Woman's Hour - Lesley Manville, Brain injuries in childbirth, Strictly Come Dancing

Episode Date: October 15, 2024

The actress Lesley Manville is currently starring alongside Mark Strong in Robert Icke’s adaptation of Oedipus. She plays Jocasta, Oedipus’ wife. Lesley joins Nuala McGovern to tell us more about the play, what it’s like being back on stage for the first time since 2020, and why she thinks women's stories are being featured more.Every year thousands of babies need care for a brain injury sustained during birth. Now, highly focused training is being piloted in nine hospitals across England, aiming to standardise the approach and ensure staff know the best way to deal with an emergency that could lead to brain injury. Nuala is joined by Mary Dixon-Woods from the Healthcare Improvement Studies Institute and Gemma Barber from Liverpool Women’s Hospital to discuss how the training will work and what difference it could make. Strictly Come Dancing pair Katya Jones and Wynne Evans have faced criticism over an incident on Saturday's show where Evans appeared to put his hand around Jones' waist and on her stomach. Both have apologised for any misunderstanding over the moment, saying it was part of an 'inside joke', but there has been an outcry from fans and the press. Nuala speaks to the Independent's Claire Cohen to discuss more. Kendall Alaimo is an artist, activist and survivor of child sex trafficking. She joins Nuala live from a UN conference in Vienna to talk about her advocacy and the importance of giving survivors a seat at the table. Presenter: Nuala McGovern Producer: Lottie Garton

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BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, this is Nuala McGovern and you're listening to the Woman's Hour podcast. Hello and welcome to Woman's Hour. Well, in a moment, Lesley Manville. She's currently starring as Jocasta in Oedipus in the West End. She is a force of nature on stage and off. That interview is coming up also today. New initiatives are currently being piloted

to reduce avoidable brain injury in childbirth. We're going to speak to the people that are involved in that. And I wonder if you're a fan of Strictly. And I also wonder, has the shine of those glitzy, joyful, escapist hours on a Saturday night dulled somewhat with the latest incident, this time between Katya Jones and her partner, Wynne Evans. Now, the dancers insist that the moments of a wandering hand and a rejected high five, they were caught on camera

and those moments went viral. They say they were not inappropriate actions, but their inside joke. But there are many that are not finding it funny and don't see groping, imitated or real as a laughing matter. We're talking about that this morning and would welcome your reaction. You can text the programme, the number is 84844 on social media. We're at BBC Woman's Hour or you can email us through our website. For a WhatsApp message or a voice note. The number is 03700 100 444. And we'll also speak about a red chair

that symbolises overcoming the trauma of human trafficking and securing a seat at the table where decisions are made to eliminate it. But let me begin with my first guest, the actress Lesley Manville. She maybe is best known for her work with the director Mike Lee. She has brought us characters so diverse from Princess Margaret of the Crown to Cyril Woodcock in Phantom Tread to Helena in Ghosts.

But now she's taking on the role of Jocasta in Richard Icke's version of Oedipus. I spoke to Leslie earlier and she told me she's excited to be back on stage. I mean, what an amazing story, you know, two and a half thousand years ago, written by Sophocles, updated to modern day brilliantly by Robert Icke, our writer and director. So that it's it's this very, very current, potent, relevant story for our time now. But of course, it's all about love and heart and emotion and families and the dynamics of all of that. And there is something breathtaking about reminding yourself that the genesis of this story was written two and a half thousand years ago. You know that it's the eve of an election and the play, the two hours of the play is set in that period between the polls closing and the result being announced. And you don't know whether Oedipus is going to be the prime minister or the president or you just know he's the lead.

He's going to be the leader. It looks like he's going to win. Looks like it's going to be a landslide and he's going to be he's going to be the leader. So with this, let's talk about Jocasta, the character that you play. How would you describe her? Well, Jocasta has been was married to the previous leader, Laius. So she is a very young first lady to this kind of dinosaur leader, who by Sophocles' accounts and our accounts was not a decent guy. Then there's been 34 years of kind of coalition and compromise

and a sort of non-government. And in that time, she's been married to Oedipus for 23 years and they've had a family. She's driven. She's hugely intelligent. They are such a good couple. They are everything you'd want from a marriage. They're the greatest best of friends.

They love each other deeply. They still find each other very sexy and attractive. But she's buried stuff that she hasn't even told him, which seems unlikely for a woman like her and for a relationship like theirs. But what she went through with Laius when she was 13 was deeply traumatic. She's given birth to a child that is taken away from her and she has no idea what has happened to that child. She's presumed it's been killed. You can imagine carrying around something like that in such formative years of your Oedipus about it. And this picture of this woman's life becomes very clear. And of course, it has so many resonances with things that are happening in our world this very week. Yes, indeed. It's such a compelling watch from beginning to the very end, which I won't reveal.

But I was wondering, as I was watching the partner of this political figure who's on the cusp, perhaps, of leading, wherever he is, were there any real life political women or wives that you drew inspiration from for your role? Not directly. I mean, I wouldn't want to say, you know, I wouldn't like to say that she's Macron or that she's Hillary. Is it Melania? Oh, no. No, she's definitely not. She's definitely not a Melania. But of course, I've watched those women and you can draw a lot from them. But I wouldn't want to create somebody that you could say, oh, yes, she's based it on her. Because that wouldn't be right. I mean, Jocasta says she has written books.

She's her own woman as well as being Oedipus's life partner. But you get the picture that she's very in control of her own life that has its own momentum alongside her life as his wife. You've spoken a bit about the role of Jocasta and we can understand what drew you to it but I mean I came out of the theatre a little bit shell-shocked that's all I'll give away. What must it be like for you at the end of each performance? Yes I think Mark and I are still because we've we've done maybe 10 performances so far. So we get to the end of the show and we are a bit kind of rabbits in the headlights, you know, kind of thing.

But I think we're both of us actors who are quite good at walking away. And you have to be. You know, I've done a lot of plays that are disturbing. Ghosts, Long Day's Journey Into Night, this. You really don't want to take those home with you. I mean, and that's not to say that we're not affected. That isn't to say that when we get to the last 10 minutes of the play that the pair of us are not really cooked up to the point where we're

feeling it. But that's our jobs. You know, we do and part of the job is to be able to tap in to this extraordinary emotional story and the cataclysmic revelation that comes at the end of Oedipus. We are there in it, but we're also, once we've got to the dressing rooms, we're very ready for a Negroni. I was wondering what the drink of choice might be afterwards. But what does it feel like at the end when you're on stage what you get from the audience? Oh, it's it's. Can you explain it? Well, every night so far that we've done it, Mark and I are the last two on the stage.

So when the lights come up, we are we can see the audience every night so far as one body. The audience has got to their feet. Yes, they have. It's not just six people and then the others think, oh, I better join in. It's been a kind of, I think the audience, you can hear a pin drop for the last 10 minutes. And you can see people physically moving forward in their seats. There's no coughing. It goes silent.

And I think for them, they've sat there, it's two hours, no interval, and it is like this train that they're on that gets faster and faster and faster and faster. And so for them at the end of the night, it's a physical release, and I get that. And I think them just being able to really jump out of their seats and show what the evening has meant to them.

So that does do something to us, for sure. And we're quite jagged at that moment too. And just to look at them and to see that what we've done has affected them and that they're appreciating it, that's a great bit of feedback. I was, as were the people around me, transported, I think, is the word I would use. You mentioned these various roles. This one that is obviously um a very intense role

for want of a better word um but this is uh being your career all these different roles that that you have played um and we speak to a lot of actors here and they sometimes talk about the potential challenges of getting the roles that they want um as get older. You don't seem to have that trouble at all. I can't really answer that in any kind of fake humble way, but I can only agree with you. I know I'm getting amazing roles to play and I don't ever take that for granted. I'm so grateful.

But I've put in the decades, decades and decades. I mean, I started working back in the day at the Royal Court Theatre in the late 70s and the 80s, working on fantastic new plays by Carol Churchill, so many writers, directors, wonderful, rich work. So that need to do interesting work has stayed with me. And then obviously my long relationship with Mike Lee and the complete diverse range of characters that he's given me to play. You know, you put that into an early career. It feels like it's fed the rest of my career. You know, what I did in my 20s and 30s, those choices, those people who I was working with, that has continued and paid off. Was it intentional?

It was. Eventually, for me, it was. The first six years of my career, 16 to 22, no, I just, I didn't really know what I was doing. I did anything that came along. But then once I met Mike Lee, once I started working at the Royal Court, I knew that level of work, that the intensity of that work, the joy of doing new plays was in my bones and that's what I wanted to do. And Mike had very much got me to play characters that weren't like me. And that was key. And for me, that's fed into my career. Is Jocasta like you?

I think there is a lot of Jocasta that is like me, actually. She's a force to be reckoned with. She doesn't suffer fools gladly. She's devoted to her man. And I've been devoted to men in the past and committed. And she's deeply in love with Oedipus. And I recognize that level of passion. Talking about passion, you know, just as I cast my eye over,

we talked about playing a mother in Oedipus and Some of the Children. You're also playing a mother in Disclaimer, which is a series out at the moment on Apple TV. Oh, there's a complicated mother, if ever there was one. So that's just two. I mentioned The Critic. There's number three. I also see in November on BBC One,

Susan Ryland, you're coming back as? Oh, yes. Anthony Horowitz's wonderful crime novels, which started with Magpie Murders. And yes, Moonflower Murders will come out on the BBC Saturday nights in November. Yeah. Yes. What do you do in your downtime?

Well, at the minute, there's not been a lot of downtime, but joyously so. I mean, a lot of people say to me, oh, you must be tired. Listen, I'm hungry for this level of work. And as long as it continues, it's my reason for getting up in the mornings. I'm working with the amazing actress called June Watson who is 89 and she plays Merope in Oedipus. She doesn't stop

and she wants to keep working. Do you think you'll continue working just for as long? Completely. As the interesting roles continue to come? Absolutely 100% yes. And I can understand why when I watch you on stage as well. But you know, you're 16 when you started as you talk about that. What do you think has been the biggest change for women who are acting

in that time? I think I can feel now that there's a real interest in telling the stories of older women. And it wasn't like that when I was 16. It wasn't like that when I was in my 30s even. What changed? Women shouting louder, complaining more. I mean, it is extraordinary when I think of even going back to the relatively recent female history of the suffragettes. And of course, women were trying to make noises way before that. But when you think of that movement and the commitment of those women in that movement, it was awe-inspiring. But sometimes I think of that time, that movement, and think, really? We're still not being heard.

We're still struggling to have a voice. We're still being sidelined or potentially sidelined. So it's different because we've carried on banging on and shouting and making ourselves be heard. But, you know, you have like the series I did, Mum, which is a story of a middle aged woman who's lost her husband, tentatively falling in love again. She was 60. Women want to see stories like that. They want to see themselves portrayed as life. Real life. Life going on. It isn't over because you're 60 and you've lost your husband. It's sad and there's

grief to be had and life will never be quite the same. But to show women clinging on to, wanting life still, to have their story carry on and not come to a full stop. The prolific actress Leslie Manville speaking to me there. Oedipus is on at the Wyndham Theatre until January next year. Moonflower Murders will be on BBC One later this month. Just a couple of the projects that she has on the go. Some of you getting in touch with me about Strictly. Here's Jennifer.

Both Wynne Evans and Katya Jones have shouted to everyone that it was a joke between them and that it was misinterpreted. I think Wynne is horrified that his actions were seen as inappropriate. What more can these two do to convince you? One from Barry, strictly was a good idea when it started, but in my opinion, it has passed its sell-by date

some five years ago. 84844 if you want to get in touch. Now, in the past week, a series of six pilots have been launched in NHS trusts across England to try and improve maternity care for women and babies.

It's called the ABC pilot. So that stands for avoiding brain injury in childbirth. In 2021, this is according to Department of Health and Social Care, just under two and a half thousand babies receive care for a brain injury during or after birth. So that's about four in every 1000 births. And some of those injuries may have been avoidable. And that's where my next guests come in. So I'm joined by Mary Dixon-Woods from the Healthcare Improvement Studies Institute at Cambridge University.

She's the Programme Director for this pilot. And also joining us is Gemma Barber, Maternity Education Lead at Liverpool Women's Hospital. You're both very welcome to Woman's Hour. Let me begin with you, Mary. Talk us through the circumstances that you are trying to rectify, where the baby is and how avoidable brain injuries might happen.

Good morning, Nuala. This is a very important programme and it's trying to target two major contributors to avoidable brain injury. They're two different things. One of them is failure to detect and respond to a baby who might be deteriorating during labour. Excuse me. And the second is an obstetric emergency called impacted fetal head at cesarean birth. And in that case, the baby is essentially very deeply engaged in the mother's pelvis, and it's very difficult to deliver the head. The programme is targeting both of these through new clinical tools, through team training and through using simulation-based techniques so that people can be trained together in order to

standardise practice and to improve care of this group. Let me talk about the first aspect that you talk about there, monitoring the baby adequately during labour. I mean, I would have expected, although I've heard many stories, of course, from our listeners, but that just to be routine, you know, it's alarming in a way, it could be seen, that that has to be introduced. Fetal monitoring is absolutely routine. Until now, the standard of care has been to monitor the fetal heart rate throughout the labour and that is done. It's not always or consistently interpreted correctly and the response isn't always optimal. So that's where some of the issues go wrong. The innovation of the ABC program is to add in five additional risk factors that need to be monitored throughout the labour. And the principle here is that if you combine

monitoring the fetal heart rate with these additional five risk factors and you have very structured ways of assessing how well the baby is doing you can then trigger the right response when you reach a particular threshold so this this is learning from what happens in adult care when you're monitoring vital signs on a hospital ward and you know to intervene when the patient reaches a particular threshold same principle used here but also what's very critical is not just this technical approach but also the non-technical approach of how the team works together and the roles the responsibilities the tasks they all have to be very highly coordinated and integrated so that's what this program is doing and what about the mother in that instance? The mother is absolutely crucial to this, Nuala, and I'm glad you brought this up. This program

has been co-designed with families and with staff from the very beginning. And we have been running simulations where we put clinical teams into a situation. They're given real clinical data, printouts, or results of other tests. We use things like PESTO to simulate meconium, which is when the baby is getting into distress. And we observe what's happening. And we involve women in observing what's happening in those simulations. and they fed back to us very early on that they weren't sufficiently at the centre of what was happening that the staff could become very preoccupied with the clinical data. So the tool now along with the fetal heart rate and the five clinical risk factors also includes the question is the woman concerned? That has to

be monitored just as carefully as anything else. And when you empower women to put how they're feeling at the centre of the monitoring, it changes the dynamic and it means that you're listening to them. The programme is very, very clear about communication principles,

which have all been co-designed with women and about very, very crucially the importance of choice by women as to their mode of birth. Let me just go back to meconium for a moment and the pesto. Can you explain that for our listeners? Sure. Meconium is what may appear when the baby essentially passes a motion during the labour and we would simulate that during one of these simulated labours by showing the pesto so that the team recognise that there's something that's potentially going wrong. They would then use the tool that's been developed as part of this programme to assess what actions they need to take next.

And, you know, I'm sure this would be very reassuring for people that are listening that this may be rolled out and maybe some have had hard incidences, painful incidences in the past if they want to share 84844. But these are pilots. What about the resources to be able to deliver this? The pilots are very important in essentially systematising good practice. That's what they're doing.

And they're showing that you can personalise care by assessing these things very, very meticulously for each woman. They're showing that you can have a standardised approach to doing this and they're optimising the available resource. What you don't want is any ambiguity about who's doing what, what is the action you should take in response to this particular finding. That all needs to be clear. So what the ABC programme will do by optimising the technical aspects of care and the non-technical aspects of care and putting the woman in the centre is improving care overall, making the best possible use of the resource that's available. The resource that's available, so you don't believe it needs a substantial additional funding for it to be standardised care as you describe it? We're going to be assessing the funding implications as part

of the pilots. That's going to be a key part of what we're doing and essentially assessing what the costs would be to implement it. I want to move on to impacted foetal head. I hadn't heard this term before. You did mention briefly there, Mary, that it's when the head becomes stuck, basically, in the canal. Do you want to describe a little bit more exactly how it happens? I did read one stat that this can happen in about one and a half of every 10 cesarean sections, just to put that out for our listeners. And please continue.

Thank you. Yeah, what happens here is that during an emergency cesarean birth, the baby's head may become impacted in the woman's pelvis. It means that the head is very difficult to deliver. This is a very, very dangerous situation and it complicates about 1.5% of all births or about 11% of all emergency sections. And it requires a very specific set of skills in order to handle it for reasons that are not very well understood at the moment because the research hasn't yet appeared. And this the incidence of this is increasing. And it's currently about 10 percent of the highest value claims for clinical negligence going to NHS resolution.

It requires that the clinical team work absolutely seamlessly. They need to declare it as what it is, which is an emergency. Everybody needs to know what's happening. And then you have to have a team that are working completely seamlessly and have the exactly right technical skills in order to disimpact the baby's head. So again, what we're using here is simulation and we've built an anatomically perfect model, which each site will have. Of what? Is it of the mother or the baby? It is. Yeah, it's basically the pelvis and the legs. And one of the things that is taught, for example, is how the woman's legs have to be supported during these procedures, which requires two people.

And the model has the baby with an impacted fetal head and cannot be released unless you're using exactly the right procedures in order to do it. Obviously, it would be very difficult to train somebody in real time on how to do this. So this is absolutely key again in training people in the appropriate procedures and coordinating the team so they know exactly what to do and can do it seamlessly. So those procedures have always been available. But was it that people didn't know them or explain to me what the issue is? Do you know what I mean? Because obviously you know what's meant to be done. Why doesn't everyone? The procedures actually have not been as well studied

as you would like. The trials have not appeared. And partly this is because it's very difficult to randomize a woman to one procedure or another when this emergency develops at no notice. So the evidence is not as strong as we would like. We have reviewed the evidence. What does seem as we would like we have we have reviewed the evidence what does seem to be clear is that you that you need to know three of these techniques

and you may need to try them in order because the first one might not work depending on the physiology of of how the baby's head is impacted and the training for this has not been um systematized and the techniques have not been as well understood as they might be. There has also been a problem that until very recently, some trusts were using a device called a fetal pillow. It now turns out that the research in which the fetal pillow was based was fraudulent. What was that? It was a device that was meant to help you essentially with disimpacting the head. But the trials in which it was based

essentially can't be relied upon. So people absolutely need to know the techniques. Let me bring in Gemma, who I introduced at the beginning, but she is Maternity Education Lead at Liverpool Women's Hospital. You're very welcome again to the programme, Gememma tell me a little bit about the training that you underwent for impacted fetal head uh what did you learn um so we went we went up to london last

monday and um what we um spent some time looking at was uh the the new model that mary mentioned the new mannequin which is excellent by the way I'm a midwife by background and I've been in the education team for two years now and of all of our training models it really is excellence because you have to as Mary said you have to perform the techniques correctly in order to to disimpact the baby's head so we went through those those three different methods that Mary mentioned. And one of the great parts about it was really taking the time to go over these disinfection methods. It made it all so simple, which I think is a real plus about training in that in an emergency situation,

when you have to move quickly, you want these methods to be as simple and as easy to to follow as possible and so yeah we went we went over those three methods we looked at the physics of of delivering the head from the pelvis um looked at some of the the research and yeah it was a really interesting day we learned a lot is it that you're using your hands in a different way it is it is in a way because um in the past like you you think if you if think about the um the the physics if you have a baby's head stuck in a pelvis you almost think like okay if you can't deliver the baby via cesarean section then you almost want to go the other way to push the baby up and that can actually you know using the ends ends of your fingers can actually cause a lot of damage to the baby's head. So this method, it's looking at how you can safely use your whole hand so you don't damage the baby's head.

You know, we're reducing this risk of brain injury. And the motion of it is simple, but not one that maybe you would have thought about immediately. Would you agree, Mary? You wouldn't necessarily have thought to put the whole hand in and use that flat part of your hand to safely push the baby's head up and disimpact it. Did you hear that question, Mary? I did, yes. That's absolutely right.

The techniques essentially require this kind of haptic feel. Haptic. I learned that word not so long ago. That is the feeling of sense and touch that we have. It's a new word for me, but go ahead. Yeah, so it's a bit like learning to drive or anything else where you need to have the muscle memory that you know exactly what to do and that's kind of trained into your hands. And you're not, as Gemma says,

having to improvise in the moment. You need this to be all something you can just deploy at a moment's notice because this happens in a very frightening way at no notice at all. I see some messages coming in. I'll just read them while I have you. I had to prompt for the C-section

when my son was finally delivered. He was so close to death. He's now six and doing well, but it was an incredibly stressful experience. A father gets in touch. He says, when my partner was in labour, she was catatonic with pain and in no position to make decisions about her care and labour. My son was born via emergency C-section, covered in meconium, after a long, drawn-out labour where his heart rate continually dropped

and was not properly monitored by the hospital team. My baby and wife needed me there as someone who could objectively monitor the situation. Fathers and birth partners are so crucial when the mother is going through such a difficult and pained labour.

What about that, Gemma, as you hear these stories? I mean, hopefully what you're talking about will be able to reassure people yes as well going forward definitely and you know that the the input the feedback um from from the women and the families that we look after is so important that that was actually a huge part of the day as well was not just the technique but also the communication with those that we look after that they're that they're fully informed of what's happening at all times

and who the best placed person in theatre, when there is a lot of people in an operating theatre, can all get quite busy and quite loud, who is the most appropriate then to discuss that with the woman? Because sometimes the person that has their hands on, the surgeon that's performing the cesarean birth, like it's very, very difficult for them to then have a conversation with the woman and her partner, as well as try and deliver the baby. We all become task focused. We all know,

we push this in our training a lot, multitasking sadly is a myth, but identifying other members of that multidisciplinary team. So it's all of us. It's our doctors. It's our midwives. It's our health care assistants. Identifying someone that we're all on the same page and they can speak clearly with the woman and her partner and just make sure that they're feeling safe, they're feeling comfortable and that they're always having that opportunity to give their input. And feeling heard. That is definitely something I've heard through various maternity stories that we have heard. What would you say, Gemma, to pregnant women listening to this now who may be alarmed by what they're hearing?

Yes, it's quite tricky because we want to obviously keep people always informed of their care and what might happen. But also, yeah, this is a fairly rare incident, but when you hear about it, it can almost be quite scary to hear of all things that might happen during labour and birth. What I'd say in this case is that, you know, be reassured that the training that we are providing is continuously improving. We're always looking to stay ahead of the curve, really,

and always working so hard to provide the highest standard of care for those coming to use our services. Let me go back to you, Mary. At the moment, these pilots are only in England. Do you think they may be rolled out UK wide at a later date? I would hope so yes and I was very sorry to hear the story of the person who described the very unfortunate experience that they had. I think what has been really key about this programme is that the birth partners have been included all along in the design of the programme and they're very much part of the training that is given on communication that they need to be included and that they are in the design of the programme. And they're very much part of the training that is given on communication

that they need to be included and that they are important in their own right, but also can advocate for the woman. And we have peer observers, so women who come and attend the training and give feedback as part of what they see. So that, as Gemma says, the training itself is improving all

the time as well and i think as i have understood from our conversation that some of the brain avoidable brain injury comes from the manipulation of the head during um the birth basically or when it becomes impacted the head but that's absolutely what can happen. Yeah, sorry, Gemma. Yeah, it was, you know, what we were saying about that use of, you know, not using the ends of the fingers, but using that whole hand technique. But also just simple things sometimes, don't you agree, Mary? Like just taking that time to pause when an impacted fetal head has been recognised, waiting for the uterus to stop contracting you know identifying the emergency to the whole team so everybody knows okay this is something that we all need to deal with because very much in the past like this this training has changed

in recent times that we didn't have that clear guidance and it was seen as well from a midwife's point of view like it's something for the doctors to deal with as those performing the caesarean section. But yeah, it's it's these small changes can make a huge difference overall. Really interesting. Mary Dixon-Woods, Healthcare Improvement Studies Institute at Cambridge University, Programme Director of the pilot we've been speaking about and Gemma Barber, Maternity Education Lead at Liverpool Women's Hospital. Thank you both. A message from, let me see, I don't have a name but it talks about her

very traumatic experience in the late 70s. Ray, a baby's impacted head. Thank you, Woman's Hour. I'm still learning things about an event that changed the course of my life. The programme 20 odd years ago helped when Sheila Kitzinger talked about PTSD in childbirth. Lifelong learning, as she says.

8-4, 8-4-4, if you'd like to get in touch. I'm Sarah Treleaven and for over a year, I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there

who was faking pregnancies. I started, like, warning everybody. Every doula that I know. It was fake. No pregnancy. And the deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth. How long has she been doing this? What does she have to gain from this?

From CBC and the BBC World Service, The Con, Caitlin's Baby. It's a long story. Settle in. Available now. Now, Strictly Come Dancing, some of you are messaging me about that too. It is again in the headlines and not because of the performances.

On Saturday night's show, there was a moment between comedian and radio presenter Wynne Evans and his partner, Katya Jones, who's the professional dancer. They've described what happened as a silly joke and that they were just mucking around. But Evans appeared to put his arm around Jones's waist

and rested on her stomach before her hand quickly pushed his hand back to her hip. You've probably seen it if you've been on social media. There's like this fixed smile on Katya's face throughout the incident. And despite their very public apologies, there has been an outcry. Some are not finding it funny at all and don't see groping in any context, whether it's real or imitated, as appropriate fodder for jokes, especially given the pummeling the flagship show has had in recent months

after the BBC apologised to actor Amanda Abington, you'll remember that, who complained about her dance partner, that's Giovanni Pernice. The investigation upheld verbal bullying and harassment complaints, but cleared Giovanni Pernice of most serious allegations of physical aggression.

Well now, Saturday Night's Exchange has featured in many of the papers, some calling for Wynne Evans to be axed from the show even. The couple appeared on It Takes Two. This was last night on BBC Two, and they addressed the situation. Can I please first get something out of the way

that I feel like overshadowed our performance for absolutely no reason, and quite frankly, actually actually can't bear sitting here watching this man being portrayed as someone he's not. And in fact, it couldn't be further away from the truth. So I have to make this absolutely clear that this whole incident with the hand and the high five on Saturday night, it was an inside joke between Wyn and I.

Was it a silly joke? Yes. Was it a bad joke? Yes. Yeah, and I've watched it back and I can see how people may have misinterpreted it. Yeah, but however, it was a joke and even the idea that it made me feel uncomfortable or offended in any way is total nonsense. And those that have doubts, you guys have got it wrong. So hopefully this will be the end of it. That was Katja. You might recognise her voice and win on It Takes Two last night. Well, just before we came on air, I spoke to the columnist Claire Cohn, who has written a column about the Ferrari.

It was a sort of sense of creeping familiarity, wasn't it? I just think the reason that my WhatsApp groups have been so full of women messaging about this and that social media has as well, is that just so many women watching that clip, watching the show,

would have sort of frozen and had this pang of recognition of, you know, okay, we don't know the context of what was going on on the show. We can only go by what's been said. But actually, for most of us, we've been in that situation. You know, we've been stood there as maybe a boss or a colleague or even a friend's husband, I've heard from some women, you know, have kind of made that slightly inappropriate move. And we've had a smile plastered on our faces thinking,

ah, what do I do about this? So I just think for me, it was that absolute familiarity and that, oh God, you know, I've been here myself. And I suppose Wyn Evans has said he's heartbroken by the incident or the reaction to, he called it a stupid joke that went wrong. Katya Jones, she said that the

incident didn't make her feel uncomfortable with the hand or offended in any way. And I suppose people are asking, you know, do you just take them at their word? They say it was a joke. Others are questioning how that is a joke

in this day and age of a hand moving, we'd say from the waist forward towards somebody's belly button. Well, quite. And look, the fact of the matter is, even if it is a joke between them, even if the rest of us

don't know the context, there have been enough of these incidents now, not only in women's lives, but on television, where something like this has happened and the man in question has been reprimanded, that you would just think, even if it's an in-joke, why would you risk it? Why would you do that in a public forum? Because it is quite triggering for a lot of us and you know we can't know whether katya felt uncomfortable but it certainly made me feel uncomfortable and i think it made a lot of women feel very uncomfortable and that that

response that it's a joke even if that's true for them it's something the rest of us will have heard time and time and time again i know i have You know, in my article I wrote for The Independent, I mentioned a former boyfriend from years ago and his best childhood friend, you know, took any opportunity on a dance floor while killing for drinks at a bar to, you know, slide his hand around your waist and sort of start moving south.

And it was just passed off as a joke. But really, women have a radar for this stuff and we know when it's a joke and we know when it isn't. And that's just too often the excuse that's used. So again, them saying that is just something we're all extremely familiar with, I think, in our own lives. And if we take Wynne and Katya at their words, but it did make you uncomfortable and other women uncomfortable, do you think there should be any action following that,

even if between them there is not an issue about it? I mean, strictly I've brought in welfare officers, haven't I? And, you know, apparently it's been through this process where it's been assessed by them. I mean, it's difficult. If they don't want to take it any further, if Katia says she doesn't feel uncomfortable, there's only so much you can do.

And perhaps that is the truth for her. Who knows? But I do think it's a good thing that it started this conversation. And we're sort of acknowledging that this stuff actually, for a lot of women, isn't a joke and does make us feel uncomfortable. And to send that message is never, ever a bad thing. This stuff actually for a lot of women isn't a joke and does make us feel uncomfortable.

And to send that message is never, ever a bad thing. The headline of your piece, your comment in The Independent is, does Strictly's hand incident mean it still has a women problem? Do you have an answer? Didn't you say the headlines ask the question ever have an answer um i mean look they've obviously just come off the back of you know a review after amanda abingdon made um claims against her dad's partner last year you know they're in a they're in a tricky situation as it is they're slightly under the shadow of this still so for this to happen so early on in the series it's not a great look and i do think it needs to be taken seriously because the last thing the show wants is to have a reputation for having a woman problem

um so you know perhaps perhaps welfare officers isn't enough perhaps they do need to be considering further measures um i don't know what those are but you know if this if this rumbles on um i think it could be you know could become a real issue for the show going forward and they won't be able to grow back from it necessarily. It's an age of social media. I think most people, or a lot of people, will have come to it through clips that went viral, for example, online,

even if they weren't fans of the show themselves. But do you think in the wider context in society things have changed that groping isn't seen as funny anymore i think publicly there's been some kind of positive um incidents you know in other situations where it's happened on television i mean the spanish fa boss luis rugales is is an obvious example um when he was seen kissing one of the World Cup winners last year, although he sort of denied the intent behind that. You know, so often when they happen in public now, they are being spotted, as you say, often on social media, even if people aren't watching the particular programme. And they are being called out more and there are repercussions. So that's very positive but I think behind closed

doors behind the scenes for the rest of us the message probably still isn't getting through and I think um you know a lot a lot of these incidents are still going on perhaps less so in the workplace is that overly optimistic to say that well I'll open it to my listeners 84844 certainly I still hear from female friends in social situations that it's not really changing. Can I read the last line of your article? As one wag on social media put it, I was sorry to hear about

Wynne Evans' sprained ankle next week. Yeah, I thought that was a great line. I wish I could take credit for it, rather than just taking credit for borrowing it. Well, I'm taking credit for sharing it as it continues. Thanks so much for borrowing it. Well I'm taking credit for sharing it you know as it continues. Thanks so much for spending some time with us Clare.

Thank you. Clare Cohn, her column about the incident is in the Independent today and the BBC press office told us that the welfare and production teams have checked in on the pair and there is no further action planned. Okay, let me see.

There is ridiculous coming in from Judith. She says, are we really going to destroy a programme that brings joy into people's lives on a Saturday night?

Why don't we just believe them? They've explained it. Perhaps Strictly could limit the amount of hugging and kissing that has built up over the years which would reduce

the risk of inappropriate touching if that is what it was. Another one that came in this time from Fiona. She says, concerning Strictly, I think maybe Katya has given off mixed messages. When the dance finished,

she threw herself at her partner with her legs around his waist. He did look somewhat stunned and surprised. It's not fair to just blame him for putting his hand around her waist. Lots of fans getting in touch off the programme. So I'll keep reading them out, but I want to turn to my next guest,

who is an award-winning activist and artist who is sparking discussions among world leaders with a chair. Kendall Alimo is a survivor of child sex trafficking. She's a campaigner. She's also an artist. And she's spent the past few years using a simple red chair

to provoke conversation at top universities and businesses. She wants to champion the human right to freedom and support people like her who are impacted by severe trauma. She's in Vienna at the moment attending a UN conference on transnational organized crime. You're very welcome to the program, Kendall. Well, thank you so very much for having me today. It's such an honor to join you on the Woman's Hour live from the United Nations in Vienna, Austria. You are a survivor yourself. Why did you decide to channel your energy then into activism? Absolutely. So I often say, for me personally, I had faced so much adversity in my childhood and in my life, and it really impacted my health and my trajectory. And so for me, you know, I think it was my social responsibility to understand the gaps in care for people that go of child sex trafficking, and my journey to recovery was really quite long.

And that's because we don't have the resources and support for people like me. And really seeing the struggles within my own narrative really drove me to start doing activism on this very issue. I'm a graduate of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. I'm also a professionally trained artist. And so I thought, how do I use really my art to drive this messaging to, you know, world leaders and civil society at large? So that is how and why I do what I do. You talk about being a survivor of child sex trafficking as well. Can you tell us a little bit about what it takes to overcome it and perhaps also what you feel is missing? Yeah, absolutely. So my journey was really long. I was diagnosed with a case of PTSD, which is post-traumatic stress disorder. And, you know,

really understanding my journey and how hard it was to recover and rehabilitate myself in really hearing stories from women all over the world who are either survivors of child sexual abuse. We know globally one in four women are sexually abused by the time they reach the age of 18. And so this is, you know, beyond trafficking, you know, genderbased violence is such a prominent issue. And so really what happens is these women don't just go through these experiences, um, pediatrically, but later in life, they often have post-traumatic stress disorder or comorbid depression or eating disorders. And that takes quite a bit of care, um, not for a year and sometimes years at a time. And so the medical system can be quite costly and the journey can be quite long. And so seeing that in my own story and seeing women around the world who are, you know,

not able to get access to clinical care that they need or not able to afford it, you know, understanding my barriers to care and healing and really seeing women all over the world who don't have access to this care really inspired me to start really driving policy on access to not just clinical care, but safe housing. We have a lot of survivors of trafficking that, you know, don't have a home to go to. They don't have the clinical care they need. Once they're healed, they don't have the jobs they need,

which is why, you know, I recently gifted a red seat to Amazon to encourage saving a seat for a survivor in employment and really obtaining economic equity so that these women are protected from being re-exploited again in their lives. This is interesting because I think what I'm hearing from you as well is the part of the journey after being trafficked, being a survivor. But you are sitting in rooms now with people that are making decisions. And I wonder how much of the conversations are about the part before, before somebody is exploited, you know, that vulnerable position that they might be in, whatever country it may be. Yeah, well, I think that's a really important conversation. And you know, what drives this and, you know, we know global poverty is a huge driver of people committing crime or being victims of crime and the vulnerabilities.

I just actually worked on a report with the Organization for Security and Cooperation, which covered, you know, even women with disabilities can be more vulnerable. So that report was just put out globally about the links between women with disabilities and the vulnerability to then later being trafficked or disabilities resulting from trafficking. So there's so many intersectionalities, but I will say, you know, I'm really encouraged to be here at the United Nations Conference on Transnational Crime right now. I just had an incredible meeting yesterday with Ambassador Benhabla's foot of the French ambassador

at the French embassy yesterday talking about these very issues and art to scale messaging on policy that needs to be driven to not just to prevent, but to rehabilitate. So I think there's really two important conversations going on,

whether it's here at the UN or the OSCE or in embassies, is we're really talking about how do we prevent these crimes and also how do we create policy to then support survivors in a full circle way with access to health care, access to housing and all that's really required. So let us get to the red chair and your project. Where did the inspiration come from and can you describe it? Yeah, it's interesting. So actually it started with a purple chair. A lot of people don't know that. As an artist, I was sitting in my studio in Chicago a few years ago and I had a purple folding chair sitting there and I was

really thinking about really times in my life I've had a purple folding chair sitting there. And I was really thinking about really times in my life, I've had a hard time accessing care or accessing pathways back to university because of the barriers I had from my own narrative. And I was sitting there and thinking I had all this knowledge. And I knew so much about the in access to really what we consider in this space, social reintegration for these survivors. And I was sitting in my art studio, and I had seen this purple chair. And it's a beautiful story, actually. I had taken it over to the lake in Chicago where I live, and I photographed it. And I don't know, it was such a beautiful image to me as an artist.

And for some reason in my head, I thought, this chair is going to go across the ocean one day when I saw the image by the lake. I said, this isn't going to go across the lake. This is actually going to go across the ocean one day when I saw the image by the lake. So this isn't going to go across the lake. This is actually going to go across the ocean. And I was sitting in my studio and I thought this chair can be a symbol of the seats that we need for survivors to be in clinical care, seats in housing, needs for housing, seats at universities to get an education, to equip them to have a job, seats at corporations to hire these incredibly resilient women that experience this. And so I ended up doing a project where I turned the chair red. And the reason I turned the chair red is because I wanted it to symbolize life and

blood and what it takes to sustain life after trafficking. And I think red is such a dominating color. I think we can't not see it. So I decided a couple of years ago to do a project where I sent red seats all over the world to universities. And I had placed them on lawns and really called peacefully for universities to consider saving a seat for these survivors that needed to make their way back to school to get an education, to get a job, to have economic equity and really, truly sustainable freedom. And so these seats I bring with me to conferences. I gift them to individuals. I just gifted a painting, a little painting of a red seat to Ambassador Ben Hoveless at the French Embassy yesterday.

And so for me, it's nice. I think these seats have gone around the world. They've gone into the hands of world leaders. And really, the point of the seat is not just a performative piece and not just seeing where they can end up, but it's really to foster dialogue on, you know, how we get sustainable pathways to freedom for these incredible women and men that go through the experience of human trafficking. So the red seat is really a symbol of sustainable freedom for these people and pathways to that. And the campaign group Stop the Traffic states that 71% of human trafficking victims are women and girls, as we talk about some of those figures. But, you know, I was also reading your artwork is in the UN General Secretary's office in New York, the Hofburg Palace in Vienna. You also talk about the French ambassador there. And I'm wondering, you know, as a woman now looking back on your life, what do you think the younger self, your younger self my journey was so, so hard and so, fought so hard. And there were definitely a lot of dark and challenging times in my life. You know,

this past June, I was invited to see my painting hanging in the President of the General Assembly's boardroom and to walk in there and have the Chief of Cabinet show me that painting was just remarkable. But I think, I think to me, it's not about Kendall Alimo. It's not about me. It's about the fact about what my art is doing. And when I was in the president's cabinet, they had told me, you know, your artwork is facilitating its job because when world leaders come in here, they're drawn to the painting. They're asking what it's about. And it's actually facilitating dialogue with people that drive policy all over the world. So it's incredible. And then I had sent an other artwork titled The Plan over to the Hofburg Palace to OSCE with red chairs. And it's actually a step-by-step plan for how-

And I will say that's the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. Continue. Yes, and I will be visiting that artwork on Friday and gifting the special representative, Kerry Johnstone, a red chair on Friday. Well, thank you so much for sharing your story with us on Friday and gifting the special representative Kerry Johnstone a red chair on Friday. Well, thank you so much for sharing your story with us and what you're trying to do to really bring attention and a reminder to people of the opportunities that should be afforded to people

who've gone through something really traumatic like I know you have as well. That's Kendall Alamo. Thank you so much. And thank you for all your messages coming in. Here's the last one on Strictly. Strictly is a wonderful show that provides real joy, particularly in these rather dark times. Leave it alone! Exclamation point. Don't have a name for that,

but thank you for all your messages that have come in throughout the programme. I'll be back tomorrow with Cecilia Ahern and her latest book. That's all for today's Woman's Hour. Join us again next time. I'm Greg Foot and my podcast, Sliced Bread, from BBC Radio 4 is back to separate more science fact from marketing fiction.

We've gone from where there's some science and we've turned it science-y. Each week I investigate one of your suggested wonder products, something that's promising to make you happier, healthier or greener. The cost is almost £200. It's out of my range, I'm afraid. The new series of Sliced Bread, including our 100th episode, where we'll be investigating the products promising to help slow the effects of ageing. We can hopefully slow down the ageing process

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What does she have to gain from this? From CBC and the BBC World Service, The Con, Caitlin's Baby. It's a long story, settle in. Available now.