Woman's Hour - Mary Quant, No-deal Brexit, Wild Rose

Episode Date: April 9, 2019

Waterproof mascara, mini-skirts, vibrant tights and athleisure: Mary Quant is widely considered to be a pioneer in women’s fashion. A new exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum celebrates the work of the iconic fashion designer. Jane talks to co-curator Jenny Lister and Deborah Cherry - who donated a Mary Quant dress to the exhibition that she had worn when she was 16.Theresa May has asked the European Council for a further extension to the Article 50 period. On Wednesday EU leaders will meet to discuss her request, and if they say no, the UK will be leaving without a deal this Friday. So what would a no-deal Brexit mean for women? What will the economic impact be on women: the catastrophe that some fear or, the opportunity that others hope for? Dr Victoria Bateman and Victoria Hewson discuss. A young single mother from Glasgow just out of prison with dreams of making it as a country singer is the subject of a new film Wild Rose starring Jessie Buckley and Julie Walters. Jane is joined by the writer of the film, Nicole Taylor, who also wrote the award winning drama ‘Three Girls’ about the Rochdale grooming scandal. Alys Conran on her new novel, Dignity, which features a woman controlled by her husband in the British Raj, her daughter, whose life was shaped by the difficult relationship, and a young second generation immigrant who works as a carer. All three women are looking for a place to feel they belong.Presented by Jane Garvey Produced by Jane ThurlowInterviewed guest: Victoria Bateman Interviewed guest: Victoria Hewson Interviewed guest: Jenny Lister Interviewed guest: Deborah Cherry Interviewed guest: Nicole Taylor Interviewed guest: Alys Conran

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BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hi, this is Jane Garvey and this is the Woman's Hour podcast, Tuesday 9th April 2019. Today, no-fault divorce, all you need to know about the changes to the law in England and Wales. The writer Nicole Taylor talks about her new film Wild Rose, which stars Jessie Buckley and Julie Walters. It's about country music and about Glasgow

and mother-daughter relationships. Alice Conran, the novelist, on her new book, Dignity, and a trip to the Mary Quant exhibition at the V&A. But we started, first of all, with a Brexit update for you. Theresa May is having talks today, Tuesday, with Angela Merkel and Emmanuel Macron. If the European Council doesn't agree to a further extension to the Article 50 period tomorrow, then as it stands, we will leave the EU without a deal on Friday. That's even though Yvette Cooper

and Oliver Letwin's cross-party bill to avoid a no-deal Brexit became law last night. That could still happen if we don't get the extension. So this morning, I talked to Victoria Hewson from the International Trade and Competition Unit at the Institute of Economic Affairs, which is a free market think tank, and to Dr Victoria Bateman, Economics Fellow at the University of Cambridge, author of The Sex Factor, How Women Made the West Rich. Here's Victoria Bateman, first of all, on what she thinks a no-deal Brexit could mean for women. Brexit is going to be, in my view, bad news for all of us. But I think it is interesting that the big women's groups in Britain, the Fawcett Society, the Women's Budget Group, the Women's

Equality Party, have all spoken out about how women will bear the brunt of any adverse effects of the no-deal Brexit. We can think about women as consumers, how it affects us in terms of potential shortages, the prices of goods, our consumer rights, women as workers and so potential job losses, and also women as users of public services. And of course, the last thing we need right now is for the economy to dip and for there to be further rounds of austerity affecting, for example, the provision of care services on which many women depend. Let's bring in Victoria Hewson then. Let's focus, if you don't mind, on those roles of consumer and users of public services. Consumers, first of all, the no-deal Brexit scenario

for women could be a problem. What do you think? Well, actually, the steps that the government has outlined for mitigants in a no-deal scenario would actually be very positive for consumers. They have announced that they would eliminate tariffs on almost everything except for a residual selection of items to protect farmers. Reducing tariffs means what, cheaper goods? It means cheaper goods because tariffs is just a tax. It's a tax on importing goods from countries that don't

have a free trade agreement, which is in the EU's case, you know, most of the world actually. And so cutting a tax on goods that people buy in the shops is great news for consumers. It's not just going to save you the amount that you'd pay in the shops is great news for consumers. It's not just going to save you the amount that you'd pay in the tariffs on those particular goods, but it introduces competition from the rest of the world, gets rid of those protectionist walls around the EU that protect EU producers and keep competition from other countries out of our markets. Let's focus on the users then of public services. How could you be certain or how are you relatively certain, because nobody's ever 100% certain, that public services will not be pretty severely adversely affected by a no deal Brexit? that Victoria just outlined who'd raised these concerns. We're talking about analysing with the cuts that we saw after the recession following the global financial crisis in 2008.

But let's be very clear, even the worst economic forecasts about the impact of Brexit don't actually forecast that we will go into a recession. They only forecast that we might grow slightly less slowly than we otherwise would have done. Well, let's put that to the other Victoria then, Victoria Bateman. We'll just have slightly slower growth, not the end of the world. Well, you know, let's look at the reality of this. I mean, economic forecasts have predicted that in 10 to 15 years time, we will be 10% poorer than we would be if we remained within the European Union.

Well, 10% less rich, 10% poorer. Now, of course, we can argue over numbers, but at the end of the day, we are removing ourselves from a union that has worked hard over many decades to pull down tariff barriers, non-tariff barriers, that allow us as consumers to be able to import goods freely from across Europe, as workers and as owners of businesses to be able to export across the continent freely, and for each of us to have important freedoms such as the freedom of movement that allows us to go beyond our own little region and make the most of our life no matter where we're

born. Yeah, I think that's probably an important point, Victoria Hewson. We focus a lot on people coming here in terms of free movement. We hear rather less about what will be our inability to go anywhere else. Well, that's a quite serious exaggeration of the situation. In fact, the EU has announced that British people will continue to be able to travel to the EU without a visa going forward. So we're not talking about travel, we're talking about work, educational opportunities. So we will be able to travel to the EU without a visa going forward. And let's be very clear, most British people who travel to work abroad don't go to the

EU. There are more British people working in Australia than there are in the whole of the EU. People want to travel to the United States, to Canada, are more popular for British people to go and work. And therefore, the opportunities for pursuing arrangements with those countries will be greatly beneficial to British people. Well, there are 1.2 million Brits living in the European Union at the moment. So I don't think this is a minuscule number. And what about future generations? I mean, we've become a more integrated economy, not just in fact our economy, but socially. And it's not the norm nowadays for a Brit to have to marry a Brit. For example, we can form personal relationships that go beyond our own

little boundary. And if we think about what supports the economy in the longer term, it is individual freedom, it is the ability for people to make most of their lives. We can't forget, Victoria Bateman, is that many, many women, many women listening now voted to leave. Many have told pollsters very recently that a no deal Brexit is just fine with them. Why are they wrong in your view? Well, I mean, I accept that the British economy faces many problems right now, housing, public services, a crisis of care, stagnating wages, but they're nothing to do with the European Union. And I do think that what's happened is we have scapegoated immigration, we have scapegoated the European Union as being the cause of some of these problems or as offering a potential solution to some of these problems.

It's been sold to us as a project that will allow us to take back control. Now, remain is, of course, no magic bullet, but those problems, housing, public services, wages and jobs will be much more difficult to resolve once we're out of the European Union than when we're a part of it. Yeah, the question Victoria Hewson has got to be, when will women benefit from leaving the European Union? Well, I think women actually, we would all, I disagree with the distinction between men and women in this question. Anyway, women equally have an interest in being part of it. Well, I can just as easily ask you, when will our listeners benefit from leaving the European Union? Absolutely.

Well, I think really I would have much preferred to leave with a deal. I think it's a great shame that we haven't managed to come to a pragmatic and constructive arrangement. Well, we don't know yet that we're at that point. But if we were to leave without a deal, On Friday. On Friday, there would be disruptions, but there would be immediate benefits in terms of we would have the certainty as to the parameters that we were operating in.

There would be no more excuses for the government to hold back from making the investments that are required in our customs infrastructure and in our trade policy. And from actually addressing some of those issues that Victoria just mentioned, which frankly haven't been addressed in the last decades of EU membership. So if it's so easy to address them as an EU member, why haven't we? And I would argue it's because government has become completely detached from democratic accountability. opening up the housing market, tackling issues around planning regulations that are preventing people from being able to own their own homes. Absolutely, we should be doing that. But I think fundamentally, we need to leave the EU and get on with the job of pursuing those policies that will make us a high growth, high skilled economy. Victoria Bateman. Yes, well, I worry that Brexit is turning direction, that what we're seeing is a backlash in society against the kind of free, open and tolerant society that we were heading towards. We're seeing resistance to immigration. We're seeing clampdowns on freedom of movement.

If you look at what most divides remain and leave voters, it is attitudes towards things like feminism, according to Lord Ashcroft's own polls. And so the type of world we're heading in, is it going to be the type of world that supports women's freedom, the type of society that is becoming more nationalistic, more anti-immigration? You're saying it will. Actually, we're becoming more pro-immigration. The polling since the referendum has shown a great or a material... If that's the case, let's have a people's vote. Let's put it to the people to see if the people

still want it. Of course it was about immigration. Of course it was about immigration. Well, it wasn't about immigration for everybody. You can't possibly say that. Carry on. Sorry, Victoria. It was about who makes the laws that decide what our immigration policies are. And as I say, as soon as the referendum result happened, polling showed almost a sense of relief that people could be more relaxed about immigration, knowing that a sovereign UK government would have control over those policies going forward, as well as all of the other policies that define our economic policies, our trade policies, which for decades have been handled by bureaucrats in Brussels. And I think it's going to be great news to have those policies brought back home.

Well, we welcome your view. Thank you very much indeed for talking to us. That was Victoria Hewson. She's from the Institute of Economic Affairs. And before that, you heard from Dr. Victoria Bateman, who is an economics fellow at the University of Cambridge. Thank you both very much for taking part in that conversation this morning. Now, you'll have heard already that the divorce laws are going to be reformed in England and Wales. So the idea being you can split up more quickly and hopefully with less acrimony. These are so-called no-fault divorces. It's something we've discussed a lot on this programme over the years. And this decision comes after a six-month consultation. Jo Edwards is head of the family law team at the law firm Forsters. Welcome, Jo. Good morning. This also all applies to civil partnerships as well, we should say.

It will do. That's the intention. Yes, Jane. Now, the timescale, when will this come into law? Well, what's being suggested today in this very welcome and frankly long overdue announcement is that the hope is that parliamentary time will be found quickly to address the issue of no-fault divorce and to bring in legislation. I've seen some reports suggesting that it may be as quickly as within the next three months, but the detail remains to be seen. And it's probably dependent on aspects of our earlier conversation, I imagine. Dare I say, I mean, Resolution and other organisations campaigning

for change have been rather concerned about the impact of Brexit and indeed the prospect of possibly a general election derailing this. So fingers crossed, nothing will stand in the way of reform. Now, is it 100% good news for women? I do feel and Resolution feels that this will be good news for women. One only has to look at the case of Tinney Owens last year. Remind us. For your listeners, that was the lady who petitioned for divorce based on her husband's behaviour. Her husband defended and said he felt that the marriage still had legs and that they should remain together. The judge looking at her case decided that she hadn't proved to the court's satisfaction that the marriage had broken down irretrievably. That's the legal test.

So she was left with having to wait for a period of either two years separation, but that would have required her husband's consent still, which he was never forthcoming. And so she's now having to sit out a period of five years separation, which will only conclude in February 2020. So she's had to wait for a long time. Have applied to a man, presumably? Absolutely, that's right. But what we see are people who are sometimes trapped in unhappy, often unfortunately abusive marriages,

who can't find a way out and do find themselves trapped in this way. Right. Could it mean that women are very vulnerable in some cases to, let's assume, a man saying, I want out of this relationship and I want it done really quickly and that's it, end of? I actually don't think that vulnerability will be there and clearly we need to see the detail. But one point I should make is that as the law presently stands, one can actually get divorced more quickly than these proposals are advocating.

So these proposals suggest that there will be a neutral process, a minimum six-month period between a statement being filed that the marriage is broken down and the final decree of divorce. At the moment, a divorce can be as quickly as four or five months. The other point I should make is that we hope, and certainly Resolution advocated this, that in cases where there could be financial hardship caused by a divorce, it will be possible to put a stop, to put a hold on the divorce until the financial consequences have been addressed. Most people don't get married. Cohabiting couples are actually the ones where family breakup is more likely. So what happens there? I mean, the situation with cohabitants in England and Wales is hugely regrettable. So there are around 3.3 million cohabiting couples in England and Wales.

It's the largest, the fastest growing family type by far. At the moment, there's no law which provides for them. And so that leaves people, particularly women, who may give up careers to have children who might not have property in their own right, particularly vulnerable on separation. So Resolution would love to see reform in that area as well. Right. I mean, are any politicians,

who I know are somewhat preoccupied at the moment, taking up that cause? Because that does seem like a massive gap. It was actually. There is a private member's bill being led by Lord Marks in the House of Lords, which had been on hold for quite some time. I think, again, probably largely as a result of Brexit.

There was a second reading of that in the middle of March and that is going to progress. Whether that is the right vehicle remains to be seen. So for now we very much welcome the reforms which are being advocated with no-fault divorce but Resolution would absolutely like to see all types of relationship looked at and financial provision both for separating couples on divorce but also cohabiting couples made. And just very briefly, the number of women petitioning for divorce, back to divorce briefly, has gone down. And the number of men petitioning for divorce has stayed about the same over the last, what, decade or so? Yeah, it's an interesting statistic that's been picked up. So the peak of divorces was back in 93 when there were about 165,000 divorces in England and Wales.

About 120,000 of those were started by women and about 40,000, 45,000 by men. By 2017, there were 101,000 divorces. Half of those, half of the 120,000, so about 60,000 were started by women and still around 40,000 by men. So there are concerns that that may be because of the legal aid cuts which took effect in 2013 and other economic factors. So another positive benefit of having a more neutral, simpler process is the hope that women will feel more readily able to access the process, able to do it online since last year, and hopefully it just makes things much more straightforward for all concerned. But to be absolutely clear, this isn't about disposability

of marriage. It's not about having an easy process. I've said already, in many cases, it may actually take longer to get divorced. And most couples in our experience think very long and hard before pulling the trigger on their marriage. Thank you very much. Really appreciate your input. Jo Edwards, head of the family law firm, law team at the law firm Forsters. Thank you very much indeed, Jo. Any thoughts on that? Welcome, of course. You can email the programme via our website, bbc.co.uk slash Women's Hour. Social media, we're at BBC Women's Hour. Loads of good stuff on Instagram for you, including some images from that Mary Quant exhibition that we're going to go on to talk about a little bit later. If you've got a thought on divorce or an experience you'd like to bring to the podcast later, remember, of course,

I don't need to use your name. We can use the email without referencing your name at all. So if you do want to tell us what you've been through or whether you think the change in the law is going to help you, please feel free to do so. Welcome to Nicole Taylor. Hello, good to see you. Good morning. The writer of a new film called Wild Rose. Now, Nicole is the woman behind the TV show The C Word with Sheridan Smith and three girls as well about the Rochdale grooming scandal, which was on the BBC. Wild Rose is about Rosalind Harlan. She's a mum of two. She's only 23, just out of jail. She returns to her mother's house, but she's got her heart set on making it as a country singer. And it's a good film. Saw it yesterday, thoroughly enjoyed it. And I think actually we're going to

play a bit of the music, actually. Can we just hear one of the tracks from the film Wild Rose? Here we go. Oh, my soul is unclean Country girl, got to keep on keeping on That's Jessie Buckley in Fine Voice. Julie Walters plays her mum in Wild Rose. This is a film, it's not just, it is about country music. It's also about mothers and daughters and hopes and dreams, isn't it? I hope I'm setting it up for the audience. Perfect, yeah. Couldn't have done better myself.

Oh, well, we'll end the interview here. So tell us, first of all, about your love of country music. Is this a lifelong thing? It's a lifelong passion. I think if I could sing, I would probably be a country star rather than a screenwriter. Ever since I was 12 or 13, I've just loved country music. I discovered it by accident.

How? I discovered it by having a lot of insomnia as a teenager and watching BBC two in the middle of the night when they showed the CMA awards the country music awards and Mary Chapin Carpenter was singing he thinks he'll keep her and it just it just blew me away I couldn't believe that a song could cover that kind of material um you know a woman in her marriage that had gone stagnant and her hopes and dreams and her frustrations and starting over in like three and a half minutes and I just loved it and from that moment on I became immersed in this kind of 90s country almost feminist canon with her and Wynonna and Patti Loveless and I think it's something that just lodged in me and I've always wanted

to write about it. Yeah Mary Chapin Carpenter. To my shame, I'd forgotten about her. She's been on the programme and she is an absolutely incredible singer and songwriter as well. Okay, so, and also I should say in this film, Casey Musgraves, who's my current country favourite, makes an appearance, a brief cameo towards the end when our heroine gets to, well, where does she get to? Oh, no spoilers, please.

But you will see Casey Musgraves pop up and another amazing woman of country at the moment, Ashley McBride, also has a cameo. Casey's wonderful, yeah. Okay, so let's go to the heart of this story then, which is set, as we may have hinted, where part of it is set, quite a brief part, but most of it is set in Glasgow

with our heroine, Roselynn, coming out of prison. Just tell everybody a little bit about Roselyne and what she's been through. So Roselyne, the very first line I ever wrote about this character a good 10 years ago now is that she's thrillingly, glitteringly alive, more alive than you. She's an absolute firecracker. She's got no self-control.

She's got the emotional intelligence of a brick, but she's warm and she's funny. And all she wants in life is to get out of Glasgow and make it to Nashville as a country singer and she's got the chops musically she's incredibly talented she's got charisma to burn but she's also got two young children and she's been in jail for a year and she's got a mum played by Julie Walters who's just fed up with this nonsense and not unreasonably wants her to get a proper job yeah settle down partly because she's left looking after the kids.

Quite, yes, exactly. And I wonder whether there's ever been a film in which a man, you can tell me, in which a man is torn between his fatherly duties and his desire to pursue his talent. Yes, exactly. There hasn't, has there? No way. I was trying to think.

No way. I'm surprised there's not even been other films about women in this situation because it seems such a universal. I think it probably is a universal. I don't know. I mean, do I feel guilty sitting here when I could be at home with two lumbering teenagers? No, not particularly. But in the past, certainly, I bet a lot of women listening will have had that conversation with themselves about whether it was the right thing to do. What do you think? I've got a two year old. So it's something I think about very often. I think, you know, it's not even just for women. I think for anyone dreaming of something, it's always in context, there's always a context of existing responsibilities. And through all these

years where the X factor and all those things were so popular, I was always more interested in people's reality and what it actually felt like to have a talent like that because it could probably be a bit of a double-edged sword it would make your life much more difficult because you just probably wouldn't be able to settle on anything um and you would want to get away and that sort of thing so I don't know I think um I think I think it's something that most people have experienced at one time or another. But yeah, it's particularly significant for women with children. What's interesting about the film is that the Julie Waters character, the mum, is she does want her daughter to have a go.

But at the same time, she also doesn't. And I wondered whether there was a kind of element of jealousy that her daughter might be having the opportunities she never had through no plot of her own. All of that's going on, isn't it? She's so ambivalent for exactly those reasons and it's all under the surface because the mum is as bad at emotional expression as the daughter.

And it's all churned up within her, that character of Marion, which is why it was so wonderful to get Julie Walters to play her because somebody who can't access their emotions to speak, I mean, she's perfect because you don't need to give her any dialogue you can understand just by looking at her face everything registers on her face and I think that conflict between mothers and daughters where there's you're ambitious for your daughter but you also somehow feel rejected if they are pursuing a life that's very different to yours that's something I relate to massively

and I really really wanted to write about it. So are you from a show busy family? Gosh not at all not at all no no no I mean if I would have said I mean I was a solicitor till I was 27. You could have done the previous interview. I couldn't I wouldn't have dared say at school I wouldn't have thought about it I always wrote and I always really wanted to write but I would never say I want to be a writer because growing up in Glasgow it would be like saying I want to be a model. You just wouldn't just be ridiculous. So, no, my my family are not showbiz in any way. Right. And how long did you did you work in the law?

Very miserably for until I was 27. Yeah, I went to law school and I read law as an undergraduate. And, you know, I did that thing to death until I finally had the courage to try and write. Yeah, but that's a big, big career move and a big change and I don't I actually just don't understand how you did it so can you explain how I stuck it out in law or how you stuck it out in law sufficiently long presumably to get some money in order to pursue your dream of being a writer exactly and I think that was what you did that's what I did yeah and it wasn't just the money I think I also had to insure myself against failure I'm not particularly um you know reckless person I think I'm quite risk averse and I don't think I would have been able to give it a go unless I knew that I had

something solid to go back to and that's very much my background you know you have to be sensible and you have to you know you know my mum left school at 15 and through her hard work she'd given me so many opportunities so it would felt like the, if I'd just gone off to be a writer, you know, first of all. So there's a lot of that, of my relationship with my mum in this relationship between Rosalind and Marion. It's very different, of course, writing a film compared to writing for telly. Well, I say that as though I know, I've got no idea. What is the difference? Do you know, it's not the writing so much as the process.

The process is so, so different. In television, once something's got the green light, that do you know it's not the writing so much as the process the process is so so different in television once something's got the green light that's you it's happening whereas with this film I first had the idea for the character nearly 10 years ago it was getting made then not getting made then getting made it's just the financing in film is so precarious in independent films so there's that um but when it comes to the writing, I suppose I didn't feel that that was any different from film and TV. My process is always the same, which is just to do one project at a time and just fully immerse myself and just dissolve until those characters feel real. Now, Jessie Buckley's character, Rosalyn, has tattooed on her arm and something I'd never heard before, but it's so true. So good as well. Three chords and the truth. Is that a well-known motto for country? It certainly is, yeah.

It's a quote from a song by a songwriter called Harlan Howard, and it's the very definition of country music. There will be some people listening who are still country resistant. Can you just name a couple of songs they need to listen to? Oh, such a good question. I think they should definitely give Casey Musgraves' new album, A Whirl. They should check out Ashley McBride, a particular song called Girl Going Nowhere.

And of course, on Friday, they should download Jessie's original soundtrack for Wild Rose. That was an open goal you certainly haven't missed. Thank you very much indeed. Thanks so much. Really good to talk to you, Nicole. Wild Rose, the film, out on Friday. And my, actually, Casey Musgraves' Space Cowboy.

That is one of the best songs ever that's on her new album I absolutely love that thank you uh thank you both I was going to say thank you to you and your alter ego Nicole for being in the room um now the miniskirt waterproof mascara a pioneer of athleisure Mary Quant that's the person I'm talking about she's the subject of a new exhibition at the V&A Museum in London. Here's a reminder of her last appearance on Woman's Hour 2012. Here she is talking about the miniskirt. I was doing pompous ballet classes, which little girls were always sent to. And then through a door I saw this other tap-dancing class going on.

And there was a girl wearing black stockings or black tights and a very short pleated skirt of about 10 inches and tap-dancing shoes, a sort of patent leather with a sort of bow on top. And it was the white socks, of course, made it. And I knew forever, that's it. I wanted to be able to move and run, go to work, go out in the evening to somewhere where I could dance half the night away, you know. And that tap dancer was always an image in my head.

Mary Quant on the programme in 2012. Well, I went to the exhibition and talked to the co-curator, Jenny Lister, and to Deborah Cherry. Deborah donated a Mary Quant dress she wore when she was 16. A lot of colleagues at the V&A felt it was a crying out to be done, this exhibition, to acknowledge her unparalleled contribution to fashion, particularly for democratising it and making it available to more people. We were able to use Mary Quant's own personal archive,

but also we had contributions from people all over the country, all over the world, sending in pictures of their garments and also of themselves wearing them at the time. So we've been able to tell the whole story and why her brand was so powerful at the time. Jenny, why hasn't there been an exhibition like this before? I think there's various reasons. It's partly because Mary herself was quite self-effacing.

There was also an exhibition in 73 which looked at her career up to that point. But also I think it's partly because she wasn't a couture designer. She designed for the people, mass production. She had her things made up in Stockport, so the raincoats were made there, underwear was made in Portsmouth, shoes in Bristol. And she worked with manufacturers at the time to produce things in multiples, thousands and thousands of these things,

which is why so many people of a certain age have heard of her. But if you were born towards the end of the 20th century, she's a name that might not mean very much at all. And yet, and it's easy to say this about fashion designers, this stuff genuinely could be worn today. It really is timeless. The colours actually are the thing that strike me first. What would you say about them? Mary had a very distinctive style she used brightly coloured cottons things that might have been used for different purposes even African export cottons and things and liberty prints as well they do stand out there was a new look that people of Mary Quant's generation they stood out from their mothers and it was just a new way of looking that

went with the social change of the time. So there's coats, there's dresses, there's skirts, anything else? Yeah, we've got everything. There's underwear, which of course transformed in the 60s as well, to go with the mini dresses. Tights, people don't realise that they were invented in the 60s. 63 was really when they first started. And of course, for mini skirts to get shorter,

you needed either very long stockings or tights. And these things we take for today there's also makeup which went with the look too Mary realized of course makeup had to change she wanted packaging to be gorgeous and minimal with her daisy logo of course so you see the full range from top to toe people could dress in Mary Quant but I think one of the key things is about the menswear that inspired her and I I think that was quite a liberated, almost a feminist thing to do, to sort of take menswear and kind of camp it up a bit and sort of say, isn't it ridiculous that just because you're wearing a tailored suit, you've got all the power? So she literally is kind of borrowed from the boys. And I think really showed women how it was possible to break out from the rules and regulations of clothes.

You mentioned then that you put out a public appeal for proud owners of Mary Quant clothes to contact the V&A and Deborah Cherry you are a woman who you've long worked in in the world of art haven't you? Yes yes and when I was a school student and a university student I just loved fashion and my my mother brought her shopping in London and she took me to Bazaar. This is Mary Quant's boutique. I think her first boutique had been in the King's Road, and then she opened this amazing shop. It was truly remarkable.

It didn't look like any other shop you'd ever been into. It had huge windows. It was very staged. It wasn't like a conventional department store in any way. And I can remember crossing the road and my mother saying, come on, this is where we're going. And she bought me several outfits there. So it was really, really exciting.

How old were you? I was about 16. You have donated to the exhibition. We're standing in front of your, I'm not sure whether this is a description I particularly like, it's described by the V&A, Jenny's looking at me, as a pocket romper dress. Is that a description you recognise?

I always thought of it as more like a pinafore over a blouse or a T-shirt. So it's got this wonderful, bold design, this white main part of the frock and then blue pieces and this lovely red peter pan collar and a red pocket on the front and what I loved about it was the colour it was so bold it was so adventurous the clothes that normally I might have worn at that period tended to be rather dull colours very very dull they were very similar to adult clothes and these were these were clothes for young women so you could walk easily they were fantastically comfortable to wear. What is the material?

The material is a cotton twill, isn't it? It's a really good quality cotton twill, which all these years later is still in really good condition. And I think that's very different to today's fashion, to throwaway fashion. But also, these are the days when Britain made clothes. Yes. I don't think Britain makes many clothes now.

I don't think so, no. But you actually wore this. I actually wore this. Right, it wasn't something that was kept in a wardrobe. No. Because Mary Quant wasn't Mary Quant then, although she was Mary Quant, if you know what I mean. You didn't know that this was going to be the leading name in fashion?

No, no, you just bought it, my mother bought it for me because it was stylish and young, it was about what were young women wearing. I also had a day sort of trouser suit, which I went out with my parents in, which was in cream and blue, so there were lots of different, she was, she led in athleisure, didn't she? That kind of thing that we think of now is so now but the the suit that I also had from her is really like kind of what would you say it was really yeah it's like a track suit with a zip up the front made in cotton twill sort of loose trousers so she was she was so varied I think that was a lovely thing about her fashion there was something for every occasion and she was popular, is that why she isn't, I hesitate, as celebrated as she should be?

It seems crazy to me, but maybe that is a factor. I think it could be. I think obviously it's the flip side to couture, so it's not Christian Dior. It's not about luxury and elegance and formality. It's about the very opposite of that. And it's almost about playing with life, you know, enjoying life. It's about an attitude much more than an individual dress on its own. It's much more than that.

And I think fashion history in the past has been led by people who wrote their autobiographies, you know, the big names like Dior, Chanel and Schiaparelli too. But Mary Conn was the first to be a designer brand who was well known and used the media so cleverly to build her brand and sell to masses of people. You could just buy lipstick and you would get a little bit of that feeling of being a little bit like Mary Quant. Why did you have the good sense to keep it? Presumably some of your other clothes you did throw away.

I kept a lot of clothes, yes. I've got my mother's couture dresses. I the other thing I would say this was a privileged childhood this is privileged white reasonably wealthy so I mean she did democratize fashion but I think there's a level of which it doesn't sort of filter through but I mean it was a total look I've still got her you know makeup palettes that was fantastically revolutionary that had all these colors in these makeup palettes tight stuff like that so it was about buying the look there's a dress we went past I think it's just around the corner actually from where we're standing now which is a really bright green

with a round collar and a zip and there there are dresses like that on sale, online, and on the high street now. So her influence has never gone away. It's just totally timeless. You could wear any of them now, no one would really take a second look at you. But again, I think it's that attitude of wearing fashion in a way that expresses something about yourself that makes you feel good and makes you get on with life

and get on with your job and can take you from work to going out afterwards as well I think that was at the heart of her brand too. What is your very favourite thing by Mary Quant, Deborah? I love this dress I mean I just thought I loved it at the time I loved having it I loved wearing it I was really you just stepped out and you felt kind of bold and you know young women had an identity by wearing clothes that were made for them these boots are made for walking and that's just what they'll do one of these days these boots are gonna walk all over you go to instagram at bbc women's hour for more images from that exhibition at the vnaA of Mary Quant's clothes.

Not just her clothes, actually. Lipstick and other stuff and mascara and all the rest of it. Some good raincoats, if I remember rightly. The exhibition closes next February. So I think it's fair to say you've got a bit of a heads up there. You should be able to get down between now and next February. And now the novelist, Alice Conran. Welcome to the programme. Good morning. Thank you. Latest novel is called Alice Conran, welcome to the programme. Good morning. Thank you. Latest novel is called Dignity, and I've loved this.

It's about three women, Evelyn, who's controlled by her husband back in the days of the British Raj, her daughter Magda, whose life was shaped by their incredibly difficult relationship, and another woman, a young second-generation immigrant, Sushila, who works as a carer in 21st century Britain. So three women, their lives interwoven. And your previous novel, Pigeon,

was a very different kettle of fish altogether. So why focus on these particular stories in this novel? I was always fascinated by my grandmother's stories of the time of the Raj. My father was actually born in Kharagpur, West Bengal. So whereas I am Welsh and my father's Welsh was brought up in North Wales, there's this history in the empire within the family. And I was just always drawn to it and wanted to explore in more depth what that experience was.

And what were your dad's family doing there? My grandfather was an engineer on the railways in India, which he has in common with the father in the book, in fact. So it does follow the sort of trajectory of my father's life in some ways in terms of the time period. But in fact, they're completely fictional characters that behave in very different ways. But I was able to mine a lot of family archive

and also a wider archive of first-hand accounts and primary and secondary materials. Where do you find this material? Because there's some really interesting and intricate detail here, particularly about the lives of women, British women in India. So I spent quite a bit of time in the British Library. You can listen to first-hand accounts. I mean, actually, the radio have done some fantastic programmes over the years, and I listened to quite a few of those. But also, I was lucky enough that we did have materials. And there's some brilliant books as well. Margaret Macgaret mcmillan i think women of the raj was a very useful resource and so so i just spent an awful lot of time reading up and and and trying to understand and and to hear the voices of of the women as i was reading and was really useful and i was lucky that my grandmother was very much in my mind who told

me these these stories and though i was a small child, I remember being told to sort of stand in critical relation to the stories that she was telling me, to be aware of maybe the prejudices that they passed on and things, but also to remember them. And I did, really quite amazingly, actually. I remembered the details of those stories that she told. Magda is, she's a real standout character for me in books I've read recently. I can't quite stop thinking about her.

She's an elderly lady. She's living in this crumbling house back in Britain. But I think it's always really touching when you have the same character as a small girl also in the same book. Because let's face it, the best we can all hope for is to age we just don't know how well we're going to do it and in whose company I always find that very moving yeah I mean she's she's become very embittered hasn't she and she's and her boundaries are very clear cut as an older woman so she's sitting in this house protecting herself with this fortress home in all kinds of ways and I suppose when we hear her voice as a a child, you see what she was like when she was unprotected

and just how imaginative. Well, without giving too much away, her home setting was dismal and deeply unpleasant. Yeah, terribly difficult and really steeped in ways of managing home life that managed all the affection and intimacy out of them as well as being exceptionally cruel actually in some aspects of their home life.

And here she is, very vulnerable and needing care and in this case some of her care is provided by Sushila. And tell us about her. So Sushila is a really clever young student who becomes a home carer to make ends meet and finds herself in personal difficulties in various ways. And Magda doesn't really want to develop friendships with her carers at all. I mean, she excludes them from her life in various different ways.

She's very clever also. And they're quite a good match for each other, really. When Sushila comes along, she gets herself underneath Magda's defences and they, these histories from her past in her mind before she dies. Yeah, it does. Well, it raises all sorts of issues about racism, about our view of the empire, about how we treated people without thinking about it very much. Yeah, and continue to treat people at times. Well, yes, indeed. There's no doubt as well that caring is, well, whenever we talk about caring in any form on this programme, always a huge reaction from the audience.

It's a very live issue, to put it mildly. Thank you very much. Thank you. I hope that's encouraged people to read what is a really interesting book. The novelist Alice Conran, and the book is called Dignity. Right, let's catch up with your emails and your views generally today. Julie says, I divorced amicably about 10 years ago. I initiated it, but it was a joint decision. It was actually a relatively quick process and we went through a two year separation. I think the no fault laws will help everybody, especially people trapped in unhappy situations, and I think the changes should be welcomed. Here's an anonymous email. My husband had an affair, but as I didn't want a divorce, he divorced me, so he ended a 22-year marriage, citing the reason that the dogs prevented us taking a holiday abroad. The judge found this absurd reason enough to grant a divorce,

leaving me feeling humiliated and with cynicism about the divorce laws. So the new law may save some individuals from even more painful finger-pointing, but the unreasonable behaviour will still go on. From Simon, my wife and I are going through a separation and have decided to avoid solicitors in order to allow us to be kind about it. Why would we throw away 15 years of love for each other by an attritional separation? It's shocking how many people when hearing this decide they need to tell us that it will get unpleasant and we must get solicitors. We are doing this for each other, not just the children. Change of law long overdue, says Simon.

On to the subject of Brexit. Diana from Madrid. I am a woman and I'm British, she says. I've lived in the EU for 35 years and had no vote in the referendum. I'm so tired of all this talk about democratic voting for Brexit when we were not included. It's going to affect everybody, both men and women, enormously if we leave without a deal. How dare people say otherwise? We know how it's going to affect us. Families, jobs, movement between countries, etc. Don't start talking about how we chose to move.

We have our own reasons for doing so, and believe me, it's not just Sun, Sea and Sangria, even if there are a few, in that category, says Diana. From Jo, I get really cross when people like Victoria Bateman trot out a doomsday scenario, but with no hard evidence. She was Eurocentric. The other Victoria acknowledged there was actually a wider world out there. By the way, why don't you talk about women's rights in Poland and Hungary, abortion and medical treatment, Hungary's terrible attitude to immigration, Malta,

corruption, the list goes on and on. The EU is not all sweetness and light. Vivian, it was a pity there was little focus on the economic effects of a no-deal Brexit in the discussion this morning. Leaving on WTO, World Trade Organisation rules, is seen by most economists and the Cabinet's own papers as resulting in a contraction of the economy, shortages of food and medicine and higher food prices. It was interesting to note that even Victoria arguing for leaving with no deal said she would prefer a deal. The deal we currently have is, I believe, the best on offer. That's Vivian. From Alison, I actually agreed with Victoria Hewson.

Victoria Bateman came over as living in a middle-class bubble, resorting to regarding those who think we're better out as racist or ignorant. That attitude really winds people up. Working-class women are better out of the EU. Mass immigration equals low wages slash social strain. Yes, just feel a bit of, I mean, nobody's inclined to feel pity for me, but it is difficult when both contributors on opposite sides of an argument have the same first name. Although, as I said earlier to the guests, nothing beats the day every single guest on the programme was called Jane. That was some time ago.

In fact, we should do that again because that was good fun in some ways. Mary Quant, what do you think about Mary? Annie says, growing up in the Northwest in the 60s, the closest I could get to Mary Quant couture was her hair. I had a version of her haircut when it finally reached Poynton, probably in about 1969. Congratulations, Annie. Paul, I joined the Met in 1981 and was told that Mary Quant designed the men's police uniform jacket, Four button, high wide lapel, very 70s, still in use as number one uniform, says Paul. Did not know that.

Lesley-Anne, I worked for Mary Quant Cosmetics when they were first launched. We consultants felt so special as we got fabulous outfits every year. My favourite was a khaki military style tunic worn over over a long-sleeved cream multi-coloured polka blouse. I had the five-point cut like Mary, but I used old-fashioned Indian henna to colour my hair, and it gave it the appearance of burnished copper. That's great, Lesley-Anne. Thank you very much. From Maggie, Mary Quant also had a fleet of London buses transformed into beauty bosses, which went all over the world to extend the brand. I was lucky enough to tour the province of Quebec with the beauty bus on the last leg of the nine month tour from the west coast of Canada to the east coast.

It was terrific fun and a quite unforgettable experience. Lovely reminiscing with your programme. Maggie, how fantastic. I did not know about the beauty bosses that toured the world. I bet you got some stories from that boss. I wouldn't mind another email if you've got a moment. We'll try and, yeah, we should actually get you on the programme. There's a decision made. We'll see if we can do that because, Maggie,

that sounds like a memory worth preserving. Tomorrow, Jenny's here for the rest of the week, in fact, on the programme. And tomorrow, she's discussing children with food allergies. Her guest is Holly Shaw. She's an allergy specialist nurse. And you might well have a question or an experience that will help the conversation in the programme. Please do pitch in. Email the show via the website bbc.co.uk slash womanshour. Oi, you. While you're here, have a listen to this, would you? Forest, forest, forest. An environmental thriller for BBC Sounds. I'm so sorry. Meet Pan.

Oh, I did. She lives a few centuries from now, after a data crash that wiped out most records of life. So when she finds an old recording of a rainforest, she has no idea what it is. Forest 404, nine part thriller, nine part talk, nine part soundscape. Starring Pearl Mackie, Tanya Moody and Pippa Haywood with theme music by Bonobo subscribe now on BBC Sounds subscribe now 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.