Woman's Hour - Lockdown anniversary, Nicola Sturgeon, Misogyny as a hate crime

Episode Date: March 23, 2021

It's exactly a year since Boris Johnson delivered the instruction to stay at home. To mark the occasion, we've assembled three women of different ages, backgrounds and circumstances to discuss their experiences of being confined for the most part in the home. Actor and author Sheila Hancock and writers Kerry Hudson and Yasmin Rahman join Emma. The future of Nicola Sturgeon has been in the balance in recent weeks as she's faced not one but two major inquiries. Yesterday afternoon an independent inquiry by James Hamilton QC cleared the First Minister of breaching the ministerial code. But this morning a separate cross-party committee of inquiry said the Scottish government's handling of harassment complaints against Alex Salmond was "seriously flawed", that Nicola Sturgeon had misled their inquiry in her evidence and that women had been badly let down by the government. Political correspondent Alex Massie, crime writer Val McDermid and Alex Massie from the Spectator join Emma.Last week’s announcement that the police in England and wales are going to start recording misogyny as a hate crime in the wake of the killing of Sarah Everard was heralded as a victory by many women’s rights campaigners but that reaction has been far from uniform. Many groups working in the arena of domestic abuse and violence against women actually think it could be counter productive and even make the situation worse. We talk to Dr Fiona Vera-Gray from the University of Durham who has written The Right Amount of Panic who thinks the move to change the law is a knee jerk reaction and also to Professor Louise Mallany who has worked with Nottinghamshire Police which has recorded misogyny as a hate crime since 2016Presenter: Emma Barnett Producer: Lucinda Montefiore

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. Today is 12 months since the Prime Minister told us all to stay home, save lives and protect the NHS because of COVID-19 and the spread of it. Because of that, perhaps today you'll be participating in the minute's silence at noon or lighting a candle on your doorstep this evening, thinking of those 126,000 who have lost their lives this year. Perhaps you'll also be doing your own soul-searching about what the last year has meant for you

and your sense of self, family and relationships. Of course, there was no small irony for women in particular being told to stay at home after decades of battling to be able to free themselves from the domestic setting. And some women are still nowhere near that. But looking to the future, as we cautiously plan for various stages of unlocking facilitated by vaccination, do you want your old pre-COVID life back? Are there things that you just cannot wait to return to? Or are they going to be some big changes, small changes, something in the middle? Perhaps the two lives actually aren't that different and you were already doing certain things before that kept you in a

more restricted way. Maybe that was caring or already with responsibilities that kept you in the home more than you perhaps would have liked. Tell us where you are after 12 months. And when you look to the future, what do you think you'll keep? What do you think you'll change? Do you want your previous existence back? Text us here at Woman's Hour on 84844. Text will be charged at your standard message rate on social media. We're at BBC Woman's Hour, or you can email us through our website.

Also on today's programme, misogyny as a hate crime. It was hailed a great political victory for women's justice last week when the government okayed it. Or, as some have put it, is it a retrograde step that could do more harm than good? We'll get into that and analyse it properly on today's programme. And, of course, your views welcome. And we'll look at the latest twists and turns in the political drama engulfing Scotland and what they mean for the UK's most

powerful female politician, Nicola Sturgeon, all to come on the programme. But it is exactly a year since Boris Johnson delivered that instruction to stay at home. To mark the year point, we've brought together three women of different ages, backgrounds and circumstances to discuss their experiences of being confined, for the most part, in the home. The actor and author Dame Sheila Hancock, who's been locked down alone. The author Kerry Hudson, who's had a baby with her husband during lockdown. And fellow author Yasmin Rahman, who spent the year living with her parents, grandmother and brother. Welcome to you all. I'm happy we can bring you together. We're still in stages of lockdown now.

But if I could begin with you, Sheila, good morning. How would you say it has been for you? Confusing. I'm terrified that the other two are going to say that they've learned French and how to knit. They've grown a garden and once had a baby. I've done nothing. I stood staring at the walls. I've gone upstairs and think, what am I up here for? I utterly confused and I've come to no conclusions except that we need a revolution. Sorry, what do you mean by that? You can't just say that at the end and then not tell us a bit more. Well, I just think the one thing that I have discovered, which I knew already,

but I think a lot of people didn't, is the vast divisions in our country, the gross undervaluation of the people that have got us through this mess. And we've got to do something about it. It's no good standing on the step with a torch and clapping. That's nonsense, and I never do that. We've just got to get down to making our society work better, and we've got to start making our politics work. I don't like decisions that are made for political reasons, as opposed to the welfare of the country, which is what's been happening a great deal of the time. Most of the mistakes have been because politicians didn't want to offend other members of their party. So that sort of thing, I want to see change. But me personally, I just want to have a coffee with

my mates because I know that being on my own has driven me slightly mad. I was a bit mad, but I mean, I know I'm really round the bend. Because there's nothing to take the edge off. No, and there's no one to get evil thoughts out of your head, confused thoughts out of your head. Normally, you think, oh, my God, I'm going to die, or my neighbour or my grandchildren are going to die if they go back to school. A quick discussion with a mate will make you realise that you're talking absolute rubbish.

But I haven't had that. So things have got totally out of control. And I'm so fed up with all my friends having achieved a lot. I think you will not be alone in that. And thank you for being so candid. It's really well appreciated here and also will be with people listening. Kerry, you have had a baby we can't take that away from you and we definitely want to hear about that but hopefully you haven't

learned French or otherwise uh absolutely no languages not even Czech which as I'm based in the Czech Republic would have been the sensible thing to do I just grew a human and I feel like that's a big enough job to be honest indeed and what what has that been like because that would be a very different life-altering experience in times. Yeah, I mean, it was it was really it's been the tour kind of intrinsically linked for me now, the pandemic and my baby. So we moved to Prague, actually, because we've been trying for a long time. I'm 40, I was 40 last year. And we'd kind of given up hope of having a baby. of course as soon as we moved country we fell pregnant so we fell pregnant a few weeks before the first case here in the Czech Republic and

then 12 days after that before country lockdown it was one of the the strictest lockdowns in Europe quite a lot ahead of Britain actually so you have this like incredibly exciting vulnerable time as a as a new mum with a very much wanted baby and then this the world really just you know becoming chaotic and especially at that time we didn't know how the virus affected pregnant women how it affected babies so it was this real a real sort of intensity I guess to the whole experience but still so much gratitude. I suppose it's one of those things, where were you when the music stopped? And what were you doing? And what that's been like? And I imagine in a way, when you're at that stage, and having been through actually both parts of your experience, not thinking I'd get there and then getting there, you know, that gratitude and all of that is incredible. But at the same time, you've got

to recover and you've got to learn how to live. And it's kind of almost aggressive nesting. But in lockdown, I imagine that would be, you know, even more. Yeah, I mean, I think one of the things that I was always quite grateful for was that so I've always worked a lot. I love my work. And that hasn't changed since I became a mother, became pregnant. But I just had to slow down. You know, I just wasn't able to do the work that I would usually do because it often just had been cancelled down you know I just wasn't able to do the work that I would usually do because it often just had been cancelled or moved or it was in another country and we'd border restrictions and so there were definitely times when it felt overwhelming and I said a lot of like why now why have all the years we've been trying is this the year that happened but then also I got

all this amazing time with my partner you know and we found ways because it's just not sustainable to live in that heightened panic or anxiety for a whole year. We found ways to try and make the experience valuable, I guess, and so that we would remember this time with our baby happily rather than as a time full of anxiety. I think that's the thing you've got to try and find that balance and as Sheila was saying if you're on your own there's no one to perhaps offset it with and you've got the opposite problem Yasmin you've got a lot of people in your home and I wonder tell us a bit about what it's been like living with grandma through to sibling. So I live with my parents all the time anyway. We're not exactly what I'd call a close family. So I just, you know, I'm mostly just alone in my room. And, you know, they're in their own room. So it's been pretty much the same. But I think what's affected me

most is the way that it plays with your mind. I suffer from from depression anxiety anyway so on top of that all this worry and you know the constant news and the doom scrolling it really really got to me at the beginning and I always say that lockdown was pretty much my life anyway I don't um I don't socialize much I don't um enjoy going out so I do enjoy just spending time in my house but it was so hard to do anything like um I you know make a living writing books so that is just sitting in my room at my desk but I couldn't even do that because of how it had affected my mental state and I think that's the horrible thing that we're still dealing with you know a year on and I don't see it going away anytime soon. But that's what... Well, I think, you know, it's interesting with some similarities there

with what Sheila was saying. One of your tweets we noticed, which was, is anyone finding it impossible to do anything these days? I have zilch motivation or energy. I just spend my days playing games on my phone, watching Desperate Housewives and feeling overwhelmingly guilty for doing so. Really much how it's been for the last year. And I think that's been my way of coping is allowing myself not to feel bad about not learning French, you know, like everyone else's or not baking all the bread and doing all the things that you see people doing.

Well, in the first lockdown anyway, that everyone was doing on social media. And you sort of feel like, oh, you know, maybe I should be using this time as well and doing you know writing more books but if I can't do it I'm not I don't think it's healthy to force yourself to do things in such a horrible situation. Has it added an extra level of stress because of contact with your grandmother and wanting to make sure she's safe? Yeah, absolutely. We were all, you know, terrified. She's, you know, nearly 90. So she's obviously very vulnerable to this disease. And obviously, at the time, my brother was working outside of the house and, you know, worried about germs coming in and even shopping and things like that. We were very terrified for her and my parents who are, you know, quite elderly as well.

But my grandma was lucky enough to get one of the earliest jabs. So she had just gotten her second jab when my parents and I got COVID. So it was extraordinary timing that she had, you know, just gotten it. And we were luckily very, very mild in comparison to other stories. So we had just each of us a day or two of just feeling like we had the flu and then back to normal, thankfully. Sheila, to come back to you, I've got a message here, which I think you'll be able to identify with from Liz in Aberdeen Show.

It says, of course I want my life back. I want bustling cafes, busy pubs, where you jostle to get to the bar. I want live music where the venue is absolutely rammed. I want theling cafes, busy pubs where you jostle to get to the bar. I want live music where the venue is absolutely rammed. I want the Edinburgh Festival. And she carries on a lot about that. Do you think you'll go back yourself personally? We can have that wider discussion that you were starting to have with us about wider society in a moment. But do you think you'll go back, Sheila, to how you were before exactly if we can?

Oh, Sheila, I think you've actually just hit your mute button, which is one of those phrases if you are going to have a pandemic bingo. I'm going to see if you could just unmute yourself to get your microphone back on. Okay, we're going to just, we're going to see if we can, I think, try and help you.

But if you can click your microphone button, Sheila, to just unmute yourself, we'll be able to hear what you have to say. Kerry, let me say that to you. I recognise you've now got a a child in tow so life's going to be a bit different anyway but do you think you're going to go straight back oh my god yes stop me you know stop me if you can um I have already planned about 500 trips overseas um and to every crowded public place I can possibly go to um obviously I think what's been interesting is that a baby just does make your life a little bit smaller in many ways, and then pandemic does too.

We are a very long way away from that in the Czech Republic, though. We're still in a very strict lockdown at the moment. We have some of the worst contagion in the world per capita. So we're really looking at possibly even not even seeing a lockdown to the end of the year. So a lot of it's about trying to remember that things might not even go back to normal. They might be better than they were before

because as Sheila said, so many things have been recognised about where society hasn't quite worked and people have identified those. Yes, and I was just going to say to your situation, in the Times I read this from a writer called Esther Walker, who said, One more thing. I've been amused throughout the pandemic about how everyone has been forced to live the way that a baby, a mother with a baby must. Without access to all the fun things, subject to stupid baking expectations, waking and sleeping at odd hours, finding outside is now dangerous and a hassle and asking daily, who am I? Where is my old life? Oh, yes. Amen to that. Just an observation I wanted to show you. Sheila, bring you back in. Your microphone's live.

I think I am back. Yeah. I'm actually quite scared of coming out. I'm so enjoying the fact that I am now wearing my bottoms of dirty old trousers and I don't wear makeup and I my hair is I just cut bits off when it gets too long I've quite enjoyed being slutty and I'm quite worried about having to look all right you know I look like a bad lady when I go out I'm looking at you now you look great no no well I've made the effort for you. But when I go out, I have a terrible woolly hat and a horrible coat. And I do look, I mean, social services are going to knock on the door eventually. But I mean, I just, I find also the fact of being disciplined again. You know, I mean, I will be because the next thing I'm doing is a television.

And that necessitates getting up at a certain time, being in makeup and, you know, I mean, I will be because the next thing I'm doing is a television. And that necessitates getting up at a certain time, being in makeup and, you know, and shooting. And I need that because I realized this last year in my 88th year, I've realized I have no self-discipline at all, which is why I'm also trying to finish a book. And I have managed to write some books, but it's been a real effort. I mean, I know that Val is on the programme later and the discipline of a professional writer amazes me. All on your own, nobody telling you to. We've got Yasmin and Kerry as well, also trying to fashion books at the moment, and Val McDermott coming up talking about

what's going on politically in Scotland. But just with something you were saying there, and I should say, I'm looking forward to watching you in Great Canal Journeys on Channel 4. But I was going to ask what you're saying there about being worried about coming out. I think that's a real thing right now. People thinking, I'm not quite sure how to get back to whatever it was before. Yeah. And to drop the things that you didn't like. There's a lot of people that I don't actually want to meet again. Do you know what I mean?

I've quite enjoyed just being on Zoom, you know. But I'll now have to be polite to them again because that's what we do. Maybe there's some polite breakups coming up. I don't know. Yasmin, do you think this time of perhaps being in, which is what you were doing and like to do before anyway, do you think there's sort of like you know hearing you know the government saying that they aim for things to be back to normal within you know June and July I've got a book coming out in July and the idea of having like a launch party or doing events terrifies me you know meeting people being close to them that like it it worries me how you can sort of promote a book as you would in normal times in the times we're in now

I think um this is your second your second young adult novel this is my truth coming up in the summer but but I suppose it's it's also just about reconnecting with with those that you perhaps haven't been able to see you know at a much lower level I know that there's there's young ones in your family that you're worried perhaps especially your mum's been worried about them not even recognising her yeah I have um a nephew who's um two years old and um he was zooming with my sister and he had to ask his sibling who she was because um he didn't recognise her anyone that's just so so sad to hear because we used to see them you know we used to seeing them every weekend and things like that so to hear things like that it really breaks your heart and I can't imagine what it must be like for Kerry to have you know a new baby who's having to sort of miss out on that interaction

with other children and things like that it's it's worrying so much. And all the support that you need when you've got a young baby do you do you get that? Are you getting that? Kerry, everyone's turned very concerned for you. Go on. Actually, I mean, I'm really lucky that I have a phenomenal partner. And one of the nicest things has been that I've fallen in love all over again with him because if you want to test your marriage,

have a baby during pandemic in a country that is not your own country. So no baby groups, no. My son's never seen me outside without a mask unless i'm also holding a takeaway cup of coffee he obviously hasn't met his parents his grandparents and his um our wider relatives and that's that's really kind of the most heartbreaking thing because he's he's four and a half months now so he's growing all the time and changing and we just want them to be able to give him a cuddle. So those are the really hard

things about it, I think. You've actually contributed to a book called This Is How We Come Back Stronger, Feminist Writers Turning the Crisis Into Change. And we've got quite a few messages along that lines. Leslie says, I sincerely hope we can look forward to a new and different future. I've used the time to develop myself. I hope we'll be less judgmental, more generous, less self-centred, less grasping, more able to wait our turn. That sort of element coming back in, especially I suppose around vaccination. Realistically, I realise that most of these things will fall by the wayside in the scramble to get back to the shops, pubs and restaurants, but I can but hope that some of the valuable lessons of life have filtered through. Thank you so much

to our contributors this morning and giving us a snapshot of how it's been for them over this very strange year. We do appreciate it. Dame Sheila Hancock, you did become a Dame as well in this time. I know, and I couldn't even celebrate. But no champagne, none of that.

Well, with this time, I think this sounds like there's going to be an awesome party. Maybe we'll centre it around your book, Yasmin, and we'll get Sheila out and we'll get Kerry over. It'll be great. Who knows when it will be, but we might be on Zoom first of all doing it. Dame Sheila Hancock, Kerry Hudson, Yasmin Rahman, thank you very much

to all of you for sharing what has been an odd 12 months and you're getting in touch. Please continue to do so and I will come to your messages again very, very shortly indeed. But the future of Nicola Sturgeon, one of the most powerful female politicians in the UK,

has been in the balance in recent weeks as she's faced not one but two major inquiries. Yesterday afternoon, an independent inquiry by James Hamilton QC cleared the First Minister of Scotland of breaching the ministerial code. But this morning, a separate cross-party committee of inquiry said that Scottish government's handling of harassment complaints against Alex Salmond was seriously flawed and that Nicola

Sturgeon had misled their inquiry in her evidence and that women had been badly let down by the government and yet as the Times analysis this morning put it there will be particular pleasure among Nicola Sturgeon's supporters that a woman did not have to pay a heavy price for events that can ultimately be traced back to the failings of a flawed man. I'm joined now by our political correspondent Nick Erdely. Tell us Nick, is she home and dry or scot-free as they're putting it? Yeah I think so. The Hamilton report, that one from her independent advisor, was the key report here. And he was pretty unequivocal, actually, that he didn't think Nicola Sturgeon had broken the ministerial code. So I don't think there's any doubt she'll stay in her job and she'll lead the SNP into the election.

And all the polls suggest she'll win and continue as First Minister. I suppose there's a wider question over the damage this has done to the SNP and potentially to the Scottish Government and Ms Sturgeon but I think for now yeah high and dry. Well what about the vote of no confidence that the Conservatives, the Scottish Conservatives are planning later today? She'll win it so we think that'll be about half past three this afternoon. She's got the backing of the Green Party, so that gives the SNP a majority. She will win that vote. There are some questioning why the Conservatives are still pushing it.

I think, frankly, it's because there's an election in six weeks and everybody's figuring out their positions going into that election. So I don't think that vote this afternoon will be a problem for her at all. And in terms of what this does to the bigger goal, that, you know, it used to be the goal of Alex Salmond and, of course, still the goal of Nicola Sturgeon. It could still be the goal of Alex Salmond, of course, but there's been a bigger thing that he's been fighting,

independence. And that's going to be, you know, one of the big questions to come out of this is, so you have Nicola Sturgeon cleared by her independent advisor on the ministerial code. But this report that's come out today is very critical and it will make difficult reading for Nicola Sturgeon because, you know, it really lays into government on how it came up with its harassment policy, on whether she misled MSPs with her evidence, on her claims that she didn't find out about allegations against or concerns about Alex Salmond's behaviour before November 2017. It cast doubt on all of that. And I suppose the question that we're all wondering,

and I can't give you a definitive answer, but I hopefully will be able to in six weeks, is what impact this will have on the election. Because the SNP are hoping to get a majority. If they get a majority, they phone Boris Johnson up on the 7th of May and say, we've got a cast-iron mandate for another independence referendum.

If they don't win a majority, opposition parties will say, they don't have that cast-iron mandate. So this could have a big impact on whether there's another referendum. The polling on independence, it's been on a knife edge for a while. There are some suggestions that it's dipped a wee bit,

but not enough to, I think, make unionists particularly comfortable. Nick Erdley, thank you for putting us in the picture politically with what's going on at the moment. I'm now joined by the crime writer Val McDermott, who's a personal friend of Nicola Sturgeon, and Alex Massey, who writes for The Spectator magazine, amongst others, around these issues. If I could start with you, Val, good morning.

Good morning. How is Nicola Sturgeon and how damaging do you think this has been for her? I can't speak to how Nicola Sturgeon is, but in lockdown, I haven't seen her for over a year. You may have had a text, you may have had a call. Friends still do that. We do still do that. We don't tend to talk very much about politics, to be honest. We talk mostly about books and what I'm writing and that sort of thing. But I imagine today she's feeling relatively reassured by the James Hamilton report, which unequivocally clears her of wrongdoing

and unequivocally says she didn't break the ministerial code. I'm less concerned with the committee of MSPs since it clearly divided along party political lines. And really, that's not kind of what you would like a committee to do. Alex, do you think that the questions, all the questions have been answered with these two reports? Well, yes and no is the rather unsatisfactory answer to that. James Hamilton's investigation was into a fairly limited,

narrow set of questions as to whether Nicola Sturgeon had broken the ministerial code or not. Now, he finds that she has not. There is no case to answer there. The Holyrood Investigation Committee is investigating a rather broader set of issues surrounding the government's mishandling, its unlawful investigation into the initial complaints

made against Alex Salmond and how it came to be that the government botched that investigation. And there, although, as Val rightly says, there is a partisan divide on some aspects of the committee's report much of it much of the detail of it is actually made on a unanimous basis and what we see there is Scottish government time and time and time again failed to implement its procedure properly failed to apply its procedures properly, and therefore ended up with an unlawful

investigation that was, as a judge said, tainted by apparent bias. Now, thus far, nobody has been held accountable for that. And the women who made the complaints also say that they lacked support from the Scottish government, that they were let down by the Scottish government. And it seems reasonable, I think, to assume that although Nicola Sturgeon's position is absolutely clear, you know, is absolutely secure, politically speaking, when it comes to answering for the government's mistakes, which she admits, there is still actually quite a lot of explaining to do. That won't threaten her position. It won't stop her winning the election.

But it does cast something of a cloud over what is otherwise, yes, clearly a pretty good series of outcomes for Nicola Sturgeon. But what would you say to that, the damage done there? Because Nicola Sturgeon has made a big point of talking about women and the women who made these accusations, even when she was appearing in front of that parliamentary committee. Well, that is the same parliamentary committee that leaked the evidence of two of the women that was given in confidence to the parliamentary committee. Their confidentiality was trashed by the committee that's now accusing the Scottish government

of getting everything wrong. And I'm not defending the Scottish government over this because they clearly got a lot of things very severely wrong here. That is kind of the nature of government. It's kind of the nature of politics because politicians are human. Civil servants are human. Mistakes get made. And if we're going to talk about mistakes, I have to say, as far as the Tories are concerned, people live in glass houses shouldn't be thrown stones. If you look at the track record of the Westminster government over the pandemic, never mind everything else, you'd have to say, why are there no inquiries being made into that? But yeah, I think it's problematic.

Well, there probably will be an inquiry. And that's obviously a question that a lot of people are thinking about today, again, because of it being an anniversary of when we've locked down. But sorry, carry on what you were saying. No, I'm just saying I think that it's been quite interesting to me that the way that the unionists are desperately trying to do anything to hold Nicola Sturgeon's feet to the fire and the feet of her government to the fire. As I say, they get some things right, they get some things wrong. That's the nature of government. But Val, they wouldn't be doing this, would they, if it wasn't for Alex Salmond?

Alex Salmond has driven this. And I just wonder, for you, as someone who supports independence, supports Scottish independence, has this not left a bitter taste in your mouth, watching somebody who really can take a lot of credit for the SNP's success and independence growing in popularity,

that he is in this sort of driving seat of what some have said is driving for revenge? Yeah, it's a desperate, desperate pity. He's a man who has effectively destroyed his own legacy. He's roaming about the landscape like a wounded elephant. I mean, I think for years he was a mentor to Nicola Sturgeon and not just to Nicola, to many of the other politicians in the SNP who grace our front benches now.

Alex, in his earlier days as leader, did support people, helped them in their careers, showed them how to manage the job they were supposed to do. But I think what happened in 2014 when he resigned was he thought he would still be the mentor, the eminence Greece, the power behind the throne. And Nicola very quickly made it clear to him that she was not going to be guided by him on a daily basis, that she had her own politics, that she had her own route to independence, and that he was not going to be this figure in the background. And I think what we're seeing here is wounded pride and revenge. Alex, just to come back on the point that Val was making, or beginning to make there about

Westminster, and looking at what some have drawn an analogy, and I wonder if what your take is on this with what happened with Priti Patel the Home Secretary last year she was found to have broken the ministerial code in her behaviour towards staff a big payout paid out to the staff member affected Boris Johnson didn't sack her well yes if he was better at chess the Prime Minister would have sacked Priti Patel in the hope that doing so might further down the line increase the degree of pressure on Nicola Sturgeon. Because, you know, Nicola Sturgeon, if you like, if you view it in raw political terms, is a piece of much greater value to the SNP than Priti Patel is to the Conservative Party. And so, therefore, the Home Secretary could be considered a sacrifice worth making. And now, obviously, the prime minister didn't think of it in those terms. But, you know, the notion with an enormous amount of time for Val, but I think that this notion that, well, government is very difficult and everybody makes mistakes.

And we should always bear that in mind is a kind of charitable verdict that she would not apply to political parties, perhaps with whom she was less sympathetic. And in any case, the we're no better than the Tories is perhaps not the defence the Scottish nationalists make it, you know, offering that line today think it is. You know, in the end, you either apply standards uniformly or you don't apply them at all. That said, you know, the temptations for sort of partisan whataboutery are familiar and all too often irresistible. You know, the Scottish government, by its own admission, made serious blunders in this process. And the only reason these inquiries are taking place is because of the mistakes made by the Scottish Government itself. And so I don't think it's particularly unreasonable for people to think, well, there should be at least some measure of accountability for these

mistakes, even if that doesn't necessarily require the First Minister's resignation. Well, I agree with you, there should be accountability. And I hope that as we move forward from this, lessons will be learned and that procedures will be put in place that serve women who are, and indeed men, who are subject to sexual harassment in a much better way within the Scottish Government and the wider civil service. It needs to be dealt with. Even if Nicola Sturgeon, as it seems to be, is going to stay in post,

of course elections coming and I should say full details of all candidates will be available on the BBC's website as we head into this period. But do you think now, Val, that this has cast enough of a shadow for independence to be off the table in Scotland? I don't think independence will be off the table because I think there's a huge number of people in Scotland who believe that our best future lies to be independent of the United Kingdom. And I think... They've got to trust the people who are going to go and do that, don't they? Who are going to lead them and break away if that was the reality. Indeed. But I don't think that sufficient damage has been done to the trust placed in Nicola Sturgeon by the people of Scotland

for that to collapse beneath us. Nevertheless, the policy of independence is something we should pursue, regardless of the personalities involved. Yeah, but policy of independence is something we should pursue, regardless of the personalities involved. Yeah, but that's the point. You've got to have leadership, haven't you? And obviously, her polling has been, to be completely clear on that, has been higher than Boris Johnson's during this pandemic. But it's a whole other ballgame if you're going to trust to break away. Alex, same question to you, and then I've got to bring this to a close. Do you think this has harmed the wider case for independence under Nicola Sturgeon as she is still the leader?

Well, it hasn't helped it. And, you know, it is quite clear that the SNP will win the election. But as Nick Ardley was saying earlier, it does make a difference, the scale of the SNP and the Conservatives to pretend that a referendum will follow in the next year, 18 months, if the SNP win a majority in May. I think a lot of that talk is excited and exaggerated and that there will not be a referendum on anything like that timescale. Well, we hope to welcome Nicola Sturgeon back to Womans' Hour at some point soon. She's obviously pretty busy at the moment. But Val McDermott, thank you very much for talking to us today, giving your perspective. And Alex Massey, thank you to you. Messages, of course, welcome on this.

We've just got a message here saying, well, Priti Patel and Boris Johnson's careers don't seem to have suffered under similar findings. Another one here, are you going to ask about the difference between the way Sturgeon was treated as compared to Boris Johnson over allegations relating the ministerial code? I think we covered that with regards to Priti Patel and more messages coming in. Let's go back to that in just short order, because there's another area of policy, if you like, that came and sort of went last week without much scrutiny. And we wanted to return to it because last week's announcement that police in England and Wales are going to start recording misogyny as a hate crime in the wake of the killing of Sarah Everard was heralded as a victory by many women's rights campaigners. But not everyone agrees. Far from it. Many working in the arena of domestic abuse and violence against women actually worry that the move could be counterproductive, possibly make the situation worse.

Dr Fiona Vera-Gray from the University of Durham thinks that's the case. She joins us now to explain more. And I'm also joined by Professor Louise Malarney from the University of Nottingham. She produced an evaluation of what happened when Nottinghamshire police began recording misogyny as a hate crime in 2016. If I could start with you, Louise, because in your analysis of the 174 cases recorded in the first two years, only one, I believe, resulted in conviction. Tell us more about that. Is that the model to be rolled out now? So this is an evaluation that was carried out by myself and my colleague Loretta Trickett at Nottingham Trent University. And we tracked the impact over the

first two years of Nottinghamshire Police bringing this in. It's important to point out that one of the reasons they brought it in in the first place wasn't to put swathes of men in jail and enter them into the criminal justice system. It was about raising the profile of how the police take these crimes seriously, and to encourage women to come forward and report. There's a vast amount of information that has been received by Nottinghamshire Police and a whole range of other police forces have also brought this in, which allows them to monitor. It allows them to report. It allows them to evaluate the situation of terms of when these crimes are happening, who they're happening to. And overall, 75 percent of women who reported misogyny, hate crime,

were very satisfied with the outcome and openly said they knew that there wasn't going to be a perpetrator thrown in jail. It was dark and they're approached by a stranger. They wanted to report the crime and they wanted to have it taken seriously. And that's what the policy enabled them to do. Fiona, what do you make of this? Explain why you've got some reservations. I've got a lot of reservations, Emma. I think firstly, I want to say that none of this is to take away from the work that happened in Nottingham and the women that drove that work I think we know now much better what this does in practice and we didn't know that before they did that so it's really good they've done that it's great that Louise and colleagues did the evaluation I think what comes out really strongly firstly we know overwhelmingly most women don't report we saw this in the

Nottingham evaluation I think it was around six percent of those responding to the survey had reported so we're thinking really small, even with the introduction of this policy. We also know that women from black and minoritised communities in particular have a really horrific experience of the criminal justice service centre process. And it's an acknowledged limitation of the Nottingham evaluation around the experiences of black and minoritised women. And we really need to know much more about what the possible impacts or consequences is around that aspect before a national rollout. Police awareness, which Louise just touched on, again, in the evaluation, you know, we found that a lot

of the police actually didn't support the policy. They said that the training was unhelpful and they were quite dismissive of the need for misogyny hate crime. So the idea that we're going to introduce this and all of a sudden police attitudes are going to change and they're going to take women seriously is uh i don't think borne out by the evidence but the last thing and the real important worry and concern that i have and many feminists have had this for for decades actually is around the framing of hate crime itself and and what it does if what we do is start to think about violence

against women and girls as being motivated by men who hate or are hostile or are prejudiced against women, because that actually takes us a step back in public understandings of violence against women and girls. Is that because men won't necessarily view what they're doing as motivated by hate? Exactly. And society won't see that because it's not.

I mean, research that's been done with men who perpetrate public sexual harassment shows that it's done overwhelmingly for male bonding, performance of masculinity, sometimes for boredom and benevolent sexism, thinking that all men's going to feel better if you wolf this ladder. The motivation of hostility or hate or prejudice just isn't actually there.

But also what it does culturally, the problem is we've seen in the last couple of weeks, we're really starting to have a very important conversation about men's role, all men's role in creating the conducive context for violence against women and girls. And what hate crime risks doing is shifting that focus away and allowing us again to think about the men who choose to use violence against women as being somehow different. You know, they somehow, they're men, they're hate-filled men, they're different men, they're not our sons, brothers, husbands, fathers, friends, they're different.

That's really dangerous. We don't want to go down that road. Keen to bring Louise back in, but just so I do get your full sense here, what are you saying we should do instead of this then? Oh, lots. Maybe go to Louise first. I've got lots of ideas of what we need to do but sorry but if you don't think this is right is there for instance an example you could just give that's that's if you like um something that could be done instead at this time because of course last week it was against the backdrop of of the killing of a young woman and that's what the political weather was, if you see what I mean.

Okay, so one example is to fund specialist women's organisations and specialist black and minoritised women's organisations to train their local police and to work with the College of Policing to develop and embed training on violence against women within the national curriculum for police. That would change attitudes much more than the introduction of something

like misogyny, hate crime would. So you don't think there needs to be this addition as it is at the moment it's actually about some not just only but about some cultural change and the change in attitudes of police i know there are other suggestions louise opportunity to to respond to that of course please let me back in um so i've i've one of the things that i want to to just draw attention to is it's been seven years in the making the misogyny hate crime since Citizens UK originally put this to the table. Citizens did a big piece of research last last year, which actually looked at the experiences of black minority ethnic individuals as well. The Law Commission have been investigating this for the past 18 months and have come up with the recommendation that sex and gender hate crime should be brought into legislation.

So it's something that's been going on for a very long time and numerous people throughout the country have already been consulted and have been part of that process. In terms of hate crime, I think if we look at the Crime Survey for England and Wales, when that was reported between 2015 and 2018, 67,000 people reported hate crime, and statistics show that they were more likely to report hate crime than there were any other crime. And 57% of those that actually reported this were women. So I think that it's important to bear in mind that this has been going on for a very long time. We're not saying that misogyny, hate crime is going to solve everything. It's one start of the process. And I would agree with what fiona said there there's a huge piece of work that needs to be done here this is very much part of a jigsaw puzzle and i think that we've got to a position

where we need to not turn inwards and start fighting amongst each other in terms of which terms matter or what we need to do because we're all fighting towards the same political goal louise do you think people know what misogyny means? Our research found that, and we spent a long time with the Law Commission talking through this at roundtables and at events, and our recommendation was to change it to gender or to change it to sex because misogyny as a term is very elitist, it's very academic, and we found even people with degrees on the street didn't know what it was and couldn't define it. So I think that Loretta and myself wholeheartedly agree with what the Law Commission are putting forward, that it needs to be changed. It needs to be gender or sex hate crime instead of misogyny,

because it's not a term that's used in common language, in common discourse. I think it has become more recently speaking, you know, I'm a language and linguistics expert and it's my area of research. And I think with the advent of what we've seen politically over the last few years, it's something that is found far more frequently than it was with Donald Trump and other examples that we can draw attention to. But if you're going to report a crime, you need to understand what that crime is. Well, of course, that's why I asked it. Fiona, final word to you. Can you just say something about porn? Because I know you feel that this is a key part of it. Yeah, get me to talk about porn. I know you feel that this is a key part of it yeah get me to talk about porn I could talk about this all day I think that that's something actually again in terms of what we need instead funding for specialist women's services to deliver this kind

of training we need to start actively demanding that media which endorses encourages excuses sexual violence that promotes harmful gender norms we need to start asking for that to be held to account and I'm not here talking about things like censorship and everyone gets oh no you can't censor. This is about making the companies, actually, they've got these terms and conditions, what they say is on their platform. No one's holding them to account.

So I've done research with colleagues in the law school at Durham, and we've found that the terms and conditions of porn sites such as Pornhub and a couple of the other most popular porn sites in the UK absolutely do not represent at all what is on their very first page. We found things on their very first page. We're going to have to come back to that.

I'm so sorry, Fiona. I hate to have to cut you off, but I do have to just because of timings here. We will come back to this discussion, but we've started it and with that analysis and you can hear it's much more complex and I'm sure we will keep analysing it. Do come back to us.

That's all for today's Woman's Hour. Thank you so much for your time. Join us again for the next one. Hi, Russell Cain here. I just want to tell you about Evil Genius. It's the show where we take legends and icons from history. Everyone from Henry VIII to Gandhi, Richard Pryor, Mary Stokes, Dr Seuss

and I have a panel of funny people who are gathered around my desk and are subjected to horrific fact bombs which reveal things about their heroes they don't want to hear. At the end of the lively mind tennis, they must vote evil or genius. Cancel Mother Teresa or keep her.

By the way, listen to that episode. She was absolutely vile. Subscribe to Evil Genius on BBC Sounds. I'm Sarah Treleaven, and for over a year, I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there who 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.