalised. There's no real couples in there. You've pulled together themes. Themes, yeah. You know, there's so many stories in my mind, it's quite easy to make composite cases up, which is what I've done. But I think people do get a lot because just like when I'm in the room with a couple, it makes me think about my relationships, my family. It prompts all sorts of new thoughts, which is one of the reasons why we go on doing this work for years on end. So it does for other people when you read something or you watch something. I'm sure, for instance, Emma, your mind's alive with things that happened to you in the past or relationships you've seen around you or your own relationship. And also it makes you think, and I know that you talk about this and you explore this, about what is the truth?

Absolutely. I mean, that's a, you know, that's why I called it Tell Me the Truth About Love, because there isn't really any truth between couples. You know, we see things that happen to us always happen in the context of our previous experiences, which, you know, distort. So it's like we're seeing through our own lens. And couples, of course, come to see me and often they want the truth. They want me to make a decision about who's telling the truth. And you don't and can't do that. No, obviously I can't I sometimes joke that you know perhaps they'd like me to install CCTV in their houses but it'd be very expensive for me to watch all the films so

no because what you're you're trying to get people curious and and you know well and what's that what does that mean in this context to get people curious to get people curious is because people come in with fixed ideas don't they they? They have a belief, an internal belief. This is how it is. You don't care about me. And what you try and do is think about the ordinary things that have happened and then try and make sense of them in terms of, you know, the context, why their partner might be behaving like that.

So getting a couple curious in themselves and in each other is the core of the work for me. Have you had it that people have walked in before and you've thought very quickly they just shouldn't be together? Very, very, very rarely. Really? I mean, you know, you could count that on, you know, on the fingers of one hand. So the point is it can work and often there is work to do that's not futile. It's not so much that in the sense of I don't say, oh, this can work. Sometimes you feel very optimistic, but more that, you know, that isn't my role actually to decide whether a couple should be together or not, except in very, very extreme circumstances. It's my role to facilitate them to work out what they want to do. Tell us about the U-shaped curve when it comes to relationships. what many people unfortunately, well, maybe fortunately for the population don't realise

is the impact of having children on relationship satisfaction. So studies have been done right across the world looking at relationship satisfaction before having children and after and then as children leave home. And it is a very steep U curve and you bounce along the bottom of relationship satisfaction until children leave home. And then if you stay the distance, yeah, things tend to get better in terms of how people feel about how happy they are. But of course, this is population studies. You know, there'll be many people out there who, for them, having children is the greatest joy and really has brought them, you know, very close. Well, speaking of children, you do start the book with Victoria and Rupert, shockingly childish themselves.

Yes, yeah. Do you ever just want to bang people's heads together when they're like that? What's their problem? Well, sometimes you do. But, you know, usually the whole point is you're thinking, well, why are you getting so worked up? What is it that's really driving these feelings that you're so passionately engaged with each other? So, yeah, but of course, sometimes you do, you know, but if you really felt like that, you wouldn't choose this job do they have light bulb moments do you think in front of you or is it more of the they do the work and then they they come back just if that's that thing you're saying about trying to get them to come out of where they are and be curious about where the other person is and how they've been perceiving it i don't i don't believe in the the idea that there is you know suddenly a eureka moment that happens very occasionally i think it's more about the process of being together in the room with me and exploring something and being with each other and the moments that probably

make the biggest difference are the moments where people connect with feelings and share feelings that they haven't known about or haven't wanted to share and that's poignant and touching and I try and capture that in the book as well. When I was looking into why people would put their actual therapy sessions on television one of the reasons was financial. There's a deal done as I understand it for a certain number of sessions in that particular BBC programme to be covered. You know it is expensive and we don't have much provision I understand on the NHS. No I mean you know, it is expensive and we don't have much provision, I understand, on the NHS. No, I mean, you know, it's really problematic. I used to be chief exec of Tavistock Relationships.

And, you know, there always was a little pot of money for relationship support for that organisation and for Relate. And that pot of money now has been shifted towards working with parental conflict and the money has gone away. And I think that's really, really a shame because there are many couples post-pandemic who are in a real state. It's just really emerging now. And there is so little public provision out there. There's a tiny bit of provision in the NHS if you're clinically depressed, but for couple therapy for depression, but that is very, very scarce. It's one of the least, even though it's got the best evidence, you know, it's done really well. It's very rare that people can access it. And we really need to address that for children as well as for the couples themselves.

Well, we also touched a little bit on this. We did a special phone-in when No Fault Divorce came in in England and Wales. And perhaps some of the silver lining of that is not having to find fault and maybe being able to work through things because you haven't had to make things difficult. Of course, many of these people who got in touch with me and the programme that day, you know, did not want to be together. That's that's fine. But I suppose, you know, I think what you're saying there about the pandemic is very interesting.

If we're going to now see people in need after that who who might have been OK and might be in a different place now. Absolutely. And the cost to society is great, you know, for couples to break down. That has all sorts of economic and social consequences, mental health consequences, you know, consequences for their children. Children can recover from divorce, but it's still nevertheless a major disruption in their lives. So you need provision and support around it. And you need to intervene in a way that couples actually can work things through. Post-pandemic, it's an important investment we should be making. Is it a satisfying job?

Very satisfying, actually, because it's so endlessly interesting. You know, that's, you know, people and human beings are so endlessly diverting and interesting. And how they see things, their version of the truth. Well, Susanna, thank you very much, Susanna Absey. My pleasure. The book is called Tell Me the Truth About Love. I mean, how many people want to know that? They do. 13 tales from the therapist's couch.

And a lot of stories put together through these couples to give you a sense of perhaps what goes on in that room and maybe what you would get out of it. And actually, you know, throughout the programme, of course course i've been hearing from you a real range of experiences about some of you've been incredibly isolated because of uh now lockdown working becoming much more normal working from home and a lot of you feeling completely liberated by it and hoping it will stay or some form of hybrid so thank you so much for many of those messages today and of course for your company back tomorrow at 10.

That's all for today's Woman's Hour. Thank you so much for your time. Join us again for the next one. Hi there. I'm just popping up to let you know about another Radio 4 podcast that you may be interested in. Especially if, like me, your social media feeds are constantly bombarding you with adverts that are hyping up the latest wonder products, promising you the world. You know the ones. Personalised vitamin plans to make you healthier. A pair of sustainable jeans to make you greener.

NFTs to earn you millions. I am on a mission to find out the facts behind the fads. I'm Greg Foot and my BBC Radio 4 podcast Sliced Bread is back to ask if another batch of these wonder products really are the best things since sliced bread. If you'd like to know about manuka honey or mosquito repellent or mindfulness apps or if you've got something you'd like me to investigate for you just go search for sliced bread on BBC Sounds. I'm Sarah Treleaven, and for over a year, I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there who's faking pregnancies. I started like warning

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

Available now.