Woman's Hour - Jessica Moxham on life with a child with disabilities, Lord Macdonald and Harriet Wistritch, Noof Al Maadeed and Rothna Begum

Episode Date: March 30, 2021

Emma Barnett talks to Jessica Moxham about her memoir "The Cracks that Let the Light in: What I learned from my disabled son." Also to Noof Al Maadeed and Rothna Begum about life for women in Qatar and the issue of male guardianship and the former Director of Public Prosecutions Lord Macdonald and Harriet Wistritch from the Centre for Womens Justice talk about the issue of "rape culture" in schools.Presenter: Emma Barnett Producer: Lisa Jenkinson Studio Manager: Tanzy Leitner

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. Was it a happy Monday then? If you live in England, did you go large last night or yesterday in the day? I've already been told. Tales of watching quizzes, Unforgotten 4, Only Connect, candle lighting in the greenhouse while planting tomato and courgette seeds, possibly with a podcast to mix it up. And Catherine, who's already tweeted to say,

socialising, what's that exactly? Bed, school run, work, school run, work, television, bed, repeat. Do tell us what you got up to with the first taste of freedom if you're living in England, 84844, or perhaps it was the same as your usual Monday night and on social media we're at BBC Woman's Hour. I did invite two people round from the same household just because I felt I ought to.

Now quite tired, really. But on today's programme, we're continuing with our discussion around what schools should be doing to stop the abuse of girls, but without making criminals of teenage boys, potentially, and how that is going to work what we'd really like to ask for today and we know it's very difficult for teachers not least because you're incredibly busy but what is that line between education and punishment and if you're a teacher with experience of this get in touch with us do that today you do not have to give

your real name we'd really like to hear how you are dealing with this, have been dealing with this, because there's a lot of talks right now of helplines and inquiries and the government getting involved and the Department for Education, police saying certain things. We're going to hear from the former director of public prosecutions in a moment. But on the front line are teachers dealing with allegations of abuse. How do you do it? How should we do it? Do you think your school are doing a good job of it? 84844. Do get in touch with us and let us know your experiences

and what you think should change moving forward. You can speak freely. This is your microphone. And I hope you're treated as such on social media at BBC Women's Hour or email us through our website. We'll get into that very shortly. Also, Jessica Moxham joins us today to discuss her beautiful memoir the cracks that let the light in what i learned from my disabled son and as the eyes of the world turn to the richest country in the world qatar ahead of the world cup in 2022 a new report is out around male guardianship we'll explore what that actually means and the country's use of it and how it's affecting its women.

Now, the outpouring of stories on the website, everyone welcomed by young girls, talking about the issue of rape culture in schools that they experience every day, shows no sign of abating. Yesterday, we heard from Ava Vakil, a former pupil at Wimbledon High School, London, who told us about the types of behaviour she witnessed. This ranged from everything from catcalling and verbal abuse. There was also a huge culture of ranking and rating girls based on their appearance. So it would be a score of 2.5 for their bum, for example, to add up to an overall score of 10. Then there were really serious instances of rape and sexual assault and groping, both in public areas,

in houses, and some instances of groping within the school itself. So it is a whole range? Yeah, absolutely. And these testimonies were coming from girls as young as 12 and 13, all the way up to pupils who had left the school 10 years ago. And tell us about, there was a word you didn't actually understand. Yat, was it? Yeah, so I started seeing this word come up so much in the messages that were being sent to me. And I was thinking, what does this mean? And I asked one of the girls, and she said it stands for yappy and thick. So I was thinking, what does this mean? And I asked one of the girls and she said,

it stands for yappy and thick. So this was a common term just as a way to address women and a way to address young girls that just helped to feed into that overall culture of misogyny. That was Ava Vakil. We included an outdated statement in yesterday's programme from King's College School. This is the latest statement. The headmaster from King's College School. This is the latest statement the headmaster of King's College School, Andrew Halls, has said. I'm grateful to Ava for sharing these testimonies and for finding time to talk to me. The accounts are shocking. We will not tolerate any form of abuse or discrimination. My meeting with Ava was very positive. We will act on what she's told us. The governors are appointing a panel of independent experts to carry out a forensic review of the school's policies, practices and values. We've received serious disclosures and we'll be referring them to

our statutory partners in line with safeguarding procedures. The school has established a system to handle disclosures made by pupils, past or present, to offer support and we urge anyone affected by these issues to come forward. We will work now with the whole school community to listen, learn and make changes. What should those changes be? Britain's most senior child protection officer, Chief Constable Simon Bailey, said yesterday, just before we came on air, that we should report teenagers accused of being involved in rape culture, that parents should take them to the police. But it is a delicate balance. How do we manage young teenagers accused of inappropriate

behaviour who are young and vulnerable themselves? I'm joined now by the former Director of Public Prosecutions of England and Wales, Lord Ken MacDonald, who says we should be wary of social media campaigns that draw in or may draw in all sorts of behaviour that is obnoxious and unpleasant but not criminal. We'll talk about that in more detail. And also by Harriet Wittstrich, the founder and director of the Centre for Women's Justice and a solicitor of 25 years. She's acted in many high-profile cases around violence against women

and has information from organisations that have worked specifically with schools in instances such as those as we're talking about. Lord MacDonald, if I can start with you, what is that point, that distinction that you're trying to make? You know, if you can start with you, what is that point, that distinction that you're trying to make? You know, if you look at the website, there are lots of descriptions, and we heard some in the clip you just played, of behaviour that is seriously criminal.

Rape, sexual assault, sharing without consent, intimate images. These are serious criminal offences and they have to be met with a criminal justice response. And where there's evidence, prosecutors should bring cases and people who have been the victims of these sorts of crimes should be encouraged and assisted to come forward. There's also a welter of other behaviour, which is obnoxious and damaging and nasty, but which

probably isn't criminal. And this is a much broader societal problem. My point really is that we can't expect the criminal law, which is a very blunt instrument, to deal with this on its own. This is about communication between parents and their children, between teachers and their pupils. It's about us empowering young people, making them feel safe to speak about this sort of issue. It's about recognising the risks that's presented by the normalisation of pornography, the sexualisation of everything, the power of

social media. I think it's very, very difficult for young people, boys and girls, to deal with the environment in which they find themselves. So I'm just really calling for a bit of nuance and a nuanced response by all means. Isn't it nuance, though, if I can, sorry, isn't it the nuance that is providing the grey area, though? So where it's very clear, it's clear, you know, rape is a crime, as you say. But it's exactly, for instance, revenge pornography has not been a crime for very long. And we also know, having covered it on this programme, that at the moment, even when people's photos are being hacked, they can't get them down off certain websites. The police and the sort of procedures we have in place, criminal procedures, can't cope with crimes that are clearly crimes, never mind this other area.

So what do you say when people yesterday heard a very senior police constable saying in the context of rape culture, you know, take your sons to the police? Well, it depends what he means by rape culture. If someone's son tells them that he has sexually assaulted or raped a girl, then of course that's something that they should think about doing. But if he's been involved in catcalling or rudeness or unpleasantness or obnoxiousness of that sort, I very much doubt that a parent is going to take that child to the police. And I query whether they should do so. What they should be doing is talking to that child and trying to get them to understand the damage that that behaviour is causing and the profound unpleasantness of it. I don't think the answer to all of these issues,

and I don't think the Chief Constable can have been suggesting this, is to take children to the police. You know, when we're talking about the court system, we're talking about a very unforgiving environment. Judges, juries, all of the formality, prison, these are very, very grave outcomes that we're talking about, and they should be reserved for behavior that's criminal. I wouldn't want the police to become involved with my children unless I thought my children had done something seriously criminally wrong. I would take it as my own responsibility to deal with the other issues in tandem with them and with other institutions, including schools. Do you worry that the reaction to this moment, which some have described as the Me Too moment

for schools, where this culture has tipped over, it's bubbled up to a point where girls are feeling that they need to share this and are protesting, that it could be a moment that we act in a way that we may live to regret in terms of criminalising boys? I think that's always possible. I think it's good. It's obviously good that girls are coming forward and speaking, but we have to at the same time avoid a great moral panic in which we feel that something has to be done and that something has to involve the police and the criminal law. I don't think we want to get into a situation where we conclude that the best outcome here is criminalisation. I just think that that would cause a lot of damage to young men, young boys who themselves

may be vulnerable, who themselves are struggling to understand their sexuality and how it all works and whether what happens on the pornography sites they visit represents the real world or should or shouldn't. I think it's a very complex and difficult world, the world of sexuality for young people now, much more difficult than I think my generation experienced. And I think we're seeing some of the results of that,

and it may be we haven't been alive enough to it. It may be that institutions haven't been alive enough to it. But I repeat, the criminal law is an extraordinarily blunt instrument. Lord Ken Macdonald, thank you for your time. Harriet Wistrich, we need to avoid a moral panic. Where do you come in on this with your experience? Well, we at Centre for Women's Justice support organisations that do frontline support with victims of sexual assault, and that includes many girls and young women. And we have heard lots of stories of girls who have been sexually assaulted or raped by boys. And sometimes they've reported that to the police. Sometimes it's happened on school premises,

but often it's off school premises. They reported it to the police. Now, we know from the work that we do that sexual assault and rape is very rarely charged. So a case that we brought recently around the prosecution of rape has shown that less than 3% of cases generally reported across the board by adults and children are actually charged. So we know that most cases aren't aren't meeting the threshold for bringing criminal charges. What we what we're hearing is that when a girl reports a rape or sexual assault and it's not charged,

that the schools are often failing to then put in place appropriate safeguarding for those girls. So especially if a girl is in the same class as a boy who's attacked them, if the school tells them to go off and report rape, nothing happens. They are treating it as though nothing has happened. Whereas the reality is, and actually the guidance that has been produced by the Department for Education says that still the school has a duty to consider putting in place safeguarding. What we've heard often is that alleged perpetrators are not being removed from the class, which means that the girls are often, you know, absenting themselves from school because they're not being provided

with the sufficient safeguarding and protection, and that they are actually suffering additional persecution or punishment because the schools are not applying correct safeguarding duties. So there is guidance in place. It's been in place since 2018. But what we've seen is that the failure of schools to adopt that guidance to provide safeguarding support. That's a very specific area. And where they say schools are saying they're listening and they can improve, that will be an area I'm sure that people with your experience will be urging them to listen to

and improve. What do you make with your experience, though, of widening the net of, if you like, including who will be taken to the police. So this idea of rape culture. So I'm very keen not to mix up rape and sexual assault with the wider range of experiences that we're seeing girls report. And I know that you are keen to not do that as well because those two things mustn't be confused. But there is now this talk of rape culture. And I wonder what you make of that with your experience

of fighting for women's justice. Well, I mean, obviously there are different levels of criminality. And some of that, the rape culture, you know, like the sort of revenge, what's known as, called revenge porn, but is actually punishment porn, really, where somebody puts kind of pictures on the website, which is deeply distressing.

Or image-based abuse, as people describe it. That's right. And those are criminal offences. I mean, there are obviously issues about criminalisation of young people and where that isn't appropriate. But this is where schools and other services come in to take very clear action to support those who are victims and to ensure that they are actually able to continue their education, because otherwise there's a form of discrimination going on here. So it is really important that schools tackle this. There must be compulsory sex education, which is gender informed and which understands, you know, and provides the sex education. But sorry, Harriet, to be clear, where you're talking there about, you don't think there should be a widening or you do think of who is taken to the police if you see what i mean now that there's been this sort of moment now the spotlight is here because for instance we got a message straight in uh when we began this discussion

from jane who's listening good morning who says maybe teenage boys need to discover that what they are doing is criminal they should already know but who is telling them do you think that it should be more of a matter of the police in a wider range of cases than it already is? Well, I think where a criminal offence is committed, then it's appropriate for the police to investigate if there is a report. As to what follows in terms of the criminal justice solutions may depend or vary depending on the age of the perpetrator. But clearly, if there are crimes committed and we have a whole range of crimes which are lesser in seriousness than may, but are nonetheless criminal offences, there has to be a very, very clear message. And this is important not just for the victims,

but for potential perpetrators to learn that they are committing criminal offences, and that ought to be taught in schools as well. You talked about schools not necessarily doing what they should be doing, where there is clear guidance when there has been an incident that has been reported to them. But you know from your own experience how hard it has been an incident that has been reported to them. But you know from your own experience how hard it has been, almost impossible at times, to get convictions and for the courts and for our prosecution services to get things right by those who report. Therefore, do you

have any sympathy towards schools in how difficult this is to get right when the services that we're meant to rely on for providing justice also struggle? Well, I mean, we know criminal case, you know, it's a very, very high threshold to pass in order to bring a criminal charge. We know that that is very difficult. And what we also know is, and we see this also in terms of the operation of social services around child protection issues,

that just because a case doesn't meet the threshold to bring criminal charges does not mean that there isn't evidence, even on the balance of probabilities, that these offences have taken place. And therefore, it's absolutely incumbent on those who have safeguarding duties to put in place protections for victims. Lord Ken MacDonald, just a final word if we still have you with us. Do you think that the police could be doing a better job around this

and still around bringing those cases that Harriet describes and actually getting better justice for women? Well, I think there have been, as Harriet has said, traditionally huge problems around this. around bringing those cases that Harriet describes and actually getting better justice for women? Well, I think there have been, as Harriet has said, traditionally huge problems around this. I'm sure police and prosecutors need to do a better job, but juries too often bring their own preconceptions to these cases.

You know, why did she have another drink? Why was she wearing that? Why did she go back to his flat? And so police and prosecutors are also struggling with these sorts of preconceptions and stereotypes. So, again, it's a profound societal problem. And I don't think the criminal law is a single solution. Incidentally, Harriet is absolutely right. The fact that someone isn't charged doesn't mean that an institution shouldn't be taking steps to protect the person who made the allegation against them, because in many cases that allocation may actually be an accurate one, although prosecutors couldn't find sufficient evidence to provide a realistic prospect of

conviction and therefore couldn't prefer a charge. And I think that is an area in which institutions have traditionally not done very well, because they become confused. They think that because a charge isn't preferred, that's the end of the problem. Very often, it's the start of the problem for the person who's made the allegation. Lord Ken MacDonald, thank you very much. Former Director of Public Prosecutions for England and Wales and Harriet Wisterich, Founder and Director of the Centre for Women's Justice. Your message is coming in. And I should say again, if you are a teacher, we would very much like to hear from you.

We know it's hard to talk about your particular school, but we would like to hear your experience. Do get in touch with us on 84844. I also was asking you with a taste of newfound freedom, was it a happy Monday? What did you get up to? You're already getting in touch. If you are in England, I should stress, Monday, yesterday, my 60th birthday. Very nice of the government to ease lockdown for me.

I went for a beautiful walk in the sunshine with my husband, had a picnic outside and then an extended family Zoom for everyone who lives too far away to actually visit and a lovely meal. Very upmarket takeaway from a restaurant. Do I feel safer than last week? No, just a bit older. I took my toddler to meet up with my mum and sister near Solihull. It was the first time we've been together since last February and it was just a perfect day. Lovely to hear that. Maggie in Wiltshire, good morning. Fun and laughter and chilled rosé with good friends in their sunny garden. So overstimulated I couldn't sleep. Maggie,

that was exactly my problem and quite a lot of wine as well. Lee in Manchester, good morning. Emma, I met up with my mum and sister. We walked the dogs, looked after my mum's miniature ponies, ate sausage butties, had lots of cups of tea in the garden until it was dark. Yes, I should have done that instead of the wine. It was perfect. First time it's legal to meet in private gardens in Manchester since July. It has been a long time. I hear you, Sally and Watford. Yes, a happy Monday.

We had our two best friends around for a barbecue and it was a great night. But feeling a bit slow this morning. Sally, we are here for you. We hear you. And thank you very much for that message. Keep them coming in, please. Now, yesterday, a new report from Human Rights Watch was published looking at the issue of male guardianship of women in Qatar, the richest country in the world, of course, which the eyes of the world will be on next year as the World Cup is hosted there. Once married in Qatar, a woman

can be deemed, quote, disobedient if she doesn't obtain her husband's permission before working, travelling, leaving her home or refusing to have sex with him without a legitimate reason. Nuf al-Madid, who left Qatar for the UK in November 2019, aged 21, joined me with the author of the new research, Rothna Begum, to discuss the lives of Qatari women, where their husbands can marry up to four women at a time without needing permission from a guardian or even from their current wife. I started by asking Rothna to explain male guardianship. In Qatar, what we found is that women have to secure male guardian, which could be their father, their brother, their uncle, even their grandfather, or upon marriage, their husband,

to give them permission before they can make key decisions about their life. Now, what we documented was that these rules are required when it comes to women needing to marry, to obtain a government scholarship to study, to work in many government jobs and government schools, to travel abroad until certain ages, and even to obtain or access some reforms of reproductive health care as well. Now, these discriminatory rules don't just impact women in terms of making decisions about their own life. What we found is that it also means that women cannot be guardians of their own children. And this basically means that even if they have legal custody of their children or their

child's father has passed away, they still cannot be the guardians of their children. And is this mandated by the state? Is this government rules? These are state enforced rules, but the legal basis for them seems to really differ. So in some situations, the law is quite clear. So in order to marry, the law says that woman needs a guardian permission in order to marry. But in other situations, there doesn't seem to be any legal basis. And in fact, Qatar's laws and rules and policies seem to contradict other rules. So its constitution very clearly says that women are equal before the law. And the family law says that the guardianship ends at the age of 18. And what we found is that there's a huge lack of transparency over these rules,

which makes it really difficult for women to challenge them when they face discrimination. And what is male guardianship rooted in? What is the justification given for it? Well, the proponents of male guardianship will usually use religion. They will say that religion requires that men are protectors of women and guardians of women. Well, we've seen this argument happen in many other contexts, in traditions and countries around the world, including in the West. But the government has denied that many of these rules actually exist over women. And they are saying that women are actually equals in society.

But what we are looking at, actually, is that these rules clearly do exist and the authorities have an international obligation to end discrimination, not just in law, but also in practice. They are supposed to look at the most progressive interpretations in their traditions and their culture and religions and ensure that it does not discriminate against women. So in Qatar at the moment, the women who are going along with this or being forced to go along with this, are they obeying it because it's what their family do? Are they obeying it because it's what their community's doing? They're following their religion. How are they, if you like, interpreting this? Have you got any insight? What we're seeing is that women are forced to reckon with their families regarding these rules. So these are state enforced guardiansforced guardianship rules. There is, of course, women who are being told by their families

they can't study what they wish, what they can't work in places that they wish. Absolutely. They're not even getting to the point where the law is now coming into question. But there are other women who are finding themselves in a situation where, you know, maybe they have very supportive families,

but they turn up at the airport and are told, actually, we need to call your male guardian to check that. So what we're trying to see really is how is it that the state is very much involved in reinforcing this idea that men should have control over women's lives. And we should say there are consequences if a married woman is quote unquote disobedient. That's right. The Qatari law on family sets out that women must obey their husbands and they can be deemed disobedient if they travel or work without their husband's permission, or if they leave the home or refuse to have sex without a legitimate reason. And if they are deemed disobedient, what they face is a financial consequence, which is that

their husband is supposed to provide them with financial maintenance. And if they are considered to be disobedient, they will lose that right. There was one case of a woman who had fled her family home because of years of abuse, and her husband filed this case of disobedience against her. So she returned. Ultimately, she did leave him in the end because the violence got too much. And how many wives do they take or can they take? So women need guardian permission in order to marry, but a man can marry up to four times. He can have four women and he doesn't not only need guardian permission, but he doesn't even need his current wife or wife's permission in order to remarry. One woman talked to me about how since 2016, she's been trying to get a divorce three times she's tried and each time the court seems to be

on the side of her husband the counsellors deem cheating and the fact that he remarried as not a ground for divorce she found out he'd been cheating on her for every year of their marriage. Now if let's bring you into this you left Qatar in the middle of the night in November 2019 what was it like for you to leave and to and I don't know if you view it like this, to escape? Yes, I do call it my escape. It was basically a lot of hoping for things to go well and praying and praying that no one asks me why I'm leaving the airport at a very weird time of the day.

It was like 5 to 6 a.m. It was like very dangerous. And if I had been caught and sent back to my parents' home, there would have been big repercussions and that would have been my only chance to free them going. And can you say why you needed to escape? Yes, because there was a lot of abuse and it got to the point that if I did not do anything about it, I don't know how far it could keep going. When you talk about abuse, are you talking about physical abuse, emotional abuse? I'm talking about physical and emotional abuse from some of my family members. And in terms of how you managed to get here and what you're able to do now, what is your life like now?

Basically, I sought asylum here and I'm still waiting for my claim to process. My life is pretty quiet. It's a big, drastic difference from being constantly abused to not abused at all. It's very nice. I don't regret it, bottom line. When you look and you hear what Rothner has been finding in her research, what can you say about other women that you were friends with and that you knew? Were they fighting back, do you think? Or was there a movement that you were part of? Yes, there was a Twitter movement before I left. People were addressing the fact that women cannot travel under the age of 25, even though technically in the normal world we're supposed to become adults at 21.

Before everyone talked about it on Twitter, a lot of women did not know that they could not travel outside of the country without a guardian's permission. Everyone was like secret and use that permit to get out. If that had not happened, I would have been in the country for four more years of my life being abused. Thank you for talking to all of us. Rafa, people will have no idea about this, which is why you're doing your work. I mean, if they're thinking of Qatar at the moment, they might be thinking about the World Cup, for instance, being staged there next year, next December. And yet, if you look at this, Qatar was once a leading figure in changing these practices. Is that right? What's changed? Well, women have over the years have been really

breaking barriers and making a lot of progress, particularly around education. So there are now more Qatari women university graduates than men. You know, NUF is one of those who was studying. And so while there's been a sea change in regards to those kinds of issues, there are still guardianship restrictions being placed on them. And we're not just talking about old restrictions, but we're talking about new restrictions as well. So, you know, NUF mentioned it, but just to clarify, unmarried women under the age of 25 are not allowed to travel abroad. There's no law that says this. These are interior ministry rules. And what we found was when NUF and another woman had fled the country in 2019, the authorities' response was in 2020, some women who were traveling and had valid exit permits, where their fathers can actually

provide that over mobile app or website, were finding that they were still being stopped and being asked to check that they were not escaping. And women even over the age of 25 who were traveling alone were also finding that the authorities were telling them that they cannot leave the country without getting guardian approval. And some of these women were pushing back because they knew about the rule that once you'd hit 25 you can now travel abroad and officials were lying to various women they were giving different rules to different women some were saying if you're under 30 you now have to have permission others were saying if you're under 37 but why there's a new regulation of the law well there seems to be a real fear that there are women escaping the country that families need

to control their women and that they don't want to upset the families in the country. And so there seems to be a way in which the authorities will go out of their way to keep women under the control of their male guardians. And what's really serious is that these rules, they're arbitrary, there's also this lack of transparency. So women, when they face this level of discrimination, find it really difficult to push back.

They don't know what to do. There's no anti-discrimination law. There's no way for them to complain when this sort of thing happens to them. And in terms of why Qatar has continued with this, and you're right to say that this isn't just Qatar. For instance, when we were talking only the other day after the massive Panorama investigation

into what's been going on with Princess Latifa, I think it was very striking that a lot of our listeners got in touch after the idea that you go to the United Arab Emirates, whether it's Dubai, Abu Dhabi, as a holiday maker in regular times, non-COVID times, and you as a Westerner can have, as a woman, can have a completely different experience to the women who live there, who have male guardians. You know, this isn't just in Qatar, but what do you think might change it?

You're obviously hoping to shine a light on this. I think the authorities are actually embarrassed to hear that we've issued a report that examines this level of in-depth discrimination against women. They seem to be denying that this discrimination exists. They're saying, for instance, that women don't need guardian permission in order to work. Now, it's true, under the law, you don't. But many of the government ministries were requiring this. What we're hoping is that the fact that the Qatari authorities are really invested in being this modern state, they are one of the world's richest states per capita, an incredibly modern, developed state, and yet they're still discriminating against women in terrible ways.

We hope that this will now allow them to really think through what's going on and to start repealing these terrible forms of legislation, issue an anti-discrimination law and provide for a civic space for Qatari women and women in Qatar to actually push back when they face discrimination. Without that, we're going to see very little change happen. Noor, final word to you. I mean, how are you thinking or feeling about this when you hear about Rothner's report? I suppose in some ways it must take your mind back. Actually, I was very pleased that someone got actual data of what we were all going through because there's even us as Qataris, we cannot like get this much information from everyone and see the clear picture. But now that the report is out, actually, it makes me very pleased. And I hope

that there is some real change after this. Culturally, it's inappropriate for the government to get into someone's private matters between daughters and their parents, between husbands and their wives. And they try very hard to respect that hundreds of years old boundary, which does not serve victims. And I hope that changes. I hope that there will be actual, like, help given to abused women and rights to travel and rights to do everything normally, just like we should be.

Thank you to Nulf Al-Madid and Rothna Begum there. Right at the beginning of the programme, we asked you how can schools stop abusive girls without making criminals of teenage boys? And I also asked specifically to hear from you if you work as a teacher. A message I just wanted to share that's come in. I teach in a secondary school and we've been talking openly about the issues of sexual harassment, bystanding, catcalling. It's a hugely complex issue and needs support from parents and all forms of media. There are so many mixed messages for teenagers to deal with. Easily available pornography, many pictures of quote perfect men and women on social media. Reality TV where your sexuality and sensuality is a key topic. Think TOWIE, Love Island watched by so many teens. We've been

teaching this subject and with a message to the boys that this is to protect them as well as the girls as they may not realise that their behaviour may end in a criminal conviction. Some teachers also shared their experiences of sexual harassment in school slash university with sixth form students with the message that we still remember it. I doubt the teenage perpetrators do. This was a powerful message.

Key message from our girls is that this needs to start much earlier. Year six primary, especially in the sports club environments. I'm also the mother of teenage girls who have spoken openly about how normalised all of this is so much and it's unreported. Thank you very much for that message from Joanne, who's a teacher. Keep those coming in. But let's now talk to Jessica Moxham, whose eldest son, Ben, is disabled. At birth, it was touch and go whether he would live, and Jessica spent most of the first year of Ben's life

simply keeping him alive, learning how to feed and soothe a baby who couldn't suck or eat. Nowadays, Ben, at just 11, is thriving, alongside his two younger siblings, and Jessica has poured it all into a wonderful memoir called The Cracks That Let the Light In, what I learned from my disabled son. Jessica, welcome to Woman's Hour. Good morning. If Ben, as he is now, I wonder if we could start there.

Could you describe him for us, how he is and how he communicates how he eats yeah so as you said ben is now 11 um and he's a bright engaged kid who loves books and being read stories and marvel movies and swimming and lots of those kind of things um ben is disabled and we help him with uh pretty much every aspect of his day-to-day life so we move him and he uses a wheelchair he can't eat so we feed him through a feeding tube and we make his food to go through the tube and and he can't talk but he can communicate with us so he uses it he can smile and frown quite readily to show us that he doesn't like the program that sister's watching but he uses his eyes a lot to communicate so he can look at yes and no symbols to answer questions and he can also use his eyes to control a computer so it's an eye

device which then has communication software on it as well as games and other things i mentioned your first year with him and he was your first born and you know a lot of people will think the first year is is the toughest you know regardless of of the child or the issues. But yours really is, of everything I've ever read, one of the toughest I've read in the terms of you had to learn everything new, but of a whole other level with the added stress of not knowing how he was a lot of the time. What was the cause of his disability, first of all? So I had a totally uneventful, typical pregnancy, but at some point during my labour Ben didn't have enough oxygen so that meant that he was born extremely ill and for the first week we

weren't sure whether he would survive and then it was clear that he would survive but the oxygen deprivation caused brain damage which then within the first couple of weeks, we were told that it was very likely that he would have cerebral palsy. And that that would mean that his essentially that his brain would struggle to control his body. And therefore, it was pretty likely that he'd be disabled. And the care for him at first, very striking line in your book, is you talk about the fact that so many professionals involved and you felt like you were not a key part of that team yeah so I think so he was in hospital for five weeks and um during that time he became better and better during that time kind of medically um but but actually I wasn't necessarily the one he needed right at the beginning he needed medics and then as time went on we could do more and more for him so me and my husband were taught how to feed him through a tube um and we spent a lot of

time at the hospital and I was really worried that he didn't that he wasn't touched enough that he'd obviously been in this bed not being held enough so I became quite um I you know I held him as much as possible and then I tried to drag in other family members to hold him when I wasn't there so that he was just cuddled enough. But he obviously needed lots of other people to help him. But also that hospital environment isn't particularly conducive to really feeling like a mother. So he had his first bath by a nurse and I sort of helped a bit. But that was quite heartbreaking because all of those things, I probably hadn't thought enough about what it was going to be like after he was born. But certainly, of course, I felt like I was going to have these firsts and lots of those firsts can't happen in that way if your baby's in hospital.

There's a very telling bit of the book where you talk about when you decide to start giving him food through his tube as opposed to just milk. And he was struggling with reflux and and all of that was very hard for you to see and it was it was a real moment it seemed in your story where you started to decide how to parent ben rather than what you were being told by the experts yeah i guess probably any new mother there's that confidence building that you start off feeling like you really don't know what you're doing and then over time you become more confident of like okay maybe I can keep this child alive and actually help them thrive um and that probably took longer with Ben because I I needed to not only be a mother but also a nurse and a speech and language therapist and physio

and all of these things um 150 appointments in a year yeah obviously the last year has been a bit different because of obvious reasons but yeah we still have about 150 appointments a year and that's been pretty consistent over the last over his life I think probably we have even more at the very beginning um so that yeah there's a kind of logistical challenge to that um and and when you you make this decision to feed him carry on about that yeah so um when he was a couple of years old, we were still feeding him through a tube. He had at the beginning had a nasogastric tube and then he had a permanent tube in his tummy. And we were feeding him through that. And the typical way to feed a child like him at that stage is through essentially a kind of formula,

a medical formula that you put through the tube. And he just vomited a lot and had reflux a lot and was really unhappy and obviously wasn't thriving therefore. And I had heard about this way of feeding him, which is that you can blend up food to a consistency that's runny enough to put through the tube. So you're just giving him real food, but blended up in a way that can go through the tube. And I'd heard about other parents doing this and their children thriving and having less reflux and vomiting less I also was pregnant with my second child and he was born and he was typical um so I was thinking about weaning him and I guess I then saw the the gap between the way that Ben's feeding was treated and the way that Max my second son's feeding was treated which was that no one was interested in what I was feeding him or when I was going to do it.

So I think the combination of that and the two years I'd had of kind of beginning to advocate for him and working out what was best for us and that I was his mother and actually I knew him better than anyone meant that I felt confident enough to give it a go. And so we started putting food down his tube rather than this milk and it was better. I've learned so much from your book and I really do feel that it's a completely different lens on a world if you don't know

anything about you should know about and thank you for that and and the reason I think the thing that comes through again and again is how much of a champion you are for Ben all the time so you talk about you you are an architect by training, you designed your home for him, most remarkable details in there. But you talk about having people in your home to help and how important, and also when you're out and about doing things with Ben, whether it's going to the pool or not, how important it is to make sure that his dignity is preserved and that even though they're caring for him and it's a job, that you really want to make sure that they aren't just sitting next to him looking at their phone while he's watching the television.

All the time you're trying to make sure that he's treated as a full human. You know, if I can put it like that, how much of a pressure is that for you to to advocate for your son? It's yeah, it's a pressure. I mean, I guess, you know, all parents want to do the best for their kids. And we're constantly trying to make sure that we're doing our best for them. But for Ben, I guess there's extra because I think we live in a society where most of us, I certainly before I had Ben, had almost no experience of disability or real contact with disabled people. So his life has been a rapid learning curve for me. And that means that most people we come across haven't spent much time with disabled people. And actually, even those who have,

there can be this issue that because he doesn't talk, people assume he can't hear, but he can hear perfectly. He can understand everything people are saying to him and they can understand what people are saying about him. And so we just try and make sure that people understand that and they treat him like they would any 11 people are saying about him. And so we just try and make sure that people understand that and they treat him like they would any 11 year old child, but also that he's dependent on people for help. And so we have to work out, we don't have a model for that. So we have to try and work out how to make that work in a way that really respects him.

And his siblings do a wonderful job, don't they? Crawling all over him and bringing him down to earth and all of you with it. Jessica, there's a lot in there. Thank you very much for giving us And his siblings do a wonderful job, don't they? Crawling all over him and bringing him down to earth and all of you with it. Jessica, there's a lot in there. Thank you very much for giving us a glimpse into the world through the book, The Cracks That Let the Light In, What I Learned From My Disabled Son by Jessica Moxon. That's all for today's Woman's Hour.

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