Woman's Hour - Indecent exposure, Natalie Dormer, World fertility, Author Jessica Stanley

Episode Date: June 10, 2025

The kidnap, murder and rape of Sarah Everard was deemed a moment of reckoning in 2021. The Angiolini Inquiry, which investigated this case, found that Wayne Couzens was reported eight times for indecent exposure. The report also found that the offence "may indicate a potential trajectory towards even more serious sexual and violent offending". A new report by The Telegraph has investigated cases of indecent exposure since Sarah Everard's murder and found that police are catching and prosecuting fewer offenders, despite a big increase in the number of offences reported. The paper's Home Affairs Editor, Charles Hymas, joins Nuala McGovern, as does Zoë Billingham, former HM Inspector of Constabulary.Natalie Dormer has graced our screens as Margaery Tyrell in Game of Thrones, Anne Boleyn in The Tudors and in films including The Hunger Games: Mockingjay and The Wasp. She’s now back on stage as Anna in a new adaptation of Leo Tolstoy’s epic novel Anna Karenina. Set in 19th century Russia, Anna is the wife of a powerful government official, who dares to step outside the bounds of society to risk a dangerous and destructive love affair. Natalie talks to Nuala about the role, her career and more.World fertility rates are in 'unprecedented decline' according to a survey of 14,000 people by the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), the UN's reproductive rights agency. One in five respondents said they haven't had – or don’t expect they will have - the number of children they want. The survey spanned 14 countries on five continents, which are home to a third of the world's population. Nuala is joined by demographer Anna Rotkirch, who has researched fertility intentions in Europe and advises the Finnish government on population policy, to discuss the findings and their impact. Jessica Stanley’s novel Consider Yourself Kissed tells the story of Coralie, a copywriter who moves from Australia to London just before she turns 30 and falls in love with political journalist Adam. Jessica tells Nuala about the book, which tracks 10 years of Coralie and Adam’s lives from 2013 to 2023, taking in love, birth, illness and a particularly eventful period in British politics. Presenter: Nuala McGovern Producer: Sarah Jane Griffiths

BBC Sounds music radio podcasts. Hello, this is Newland McGovern and you're listening to the Woman's Hour podcast. Hello and welcome to the programme. You might remember a pledge by police after the rape and murder of Sarah Everard that they said they would crack down on perpetrators of indecent exposure. Police acknowledge that it is a precursor crime that can escalate into more serious contact sexual offences, including rape. But the Telegraph has found despite higher reporting rates by victims, prosecutions for

indecent exposure have decreased. We're going to discuss why that might be this hour. Also today, the UN Agency for Reproductive Rights has said that the world has begun an unprecedented decline in fertility rates. Now we'll explore why that is and also whether it matters. But I'd also like to hear from you about one finding from this report. 31% of respondents over 50 said they had fewer children than they wanted. Now you don't have to be over 50 to answer that question for us this morning. But do you have fewer children than you wanted?

What stopped you? You can text the programme the number is 84844 on social media or at BBC Woman's Hour or you can email us through our website for a WhatsApp message or a voice note. That number is 0300 100 444. And we have the actor, Natalie Dormer, joining us. Maybe you're a fan of Game of Thrones, Hunger Games, The Tudors. She has a long list.

But Natalie is currently on stage as Anna Karenina. And so we are going to step into 19th century Russia with her. But we're also going to spend a while in the time period from 2013 to 2023 with Jessica Stanley. She has a new romantic comedy novel kind of meets state of the nation. It's called Consider Yourself Kissed, a conversation with Jessica also coming up this hour. But let me begin. The rape, murder and kidnap of Sarah Everard was deemed a moment of reckoning for tackling

male violence against women and girls when it happened back in 2021. Now under the previous Conservative government, the national policing response to violence against women was put on a par with terrorism and the current Labour government has committed to halving the rates of this type of violence. Central to Sarah Everard's case was the fact that the serving police officer, Wayne Cousins, who was convicted of her rape and murder in 2023, had a history of alleged sexual offending. He had been reported for indecent exposure eight times prior to that fateful night during the COVID lockdown. The Angelini inquiry, which investigated this case, found that Sarah's murder could have been avoided if these threats had been recognized and that indecent exposure may, and I quote,

indicate a potential trajectory towards even more serious sexual and violent offending, unquote. The Telegraph this week released figures on the outcomes of reported cases of indecent exposure since Sarah Everard's murder. They found that the police are catching and prosecuting fewer offenders for indecent exposure since Sarah Everard's murder. They found that the police are catching and prosecuting fewer offenders for indecent exposure. That's despite a big increase in the number of offenses reported. In a moment I'm going to speak to Zoe Billingham. She's a former inspector of police. But before we came to air I spoke to the Telegraph's Home Affairs editor, that's Charles Hymas, and I began by asking him how indecent exposure is defined. It's someone who is exposing themselves with an intent to upset, distress, humiliate another person

and often it's associated with some sexual act that the person may be committing and that obviously is an exacerbating factor in any incident. So that's really how it's defined. I think the thing that's really important is the is the fact that it's a precursor crime. It's seen as something which leads to something more serious and if it's not nipped in the bud then you see it developing in 10% of cases to serious contact offenses and 25% of indecent exposers reoffend. Why did you want to look into this?

I've always been very interested in this particular area, ever since the Wayne Cousins and Sarah Everard case. And I had a long conversation with the College of Policing about three years ago in which they recognised that the police had let the public down by not taking it seriously enough, being potentially sort of dismissive of this sort of crime, and they were on a big sort of push to try and make it be taken much more seriously by the police. So I just thought, three years on, let's have a look and see what's happened. As a result, I asked our researcher, sort of data, data people to look at the data, both on charging rates and also on actual number of offenses. And what we found was not surprisingly

that there'd been a massive increase in the number of reports of offenses off the back of, I think, things like the Sarah Everard case and the whole issue about violence. and then also at the charging rates and obviously we saw that disparity that essentially they were still failing women basically. So let's get into the specifics of that of what you found increased reporting but when it comes to charges what are some of the specifics? So what we've seen in the last decade is basically a decline in the proportion of those offences resulting in a charge, so in other words, catching their person, and it's fallen from 20% down to 10%. And if you take that period between Sarah Everard, the rape and murder

of her by Wayne Cousins, it's fallen from 12% to 10%. So what that means is that just one in 10 of those offences are resulting in someone being caught, arrested and being charged, in essence being sold, which I think most people would think is pretty shocking. Any idea why? I think it's partly, I think the last decade you've seen a resource issue, the police have been fewer police on the streets and so therefore I think there's a perception that they have not got into their communities to be able to understand what's happening, the sort of so-called bobbies on the beat, so you've seen a lack of resourcing and they've had to prioritize other things. You would have thought that perhaps sexual offending would be something that they should

have prioritized, but clearly not. With this, we've mentioned Sarah Everard and Wayne Cousins. Can you remind our listeners exactly what happened or what they found out had happened with Wayne Cousins previous to the murder of Sarah Everard when it came to indecent exposure. So what emerged in the aftermath of that horrific case was the fact that Wayne Cousins was a serial indecent exposure and he'd actually exposed himself on at least eight reported occasions, but police had not investigated those offences.

And the Angelini inquiry, which was subsequently set up to try and learn the lessons from what happened, essentially established that, you know, its conclusion was absolutely damning. It said that basically, if police had acted on those incidents, he could have been stopped and Sarah Everard may still be alive today. You mentioned the charges going down to one in ten. Do we know what sort of sentences are received for those that are charged? I mean that was the other aspect is that having got that data was that I asked our data people to look at sentencing. And what we found with the sentencing was that there'd been a sort of a 50% increase in the, in the sort of cases where they had not had sentences of more than six months.

So in other words, there was basically more leniency by the courts. I mean, there's no ostensible or clear explanation for that. But my suspicion is that the whole criminal justice system is really in crisis. And what we've got is prisons too full and courts therefore have been actually directed not to send people to jail if they can find an alternative. So I think that justice is very sadly in decline. Charles Hyam is there, the Home Affairs editor at The Telegraph, who looked into some of So I think that justice is very sadly in decline. Charles Hymas there, the Home Affairs Editor at The Telegraph, who looked into some of those figures. I'm joined now by Zoe Billingham, former His Majesty's Inspector of Constabulary.

Good to have you back with us, Zoe. First, your reaction to what you were hearing there? Morning, Luna. Shocking, isn't it? And Charles should be congratulated. It's a great piece of research. It's exactly the sort of thing that we want our journalists to be shining a light on but it's deeply disappointing that after Sarah Everard's appalling murder at the hands of a serving police officer, that the data still suggests that the police aren't responding appropriately to indecent exposure and as Charles said there's good research in the United States in fact to suggest that people that do do an indecent exposure go on to commit contact crimes so that's more serious sexual offenses

25% of the time so this is a really serious red flag crime it's a demonstration of uninhibited behavior, sexual aggression by men against women, and it needs to be treated seriously by the police. Do you feel that red flag, as you talk about in some of the research that you and Charles have pointed to, is that accepted across the board? That this is a precursor? Yes, absolutely, 100%. And there's some positives in Charles's research as well.

I mean, what's really interesting is it is important that more people come forward. So there's been a huge increase. Six thousand crimes were being reported by members of the public prior to Sarah Everard's death and 16,000 now. So that's really key that it is it is recognised as something that is not acceptable because in the past Indecent exposure which some people I don't refer to as flashing has seen it's been seen as a bit of a sort of Nod nod wink wink. It's not something that we're going to treat terribly seriously but it is being reported more often and also the police have responded by training over 40,000 of their officers on the importance of dealing with non-contact sexual offenses right off

but clearly that is not translating into the outcomes that we as women want to see. And what do you think is there? I mean some have talked about victims for example not wanting to continue within that criminal justice system, which can take a really long time I think as Charles was also alluding to with some of the specific challenges that there are with the justice system. Is there a way to prosecute without having the onus on the victim to be present throughout that whole trajectory? Yeah, absolutely Noona.

I mean, Charles referred to it, didn't he? The whole of the criminal justice system is at breaking point, let's be honest. But the police have got to do their bit of the job well within that whole system. And too often in these cases of indecent exposure, the police are writing off the crime, if you like, on the grounds that the victim doesn't support police action. Now, I think that that's a really, really lazy approach on the part of the police, and I've been pressing in the past that the police must progress these cases,

and they can do so on what's called evidence-based prosecution. So that means a prosecution where they gather a whole range of evidence like CCTV, mobile phone data. These offences are taking place in the public, so there may be other witnesses that have seen these offences, eyewitness accounts that can be drawn together. So even if, understandably, the victim herself doesn't want to go through that ordeal of having to go to court, the police can create a case and build a case for the victim and that's exactly what should be happening in these cases. So, sorry to interrupt you Zoe, but when we hear that term that the victim doesn't

support police action, how do you interpret that, that they don't want to go through the court system? Yes, quite often that's what it means. It's a shorthand that the police use to say that the victim isn't going to provide a witness statement and then kind of wait sometimes, not just months, but years for this case to actually come into court. I mean we see this in rape cases, Nuna, for goodness sake. We see rape cases taking over two years to come to court and the impact and the trauma that has on those victims is indescribable. So my view is that the police should not be pushing all of the responsibility to bring the offender to justice onto the

victim. They can quite readily build a case on the victim's behalf, even where the victim doesn't want to pursue the case in terms of her appearing at court. And that's a perfectly justifiable logical and appropriate place for the police to be. But I think we have to ask ourselves, don't we? Are there still underpinning cultural issues at the heart of all of this? I know the police are busy, I don't dispute that, but are there some cultural issues that suggest that some police officers actually pursuing these crimes isn't quite as important

as some of the other crimes? Is that what you think? I think there's still some underpinning within policing of cultural issues. When you look at the age profile of policing, and yes, our new police officers are coming in at a rate which is great, and many of them are really keen and absolutely on it and want to come into policing to solve these sorts of crimes, I identified all sorts of cultural issues when I was doing this job three or four years ago where police officers would visibly groan even with me in the car when we're on 999

response calls if it was a domestic abuse they'd groan and say oh not another domestic. So you know there is still these kind of issues that I think policing needs to tackle and address. Just a statement that we did have from the Assistant Chief Constable Tom Harding, Director of Operational Standards at the College of Policing. He says while we are seeing increased reporting of these offences, reflecting growing public awareness and confidence in coming forward, we recognize the need to improve the quality and consistency of investigations and outcomes. He did go on to talk about the College of Policing launching their new national training for non-contact sexual offenses

including indecent exposure, voyeurism and cyber flashing. This is in response to recommendation 2 of the Angelini inquiry to help police officers and staff better understand and respond to the offenses and the number you mentioned so far 40,000 officers and staff have completed the training. Do you think the training is fit for purpose? Do you feel out of those 40,000 for example there wouldn't be a groan when a certain incident comes through? Look this goes to the heart of what we want our police to do doesn't it Núile? I mean you can train people but if actually the hearts and minds aren't there in the first instance it's impossible to say that attending a single training course is going to

change attitudes. One of the things that I'm really keen to see is that we're really clear about what type of skills, competences, capabilities we want of people coming into policing. We need far more diversity, we need more people from black and Asian communities, we need more women. And we need more people coming into policing who really understand the complex social issues that policing have to deal with day in, day out. It's not all about fast cars, guns, police horses and dealing with riots. Almost 60% of crime that police are dealing with will be domestic abuse related and I don't think that police are always being clear to new recruits that that's what the job is about and it's a really hugely valuable job but

we need the right people coming in at the right time. And do you think, I don't know, is there a campaign that can attract that profile of person that you're outlining, Zoe? Well, isn't it really interesting? Because I don't know about you and your listeners, but when you think about the kind of the adverts for police recruitment, you see the flashing lights, you see the guns, you see the hostage situations, you see the kind of the really significant disorder. I think we've got to think about very different ways of campaigning to recruit people into policing,

being really frank about what this is. You know, one of the best jobs in policing is neighborhood policing, so it's not the response 999 rushing around in fast cars, but it's actually being in your communities, being embedded, understanding where the problems are happening, talking to kids in schools and stopping crime happening in the first place. And I can't remember many police recruitment campaigns that really focus on that. So I think that absolutely needs to change. Culture needs to change and culture changes through leadership. We do hear, as we've heard from Charles and also from you, that the government is under

a lot of pressure. There's the spending review tomorrow of course and demands on the finances. You're the chair of the police renumeration review body and I know you're unable to discuss the details of that but I wonder of what you make about the pledge that the government had to meet its target to have violence against women and girls after nearly a year into their time in power. Yeah look this is a great mission I'm not going to pretend otherwise. We have to have violence against women and girls as a decade to do that,

and actually the fact that the government is treating tackling violence against women and girls as seriously as terrorism absolutely is where we need to be. But in order for the police to be successful, I have a lot of sympathy for the chiefs that have been coming out of the door over the last couple of weeks in a concerted effort. I think to convince the Chancellor as opposed to the Home Secretary, I think the Home Secretary is absolutely on this. She wants to protect policing budget but actually they're not going to be able to deliver the key missions of this government without additional resources.

So it is important that police budgets are protected in this regard. Now we'll see what will happen. I do want to read the safeguarding minister, Jess Phillips, a statement from her. Violence against women and girls is a national emergency. I know the devastating impact exposure and voyeurism can have on victims who are too often being let down. We're fundamentally reviewing the way police respond to these offences and have supported the development of new training for officers.

As part of our ambitious mission to have violence against women and girls in a decade, we'll be setting out a new strategy in the summer to keep more women safe. Maybe we'll have a chat again then as Zoe Billingham, who was the former His Majesty's Inspector for Constabulary. Thanks very much for joining us. Please. Now, my next guest, Natalie Dormer, has played Marjorie Tyrell in Game of Thrones and Belin in The Tudors and appeared in films including The Hunger Games, Mockingjay and thriller

The Wasp. But she's back on stage now as Anna in an adaptation of Leo Tolstoy's epic novel Anna Karenina, set, of course course in 19th century Russia. Anna is the wife of a powerful government official who dares to step outside the bounds of society to risk a dangerous and destructive love affair with the handsome Count Vronsky. I have given up everything for you! You don't want to be divorced from dear Karenin. You never have! Because of you I am forever separated from my son!

Oh my love, you want to be this Alexei's mistress and that Alexei's wife? You're going to regret saying that. No more threats. I'm going tomorrow. I'm going out. If you leave me for an hour you will regret it. Very dramatic. Natalie Dormer as Anna Seamus-Dalane as Vronsky in a new production of Anna Karenina at the Chichester Festival Theatre. Natalie, welcome. Hello. Hi, Newland. Good to have you with us.

OK, let's get into the role of Anna, a very, what we say, deep and at times disturbing role, perhaps, to play that has this destruction that happens as she launches into an affair. I can understand why it would be appealing. Tell me how it's been to play her. Oh, it's just been an absolute dream. As you say, she just wants to escape the confines of her incarceration and a loveless marriage in a very specific time in history where women have very little rights and as Tolstoy says and we say in our play she wanted too much to live you

know and it's just glorious to be part of such I suppose I use the word advisedly epic theatre you know there's 18 cast, we have live musicians on stage with us, it snows, we waltz at the bar at the ball, there's children running around on stage with us. It just really has this all-encompassing epic feel to it, trying to get the enormity, but also the domestic pedestrian, that contrast that Tolstoy explores. It's a joy. We've done two previews so far, so I'm still on a steep learning curve. Well, I'm sure it's really interesting as well to see the audience and how they react to you. I mean, Manny will be familiar with the story, but not all. In short order, she is socially

exiled for having an affair. Her brother instead, no problem if he is womanizing. And I was just thinking about the double standards. And do you think they have changed massively from 19th century Russia until now? Well, there's the question, isn't it? I mean, the truth is probably not, not that much, as much as we would like. What I love about this production is often in the glorious features of the past, be it Vivien Leigh or Greta Garbo, or, you know, and obviously there was a Keira Knightley movie, but it really does concentrate on the love triangle, the Vronsky, Karenin, Anna love triangle. But the beauty of this production is it really looks at the ensemble nature you know, Tolstoy is like Dickens he has this wide plethora of characters to compare and

contrast and as you so well say you know there's her brother Stever in his marriage with Dolly which is under the spotlight as well you know six kids down and you know they're going through their own things and then there's this beautiful contrast of the relationship between Levin and Kitty, which is not such, you know, it's not such a dramatic. It's a slow burner. Yeah, exactly, it's a slow burner. And therefore the one that sustains

and has this beautiful, you know, there's beautiful, compassionate, gentle love in it that flowers so beautifully at the end. So what I love about the production is it really compares and contrasts, you know, marriage, love, families, all of most of the characters are analyzing what they are going to bequeath to their children. They're also going through sort of these existential crises because it's a very specific time in Russian history, you know, electric light is coming, the railways as you know, the downfall of Anna being with the trains, you know, the railways are coming, changing the way people move and interact and that sort of like

the abrasive confrontation of new technology, I think is something that a modern audience can very much identify with, you know, whether for us it's AI and social media or whatnot. Which I'm just thinking for people that haven't read it and are wondering what's the problem with Anna and the train. I think it's OK. I can give a spoiler. I can give a spoiler. Considering it's been around for a while. The train is her undoing. But it's so interesting because, you know, Tolstoy actually, as a landowner, as a local landowner, he was invited to view the body of a woman in his local station,

the new, you know, cutting edge station that was a few miles from his house. He was invited to view the body of a woman who had thrown herself under a train after, know the mess of a forsaken love affair and I think that took root in his brain and then he wanted he speaks about how he wanted to analyze families and found from the grand epicness of socio-political horizon of war and peace you know what you get is a much more he was meant to be reading Anthony Trollope at the time you know he sort of looks of looks at, you know, that English novel sort of looking at families almost in a Jane Austen kind of way. It's like, let's look, let's really break down families.

So what about this line in the book, which, you know, I think people who have read it will be familiar with it. It's also in the play spoken by the character of Kitty. Happy families are all alike. Every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way. Yes, in our play, spoken by Dolly, the amazing and nobly Sheldon. No, absolutely. Don't worry. I mean, quite. It's one of the great,

is one of the great openers, isn't it, to literature? It really is. And I know. Well, there you go. Discuss. Yeah, come along, you go, discuss. Yeah, come along folks and discuss. And also, you know, the end of the play equally meaningful, the total and unquestionable meaning of the good. Tolstoy trying to galvanize us all to say, however scary and horrific and dark the world can be,

what is the inner reason to live and to search for redemption. Can I? So, I mean, to search for redemption. Can I? So, I mean, I don't, I don't want your listeners to think that it's also too, you know, wholesome. There's a lot of laughs in there. It's, uh, we try, we try and make you giggle as well. It's sort of, um, hopefully we've got the highs and the lows in there. You talk about it being very modern in many ways,

and you talk about the technological revolution for example that is coming while we have the AI train hurtling towards us that I think I heard you speak of previously. I was curious you stay off social media you now have two children which we can talk about in a moment but are you already thinking how you're going to navigate that world with them? They're little at the moment. Definitely I am. Of course I am. And it is a part of our day to day life. And this is the constant debate, isn't it?

I stay very close in touch with my colleagues at the NSPCC, stay very close in touch with my colleagues at the NSPCC, who are obviously at the forefront of pushing through the safety online, the online safety bill becoming an act last year. And they have this wonderful task force that continues to review the legislation and, you know, lobby for changes and for responsibility to be really taken by the tech platforms. And they very importantly have a youth task force as well, a task force that is actually, the NSPCC keeps this task force of young people. Because I think it's very important to listen to what the young people are telling us about how they interact with tech before we go away making grand, sweeping statements and legislation. We need to listen to them. So I suppose, Nula, I'm just very grateful

that I haven't been an honorary council member of the NSPCC and done a lot of work with them since about 10 years now. That and my ambassadorship of Childline, which I'm very proud of, I just, I try and keep very much in touch with their programs, with what they're advocating, their research. Obviously they do wide-ranging surveys and research, often in tandem with universities and so

forth, and I feel calmer that I've got some of those colleagues on speed dial. And you know, a lot of my friends, I've had children later in life. So I watch my nieces and nephews, I watch my brothers and sisters-in-law and so forth, navigate it with children that are 10, 15 years older than mine. And I think invariably there has to be a revolution, because I think Adolescents were recently that television show, you know the Divine Jack Thorne You know I had the privilege of working with early in my career

You know I think the fact that 96 million people or whatever had watched adolescence within the first three weeks Proves that there is a general general populist outcry that this is not being handled properly. And also, I think, yeah, from guardians, parents, caregivers, trying to understand what's happening in that world. So it's so interesting that you talk about needing to know how are young people using it. But why don't you use it? It's varied over the years, to be honest with you. The, like, if you ask me a different year on a different time, my reasoning has

slightly altered. I mean, at the moment, it would be incredibly useful for me in certain regards to be able to contradict misinformation that's out there about me and you know misquotations and so forth and it would be you know one thing or maybe that would be a quick fix that I could just set the record straight but I'm innately a very private person Nula and I guard that and for my family as well but moreover

I think the real answer, the true answer, is because of my understanding of the landscape at the moment with my work at the NSPCC and also understanding the incredible work that the IWF do, and the Internet Watch Foundation do. I mean, in 2024, over 290,000 images of child sexual abuse were taken down by the IWF. And then another status, like 3 in 10, 8 to 17 year olds have experienced some form of nastiness towards them online. And when a child is contacting

Childline every 45 seconds in our day to day. I just feel like there is this mass epidemic that is just not being addressed. And I just can't quite bring myself to engage with social media until the tech platforms take full responsibility to their influence and responsibility to safeguard children and young people. So I'm sort of abstaining. Yes, I understand.

And to that point. You're taking a stand and kind of putting. I mean, I don't mean to, I don't want toaining. Yes, I understand that point. You're taking a stand and kind of putting... I mean, I don't mean to, I don't want to sound, sorry, just to say. Yeah, sure. I don't want to be too, I don't want to be earnest and judgmental about it. I'm not, I'm not casting aspersions on other people that do it. No, I understand that. I'm just saying for my own personal, my own personal reasons, that's where I sit. You know, it was interesting because when I read about you, because you have Anna Karenina going on right now in Chichester, but you also recently portrayed Audrey Evans in the film Audrey's Children, which is now available to stream.

I mean, I just watched the trailer this morning and I was getting teary watching it. This was a British doctor who went to the United States and pioneered cancer treatment for children. It looks brilliant. And then as I read further, just staying on this point of advocacy for children, you donated, you had to get your hair cut for the role of Audrey. You donated your hair to the Little Princess Trust, a charity that makes wigs for children with cancer or other conditions. And I know you've had children recently, but it feels as I look at your

life and career trajectory, you've always had children close to your heart. I mean, I think that's fair. I mean, Audrey, I mean, Audrey was the most inspiring woman. I mean, the feature that will be out later this year in the UK came out in America in March. You know, it's called Audrey's Children for a Reason. She didn't physically give birth, but she, you know, has given hundreds and thousands and ramifications of her research and her work given so many children life and a co-founder of the Ronald McDonald Houses as well.

And she's a real inspiration to me. She referred in answer to your question Audrey, I have a photo of Audrey on my desk at home and she referred to herself as a woman who cared. I want she wanted she gave permission for the film to be made about her and God bless her I held her hand on her deathbed and she passed halfway through our shoot which was one of the most moving experiences of my life. It's really hard to talk about it not in hyperbolic terms because it was so affecting. And she said, you know, she'd said to our writer, producer, Julia, you can make

the movie if it makes a difference to children. I want to be, I hope to be remembered as a woman who cared. And I suppose I'm just the same ilk. I think a lot of society and governments go around with their elbows out, making all these decisions without truly thinking about the ramifications of the next generation. And, you know, it gets me on my soapbox a bit, to be honest with you. Well, I'm glad you've decided to come and hop on your soapbox for us here at Women's Hour. I will let people know also, staying on here, that you've been filming a TV drama The Lady portraying Sarah Duchess of York popping on an Auburn wig. When can we expect that? That's a very good question.

I don't know. I would imagine it be sometime in the next year. Okay. Yes. All I can tell you is the late 80s fashion, early 90s fashion was absolutely fabulous. I wore shoulder pads that were so wide I could barely fit through doors. Come back and have a chat with us about that when it's out. That will be the lady. But for now, I want to thank Natalie Dormer, Anna Karenina, as I mentioned, previewing now at the Chichester Festival Theatre opening night on Friday. Break a leg. Press night on Friday and through to the 28th of June.

Thank you so much, Nula. Thank you. Thanks for spending some time with us. I've been asking you about birth rates. Have you fewer children than you wanted to have? Here goes one from Katie. I'm 54. My biggest regret is not having had more children. I had a difficult time conceiving two miscarriages and an ectopic pregnancy. Then just before my son was born 18 years ago, my dad died suddenly, it was too traumatic. I do feel blessed to have my son. We have a large extended family so he's lots of cousins. He'll never be alone, which was always my biggest worry. Another, I always thought

I'd be the mum of a big family. I had my first daughter when I was 36. I unfortunately had miscarriage after that and suffered secondary infertility and despite hormonal treatment I was unable to conceive again. A lot of you talking about that which is related to our next item that we want to move on to because world fertility rates are in an unprecedented decline. This is according to a survey of 14,000 people by the United Nations Population Fund, that is the UN's reproductive rights agency. One in five responding said they hadn't had or don't expect to have the number of children that they want. Now the survey spanned 14 countries on five continents that are home to a third of the world's population. To discuss the findings and impact, I'm joined

by the demographer Anna Rottkir, who is researched fertility intentions in Europe and also advises the Finnish government on population policy. Good to have you with us, Anna. What did the survey find were the main factors behind this unprecedented decline? Yes, hi Nula. Thanks for having me. And I must say I'm a great fan of a woman's hour and a thrill to be here. So this new report by the UNFPA says clearly that we have a fertility crisis. People's reproductive goals are not being met. And this is around the globe, also in high fertility societies.

And it is mostly driven by people having fewer children than they say they would have liked to have. And what's behind that though? What's stopping them? Yeah, well, that's the, they did this pilot survey and I'm really happy as a demographer that there will be a larger word, Sylvie, because we don't have enough data, especially globally. But the new thing which is happening is that the requirements of parenthood,

the costs of parenthood, the expectations of parenthood, have become so high that increasingly many are never having children or are having them very late in life. It's interesting just as you talk about that, Anna, here's two comments from our listeners. One from Tracy. I'm a proud mummy to two girls. I'd happily have considered a third child, but because I had my babies as a geriatric mother, she puts that in inverted commas, I was 35 and 39 when I gave birth.

I felt like it wasn't a root for me. If I'd started having children five years earlier, I'd happily have had a third. Another, my husband and I had a conversation this week about having a third child. We currently have two happy, healthy children that are four and two. In my heart, I long for a third child and would forever regret not trying. Now at age 36, when I'm healthy and able. But my husband sites the strain on our finances. And how can I argue with the very clear fact sheet?

Oh, yeah, I recognize those feelings from my own life too. Yes, so I think there is a mismatch currently and this mismatch is not the fault of young adults or women. But we expect people to do many, many, many things before they have the perfect life, and then they should contemplate parenthood. And that is simply too late. Because if you want to have two or three children and be quite sure that you manage to have them and you don't suffer primary or secondary infertility, you should basically start to try for pregnancy while you are in your 20s.

20s, oh, which seeing this now... Yeah, it seems stressful just to say it. I mean, but, and again, this is the mismatch we have put women in, and men, of course, that if you, so if you start at the age of 35, many will succeed in meeting their goals and having as many children they would like to have, but many will not. And in Finland, for instance, we have now a record high level of childlessness. Most of the people who are childless in their 40s would have liked to have children. Interesting. I know in the UK, those that have reached the age of 30, 50% do not have children and those are from the ONS in 2022 is the

first time they've had those figures changing dramatically from decades before. But this story is about a global unprecedented as they call it effortility decline. Why does it matter? Does it matter if the population strength dramatically? Some might think it's a good thing for climate change for example. Yes, so I think these are two quite different questions. What will happen with population decline? The answer there is we don't really know. We know different areas differently, like some areas of Eastern Europe,

East Asia are already in decline. Villages, communities, lineages, small languages will die out sooner than expected, while others may, like London, will probably flourish for a good time to come and attract the increasingly few youth we have. But for me, it's more a question of how do we actually live our lives and how are young adults able to have the partners and the children, they say they would. What do you think? And I think this is kind of the big thing is that are

young people okay? Are they okay with the way that it may pan out? Hearing some stories this morning, of course, from our listeners. But what can governments do that would work to reverse this fertility decline? What works? Yes, so I think this report is really good in that it says there is a crisis. The way to solve it is to really listen carefully to the needs of young adults. Some don't want to have children, they should be supported in living.

That's why not stigmatized, but most do. Most by far the vast majority in all countries want to have both a partner and ideally children and, and listening to them and then meeting their needs and making this a priority. But what is it? Is it higher taxes? Is it a paternity leave? What are the specific levers that a government has? It's key to understanding and for the Finnish government, this was my first point, that it

is the current situation is not the result of one government or one single policy. It's a vast changing our culture, this postponement of parenthood and the rise in childlessness that you mentioned. But some might put that down to, for example, a lack of housing is the reason that people have a delayed start to family life. Yes, so we have all the usual suspects which are the economic, like stable employment, good family-friendly housing. That's there, but that does not suffice to explain the change which we have seen during the last 15 years. And I think we need there to talk about partnership. We have the relationship recession, the rapid decline in

marriages and also cohabitation, which we know from lasting cohabitations, which we know from the Nordics, where we have good data on this. So young people are more alone and they are more in not lasting relationships. And this is a major driver. So there's no way that a government spending money, whether it's incentivizing per child or I don't know, giving housing grants, you don't think that will reverse the cultural shift that's in people's brains about when they begin to think about parenthood? No, I'm saying that the problem is complex. There's no quick fix. A government saying very clearly, children

are good. Having children, prioritizing those who have them and those who help parents raising them. This is a public good and we are supporting you. And then the measures can range from housing, family-friendly neighbourhoods, good work contracts for young people, to, for instance, enhancing digital wellbeing, which you discussed very interestingly in the previous interview. So I think parenthood has become also to appear much more stressful due to the phone-based childhoods have and and the kind of limitations. I understand. I understand. It's a rich discussion.

Anne Kottry, thank you so much for joining us. She does advise the Finnish government on population policy and his research fertility intentions in Europe. Keep your comments coming 84844. But I do want to move on to Jessica Stanley and her new romantic comedy meets state of the nation novel. It's called Consider Yourself Kissed. It tells the story of Coralie, a copywriter who moves from Australia to London

just before she turns 30 and falls in love with Adam, a political journalist. The book tracks 10 years of Coralie and Adam's lives from 2013 to 2023, taking in love, birth, illness, and partly because of Adam's job, a particularly eventful period in British politics. Jessica joined me in studio to talk about her novel and started by telling me why she wanted to focus it on Coralie's 30s. I suppose when I decided to start working on the book, I had just survived that decade myself. Survived, I have to stop with that word. Well, I did find it to be a very dramatic 10-year period of my life. In my 20s, I suppose, like everyone, I had felt like I had lots of options, quite a bit of freedom to pick and

choose. Do I want to pursue this career or do I want to move to this city? But by the time I was 30, I felt as though my options were narrowing, my choices were falling away. And a lot of the things I was left with, I wasn't really in control of. So I could try as hard as I could to find a really good job, but I wasn't in control of whether my boss was a psycho or a nice person. You know, nobody can plan to find their soulmate. You know, all of these things are out of your control. So I did feel it was very difficult. Also there's a bit of a TikTok of the biological clock,

which everyone talks about so much that it's become a cliche, but it is real. You do have to sort of make, make a choice in that decade. And things start getting a bit difficult if you're lucky enough to have parents who are still well when you're that age. You know, they're maybe finishing work, you know, maybe problems are popping up for them health-wise. I think you start to have a lot of responsibility and a bit less freedom and yeah, it's hard. So that was an interesting time for you personally and then you were putting that into the book

Exactly. So I actually had the idea for my book when my husband and I had a joint 40th birthday party Mmm, so literally end of the 30s. Literally. So I had moved to London when I was 29, which is the same as Coralie and You know, I came over knowing hardly anyone And then by the time I was 40, I had this amazing party with my husband, my kids, and my friends, and my friends' kids. And it was such a lovely occasion. And if I could have seen, if I could have flash forward and seen that party when I was 29, I would have felt as if all my dreams had come true. But the actual kind of disjuncture between the experience of getting to that place. You know, every day in some way, it felt like a struggle. And so I wanted to capture that feeling of,

this is my dream, but it was so hard. Why did you come to the UK? I came to the UK because I had met my husband when he came to visit his brother in Australia. So I had two dates with him and then we became pen pals and then we had two holidays together where we checked if we were properly in love and then we were so I moved over. So you're you are a romantic? Yeah I think so. Because this is really a love story as well at the heart of it. It's Coralie and Adam. Yeah. What do you want to try and get across about relationships or love? Well, when I began the book,

my main aim was just to try and create something that felt real. But I think I also wanted to show, often when you are watching movies or watching a TV show or reading a book, for the sake of drama, someone in the relationship has a dark secret in the past or someone is a toxic narcissist. What if you're both really good people trying your hardest and if you both really love each other? You know, life and the relationship doesn't end

as soon as you find each other, it goes on. And how do you live after you've found love? That was really my question. Which is really the majority of people are good people trying to do the right thing. Exactly, I really think that. And so to bring us in there and also hold the reader, was that challenging?

I mean, without a plot twist of the traditional sense? It is really challenging. And I was really conscious of that because I began writing sort of as we were coming out of COVID. And a lot of people were saying to me, my friends who aren't writers, my friends who are readers were saying, oh, I'm in such a reading drought. I'm so stuck. I can't get through the first chapter of a book. And so I felt this huge pressure. How can I create something that people, like a world that people want to be in? So writing a book, I think, is always hard. It's known to be one of the hardest things you can do. But the stakes just seem to be much, much higher coming out of the pandemic when the state of the world and the state

of our emotions and consciousness even means that it's very hard to lose yourself in a fictional world now. I think there's a lot of people that couldn't read during that time, myself included. I started on audiobooks for the first time really during that particular period, particularly if something was intense or what would I say, negative, I just couldn't take it in. There was enough in the real world. I felt the same, yeah. And I found myself revisiting lots of books that I had read before because I knew what I was getting. Exactly. I wanted it to be comforting.

Let's talk about the drama of politics because you set this book in a time when the country is going through political turmoil. Tell me a little bit about using that as a backdrop. Well one of my favorite books in the world is, well probably the most favorite book that I have, is The Line of Beauty by Alan Hollinghurst and that sort of follows this young man who finishes university and then he moves to London and lives in this huge house belonging to a Tory MP and Nick is in love with the Tory MP's son and we follow him as he kind of falls in love with someone else and comes of age. But it's all against the backdrop of the AIDS crisis and against

Thatcher's Britain. And there was something really amazing. I mean, I've read that book so many times and I still don't know how Alan Hollinghurst did it, to somehow all the thinking and detail that he's put into the state of what was going on around Nick just really makes everything that's going on inside Nick even more vibrant and alive. And so I sort of wanted to copy that if I could. Because in this case, Carly's partner Adam is a political journalist who's working to cover political events of this period. And you do tie the personal and the political together. Is that something you felt you were living yourself during that time?

Well, I was always very interested in British politics, and I even studied it at university for a bit. And when I moved over, I had almost an anthropological interest in coming to understand this new place that I lived in. But then, maybe around the time of the Scottish referendum, the Scottish independence referendum, I began to consume the news with just a bit more worry. I sort of thought, things could really go wrong here. Surprising things can happen.

And then by the time it was the Brexit referendum, when I think no matter which way they voted, I think everyone was quite shocked at the result, I sort of lost my sense of security, almost complacency that you could wake up and basically know how the day was going to go. It kind of got swept away. And by the time Trump got elected, which I would consider also a surprise, whichever way people voted, and then as soon as COVID began, it almost became, you know, you would check your phone to see if you were going to survive until the end of the day. It became almost an anxious situation for me.

I think definitely the rise of social media at the same time of those litany of news events that we can go through that people felt very strongly about on whatever side that they might be. Did change, definitely, how people consumed politics or policy indeed. But there is this strong tradition of British novels that directly reflect the politics of the era that they're set in. You were mentioning Alan Hollinghurst there, there's Ian McEwan, Geoffrey Archer, John O'Farrell, Jonathan Coe, Anthony Trope. There's something in common all of those people have, the fact that they are men. Any thoughts on that? Because yours is also reflecting the politics of the day.

That's true. I mean, it does sort of seem like a grandiose concept, the state of the nation novel. And my first thought is that maybe women aren't out here saying in a bombastic and grandiose way, I will take the temperature of the nation and reflect it in a big book. But then of course, there are lots of women writing state of the nation novels, like Natasha Brown with Universality, which just came out. But overall I did start with this, I started with a huge spreadsheet that had all my characters ages and then you know I had to go through and work out when this political thing happened, when that political thing happened, you know doing

actual research almost a science, science based approach. But then... Political science. Exactly, political science, exactly. But then- Political science. Exactly, political science. Exactly. But then halfway through, the sort of emotions of everything overtook me and I found myself going more into Coralie's world. And in the end, I feel like I produced something that isn't so much a state of the nation as a state of being human. What is it like to be in a situation

where you wake up every day and you have not just what's happening outside the home in the world of politics, but then you also have in your workplace, in your home, and then what's happening inside you. We're all dealing with so much. I wanted to capture that struggle on so many levels that we all go through each day. All the different layers. I suppose if we come to one of those really big events that happened during that time, it's the pandemic and COVID. I think it exacerbates the problems of Cora Lee being expected to take on domestic roles, for example. What were you reaching into there? Well, I always feel as though I have to say that the COVID part of the novel is very small. It's a very small part of the novel. I feel as though no one wants to go back into that time of COVID.

Isn't that interesting? Because we're five years on, I mean, from the beginning, I'll say, because, and for many people, you know, they're still suffering effects off it, whether it's physical, financial, emotional. How do you understand that, that people don't want to delve into that yet? I think it was a really difficult time and there was no real way to make sense of it. When we approach something like the World Wars, we can valorize the contribution that people made and we can say, thanks for your sacrifice, you did amazingly. But there hasn't really been a kind of national or even global reckoning of this was really hard, you did an amazing job. We never got that clap on the back. And I do wonder if maybe Boris Johnson hadn't been so caught up in the way he broke the law around lockdown,

maybe it would have been the role of some sort of national leader to say, well done, that was hard, you did a good job. And of course, there were so many changes of leader as well. Exactly. In the time that followed. The book ends in September 2023 on the brink of even more turmoil to come with the Queen's death, Liz Truss and then Rishi Sunak's governments, the 2024 general election. Why did you want to draw the line there?

Well, I feel very fortunate that I had always planned a 10-year period that took me from 2013 to 2023. But I'm actually personally glad that I didn't have to take on, you know, after summer 2023, I feel as though I couldn't put my finger on any sort of state of the nation after that. It became even more complex and disordered and disturbed. And I've actually sort of dipped out from following the news to the extent that I used to, because it just became a lot more hard, I think. How are your 40s? Oh my 40s are great yeah my 40s are really brilliant I have three children and they are aged 8, 10 and nearly 12 and it's such a brilliant age yeah I'm loving it. I didn't get to ask Jessica

Stanley whether she would have liked more children or whether that was enough her discussing her novel Consider Yourself Kissed. Thanks for all your messages. Join me tomorrow as we ask, do FemTech apps profit from your menstrual tracking data? Join me then. That's all for today's Woman's Hour. Join us again next time. Hello, I'm Manishka Matandodawati, the presenter of Diddy on Trial from BBC Sounds. Sean Diddy Combs is facing a fight for his freedom as his hugely anticipated trial starts for sex trafficking, racketeering with conspiracy and transportation for prostitution. He denies all the charges.

I'll be bringing you every twist and turn from the courtroom with the BBC's correspondents and our expert guests. So make sure you listen, subscribe now on BBC Sounds, and turn your push notifications on so you never miss a thing.