Woman's Hour - Primary school suspensions, Chess, Female birdsong

Episode Date: May 1, 2026

According to the latest Department of Education data, more than 7000 children under six were suspended in the 24 /25 school year in England and the number of children losing learning to repeat suspensions has doubled in two years, with the steepest rises among the youngest. This is against a slowing of suspensions in secondary schools. So why is this happening in primary schools? Anita Rani is joined by Kiran Gill, chief executive of The Difference, a school leadership charity who's been analysing this data.Last month eleven year old Bodhana Sivanandan became England’s highest ranked female chess player. The numbers of women registering to compete is slowly rising, but the game is still male dominated. Anita talks to two women who work in chess to find out more - Sarah Longson, CEO of the UK chess challenge, and chess player and streamer Sarah El Barbry.Last October a Sikh woman was subjected to racially aggravated rape and assault in her own home just outside Birmingham. Perpetrator John Ashby followed his victim - a stranger to him - off a bus into her house, where he carried out the brutal assault. Last week he was sentenced to life in prison. The BBC's Midlands Correspondent Phil Mackie joins Anita to tell us more about the case, alongside Sukhvinder Kaur, the Chair of Trustees at Sikh Women's Aid.As the spring dawn chorus reaches its peak, a new book is challenging long held assumptions about birdsong, and revealing the overlooked role of female birds. Researcher Lucy McRobert, collaborator for the new book, The Sound of Birding: Second Edition, joins Anita to tune our ears to a richer, more complex soundscape. Pippa Cleary is the only female British composer to have had three musicals in the West End, with hits like The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole and The Great British Bake Off Musical. Her latest show, Bank of Dave the Musical, co-written with Rob Madge, is about to make its world premiere and she joins Anita to talk about turning the true life story of Dave Fishwick into a joyful stage show.Presenter: Anita Rani Producer: Corinna Jones

Hello, I'm Anita Rani and welcome to Woman's Hour from BBC Radio 4. Just to say that for rights reasons, the music in the original radio broadcast has been removed for this podcast. Good morning. No, that is not your phone ringing. That is the sound of a mallard. I'm sure many of you will have known that, but what you may not know is that most birdsong is attributed to male birds. Well, guess what? On Woman's Hour today, we'll be turning our attention to female bird song.

Yes, that was a female mallard. And it's Friday the 1st of May, and I hope it's as sunny where you are as it is in central London. For the nature lovers among you this Sunday, it's worth setting your alarm nice and early and open your windows in order to be serenaded by peak dawn chorus. Birds will be singing at their loudest this Sunday morning. So right now, I simply want to hear from you about your love of nature, wherever in the country you are. Tell me what pleasure you get from the natural world.

world around you. Do you see regular red squirrels in Anglesea or seals at Blakeney, wild ponies of Dartmoor or wherever you are, simply watching birds and butterflies in your garden? Share with me a moment of connection you have had with the nature around you. Get in touch in the usual way. You can text me on 84844. You can email the program by going to our website or you can WhatsApp me on 0300-100-444. Also on the programme, we will be hearing about a racially aggravated rape of a sequoomen in Birmingham and the impact on her and the wider community. Pippa Cleary is the first female British composer to have three musicals in the West End. She'll be telling us about her latest, based on the story of the Bank of Dave. And women and chess, do you play?

Well, we'd like to hear from you. That text number once again, 84844. But first, more than 7,000 children. under six was suspended in the 2024 to 25 school year in England, according to the latest Department of Education data. And the number of children losing learning to repeat suspensions has doubled in two years, with the steepest rises amongst the youngest. This is against a slowing of suspensions in secondary schools.

So why is this happening in primary schools? Well, to discuss this, I'm joined by Kiran Gill, chief executive of The Difference, a school leadership charity who's been analysing this data. Welcome to Woman's Hour. So before we get into it properly, give us an overview. Tell me about the figures and what you're seeing. Sure.

So the difference analysed this data and nearly a million children were suspended across that last academic year that we've got figures for. And suspensions have doubled from pre-pandemic rates. There's been a really shocking rise. And now overall, they are starting to stabilise and fall slightly from the sort of all-time high that we had in 22, 23. But in primary schools, they are continuing to rise. And we looked particularly at repeat suspension. So children who are sent home more than once, up to 10 times. And actually, those suspensions have also continued to rise and quite sharply.

So children suspended 10 times. We're up 100% since two years ago. Over a mass of 2,000 children sent home 10 times across the first term of last year. So imagine that's like almost once a week. It's really high. I've got suspensions of 5-year-old rose by 62%, six-year-olds by 64%. Why is the increase happening in this age group? Yes, it's a really good question. I think there are a lot of challenges for young families at the

moment. We know that. The cost of living crisis is not affecting everybody equally, and it has implications for sort of the childcare that you can afford. And schools are increasingly seeing children coming to them, you know, not necessarily with a social emotional development that they'd expected or that they might need, maybe with delayed language development, and there has been a real rise in that need from COVID as well. And schools are doing an amazing, a lot of work. Lots of them are setting up nurseries, which can help,

so that there's stronger three-year-old provision and also thinking about what they can do in terms of internal support for students. So actually, the difference helps schools do exactly that, and I can talk a little bit more later about a brilliant primary school in North Tyneside that's been setting up a space that helps students who are just coming in and maybe aren't quite need some more input to develop those skills

and they're in a smaller space with dedicated intervention to boost their language, to boost their social emotional skills. And the government's reforms with this sort of expert hand funding and reforms to suggest that schools can set up inclusion basis, I hope is going to help more schools be able to do that because you can hear there's a need across primary schools in England. Well, what sort of behaviour are we talking about? So it's hard to say from a sort of bird's eye view because it's coded in certain ways.

But the title we've got is persistent disruptive behaviour. That's the most common reason across all suspensions. And it's interesting because people often think it's violence. But actually persistent disruptive behaviour, what is that? It can look like emotional outbursts. It can look like struggling to sit still. It can look like a whole range of things at different age groups. I've interviewed a lot of young people who've ended up permanently excluded, kicked out of school.

A lot of the time they talk to me about things like bereavement, which might not be, you know, what you would expect, but sort of grief and challenges in their life, which have really changed their ability to control their emotions or understand their emotions. But it isn't just linked to sort of struggles like that. There is a definite link to things like special educational needs. Yeah.

So when I'm talking about outbursts, you know, you might think of maybe a child you know who's got autism and in the earlier part of their life is struggling to deal with, with overstimulation and hasn't got those strategies yet. maybe ADHD or speech language communication needs. And actually children with special needs are four times more likely to be suspended in this data. Well, you touched on it earlier, but also how many of these suspensions are concentrated on children who are already facing challenges. Well, I gave you one of them there, so special educational needs, but you're absolutely right, Anita.

So sadly, children who we know are living in poverty made up the majority of suspensions again last year, even though they're the minority of the population, sort of one in 14. children, but 60% of suspensions. And a thing close to my heart, my sisters were adopted into my family, interacting with social services because your life just isn't safe. Maybe it's not safe at home or it's not safe in the local area. Those children in social care interactions are three times more likely to be suspended. So that's so sad when you think they need the stability of school the most and actually they might be sent home potentially into the situation that might be exacerbating distress. Sure, exactly. So what's that telling us? Is it that schools aren't able to cope?

Or is it a combination of many things, which I'm sure it is? I mean, yeah. I call complex problems. It's a combination of many things. I think we are seeing increasing need at school and schools are saying we want more support. And I do think that reforms ahead should help. The difference as a charity, I was a teacher and I quit that work after working in policy to set up a charity to work with head teachers particularly, but also their senior leaders and their special educational needs coordinators to think about, well, who is getting suspended in our school?

What are the patterns? Who's also not attending? And what can we do to shift that? And I think more schools need that sort of support. To set a strategy, the leader I was going to shout out today as a brilliant woman, shout out on Women's Hour,

called Catherine Thompson, and she runs Percy Maine Primary School. But she decided she wanted to lean into this challenge, and she got all her, senior leadership trained through the differences inclusive leadership course. And they set about training all of the staff to think about how they could speak day to day with children about their emotions, start to build a language about that, how they can boost their coping skills, their ability to repair problems when they fell out with other children, when they were frustrated

in class. And they also set up that specialist space that I talked about. And as a result, even though nationally, we're hearing that children are suspended at higher rates in Percy Main Primary. school we haven't had suspension, just one over three years. And we've talked about schools. We've needs to talk about parents as well in the role. I mean, a lot of these kids are being sent home and or are they? I mean, what does suspension mean for these children? Are they being sent home?

Can the parents cope? Are they being prepared to come to school in the first place? I mean, what sort of role and responsibility to parents have in all of this? Well, it's a really challenging issue actually because if you think about, and I interview a lot of parents who, when they experience multiple suspension, like 10 times in a term, imagine that for your child and you're getting a phone call at work and you're having to come home. It can really disrupt employment. It can be really challenging and push your family into even more sort of financial challenge. And we know that the cost of living is affecting

people's need to take on multiple jobs to work shift patterns to actually get to spend less time with their children talking, doing that emotional and social development, which is sort of feeding into the problem. One of the things that the government said recently is they'd like schools to try and reduce suspension for things like persistent disruptive behaviour where they send children home. And they're actually naming things like mobile phone use. You know, what might a young person be doing sat online doom scrolling or out in the street, you know, not with the supervision that they need because parents have no choice but to work. And they're actually asking students schools to do internal suspensions for all but the most serious reasons for a child to be sent home. But again,

schools need support to be able to do that. So yeah, what more would you like seeing to see done, Karen? Well, cheekily, I'd like to make a call out to anybody who knows a school leader out there and tell them about the difference charity because we are willing to work with those schools, help them train their staff, set up inclusion bases to support children who might be having more crisis. And we're also keen that the government implement these reforms really well so that schools can get more funding that they need to be able to put this provision in place. There you go, Kieran. You've got your cheeky shout out there.

Thank you so much for speaking to us this morning. Kieran Gill there from the difference, which is a school leadership charity. 84844 is the text number. Now, we contacted the Department of Education about this, and a spokesperson said the statistics reflect the scale of the challenge we inherited in our schools, but there are real signs our reforms are working. Teachers are already reporting significant improvements with more reporting good behaviour in classrooms in 24 to 25 than the previous year.

We back head teachers to take firm action when needed. and we're transforming the system with 93 new behaviour hubs, curriculum reform, and once in a generation overhaul of the send system and an evidence-led review into anti-bullying and effective behaviour management. This will be a topic we will be coming back to on Woman's Hour. Now, in April, 11-year-old Bodana Sivandanan became England's highest ranked female chess player. You heard right, she's 11. There is evidence that more women and girls,

are playing competitively, with the proportion of female players registered with the World Chess Federation fide for the standard time control, which most competitive games are played under, rising from 10% in 2020 to 16.5% in 2026. Chess.com research shows that the largest proportion of female players are under 15, and streaming is popular. As of January 26th, a female-led channels accounted for about half of the top 20 most watch chess streams on Twitch. But the elite remains dominant. by men and most chess content creators and their audience are male.

There are currently no women in the top 100 players and only three women have achieved this feat in history. Well, to discuss this, we're joined by Sarah Longson, CEO of the UK Chess Challenge and chess player and streamer Sarah L. Barbary. Welcome to both of you. I'm going to use your surnames because you're both called Sarah. It'll keep it easy. So Sarah Longson, I'm going to come to you first. Can we discuss the brilliance of Budana Sivandanan? She attends your chess school.

Tell us about her. Good morning. Yes, she learnt chess aged six. I believe her father was going to throw away the, bring it to the charity shop, the chess set in the house. And Bodhana looked and said, no, I want to learn. And then she started learning during COVID. And she joined our UK junior chess academy.

And she's just gone from strength to strength. And now she is absolutely fantastic and improving daily. Amazing. And we have a young female role model there. Do you see many girls getting into chess? Yes, we do. I think COVID has helped a lot and the Queen's Gambit. Loads of girls get into chess, but it's how long they stick at it for. So I think the reason there's a male dominance is because girls tend to do lots of different things

rather than prioritise just chess. And some of the boys and males, they just keep going. And chess is their only thing. And they get really good. So what age do they stop then? Or what age do you see themselves moving on? I think they prioritise, you know, exams and other activities. that are good at and university applications and things like that. So, you know, chess is still very, very popular with girls and females, but there's a big male dominance after primary school, I would say. Sarah Elbarri, welcome. Join us. How did you get into chess?

Well, I've started chess very young at age of 10, so 15 years ago. I was watching my brother playing chess with my cousins in Egypt, and then a couple months later at school, there was this chess activity. So I asked my mom to be part of this, and then I got to a chess club, and then I've never stopped playing chess. Okay, I'm going to put my personal experience in.

So me and my brother were both taught by my dad, and my brother stuck at it, and I classically kind of just did other stuff. So what kept you going, Sarah Al-Barbari? What was it? Tell us about the joy of chess. why did you stick at it? What's the pleasure you get from it?

A lot of pleasure, a lot of opportunities. It's not about only the chessboard. Well, first, about the chess board. When you play chess, you're fully focused on one thing. I like this. I like feeling my brain working, you know. Also, it's about this emotion that you get in chess that I don't get anywhere else.

The stress, the excitement, the fear, the sadness, the cry, everything is extreme for me personally my emotion are very extreme i love winning it gives me so much confidence and you know when i lose it's hard but uh you can come back better so you want to improve it's all this um this emotion and over the board except the board you have experiences you get to play some tournaments to meet people chess is the most universal uh sport you can ever have and you play online? Yes, I play online because now I'm a fully, my fully job is the chess content creator, so I stream. I do also competition and it's part of my job. But yes, I play online now, but I'd rather play over the board. You'd rather play over the board, yeah, in real life. But

who watches you when you're playing online? Well, more than 90% of other people watch me are male according to the stats but I think that girls play chess but it's like Sarah said they have multiple activities and it's more acceptable for men to be fully involved in chess than girls are that's my impression so I feel they're they're more interesting to watch chess content yes let me ask Sarah longson what can we read into that over 90% of people who watch chess and watch Sarah are men. I think, yeah, men like watching streamers and especially, you know, attractive females.

And I think, yeah, chess is, like Sarah was saying, we love playing chess females, we don't necessarily like watching it as much. I just playing and the excitement of the game. Do you think, I mean, you coach chess. Do you think because it's quite masculine, it's an intimidating space for women? I don't think that because I've grown up with chess since I was seven. Sure.

But I know some friends that do and gave up chess because of that. What did they say? They didn't like, you know, some male comments and the fact that sometimes you'll go into a hall and you're the only female there. Let me bring Sarah L. Bar. People don't like losing as well to females. Oh, well, there's, there you go. Here we go. Now we're getting interesting. So Sarah, El Barbary, you were nodding away to that, women feeling intimidated in sort of a big masculine space.

And also, how is it when men lose to you? I mean, two big questions there. Discuss. Yeah, yeah. So I've traveled a lot of things to chess. I've spent a lot of time in tournaments. And when you have only boys, sometimes you just want to get to have fun with girls, you know, spend time with girls. When you're only male, sometimes I feel.

feel that when they talk about chess, I feel excluded, for sure. It's like, you know, we were talking about chess, so just stay here. And then we'll have fun later for other topics. So between girls also, we never speak about chess. It's like we want to just enjoy the moment, talk about other topics. And I feel like boys are obsessed with chess more than girls. And the second question was about... How do they feel when you beat them? Ah yes, I love beating my voice. I feel so proud. But at the same time, sometimes it's a lot of pressure

because I feel like I need to, you know, to represent all the women in the world and to prove in that game that we are capable of, which is very sad because all men should know that we are not less better than them chess, it's just that we are less in terms of numbers and, you know, opportunities are not the same. Anyway, so yeah, they are a bit angry. I can feel that, but you have to be very strong. You have to be very confident. Like, for me, when I win against a boy, I act like it's normal.

I mean, I beat you. It's normal. I'm better than you. Point. Fact. Love it. Sarah, either of you actually, Sarah Longston, let's come to you first. It's the same question. Why haven't we seen? a female grandmaster in the UK? So we've got women's grandmasters that are female in the UK, but we haven't seen an actual grandmaster. I think Bodhana will probably be the first, and I hope she'll be the first.

If she keeps playing. Yeah, she will. She's improving at a phenomenal rate. Excellent. And then that will inspire more girls to get into chess, and I think there's been a big rush of strong girls on the chess circuit. We've got the UK chess challenge.

We've got some phenomenal girls that play. that. Well, Sarah El Barberie, you've got a whole entire audience listening to you. Why should girls start playing chess? And why should I get back into it this weekend, maybe? So you should go back playing chess because it's the moment you get to feel yourself to get confidence. And as I said, you're going to meet so much people from different origins. And you have a lot of people. And you have You can travel, you can play chess tournaments. You learn so many things apart from chess. Chess is the game that you can play anywhere, everywhere with anyone.

And, you know, it's beautiful. I mean, I got to... Now my job is about chess, it's about my passion. So you can do a lot with chess. And also just be confident, feel strong. You really feel strong when you win, when you improve, when you get better, all this emotion, you will get them, on chess.

Sold. Brilliant. You never know. Maybe this weekend. Bank holiday weekend. I'll play a game of chess. I think it's raining on Sunday. That's something to do. After I've heard the birds' song.

Sarah and Sarah, what a joy speaking to you both. Thank you so much. Sarah El Barberie and Sarah Lonson there. And a game that was invented in India. There you go. Extra fact. Lots of you getting in touch about the nature that you're seeing around you.

Finola says we live in North Yorkshire and nature here is beautiful and amazing every day and every season. Dolphin pods and seals are regular visitors to our north-east coast, prolific bird life, deer in the local woods, and a barn owl that swoops over the neighbourhood every evening. Less welcome are the hares feasting on our vegetable patch. 84844 is the text number. Now, last October, a Sikh woman was subjected to racially aggravated rape and assault in her home just outside Birmingham. John Ashby followed his victim,

a stranger to him, off a bus, into her house, where he carried out the brutal assault. Well, last week, Ashby was sentenced to life in prison. But what does it mean for social cohesion when a young woman is violently attacked in her own home on grounds of race? Well, our Midlands correspondent, Phil Mackey, joins me to tell us more about the case alongside Sukvindakor, the chair of trustees at Sikh Women's Aid. Morning to both of you. Phil, I'm going to come to you first to get the details, really, of what happened to this young woman on the 26th of October last year. Well, I need to actually, some of the details are, I really so horrific, we can't really go into them.

Sure. The broad brushstrokes of what happened were that John Ashby was riding on a bus. He saw this woman. He'd never seen her before. She didn't know him. He started to follow her, followed her off the bus, followed her back to her house. This was all captured on CCTV. The footage also shows him then stopping to arm himself with a large stick before he got into the house,

forced this way into the bathroom where this woman was. and then subjected her to an ordeal of torture, beating, rape, degradation that lasted for 24 minutes in which he racially abused her. He insisted that she was a Muslim. She told him he was a Sikh. She was a Sikh. He used various language that indicated he believed that her ethnicity was one of the reasons that he was attacking her. And then he left her. She was looked after and cared for by members of the local neighbourhood watch who were among the first people to get there, people who were from the Sikh community,

people who were in court last week. It was a horrific, horrific case. And ultimately, Mr Justice Pepprell, who was the judge who sentenced him, regarded it as so serious that he gave Ashby, the longest sentence possible for rape, which is life. Yeah, talk us through the key moments from inside the courtroom. Well, it was an interesting. interesting case because it went to trial and on the Monday the case opened which meant that the

victim in this case had to come to court which she was determined to do very bravely to sit through the opening evidence to hear what had happened to her spoken out loud in front of her yet again and it was on the second day of that trial where a member of the public somebody who'd been sitting in the public gallery after hearing some of that awful evidence stood up completely something you should not do and he was removed from court for doing so but approach the defendant in the dock and said, basically sort yourself out. There was an adjournment. Ashby changed his plea and he was sentenced on Friday. There was a lot of detail. Again, we can't go into, but the woman, as I said, bravely sat through it. You could hear her crying. You could

see her being comforted. At one point, she had a panic attack. She had to be taken out. But the case adjourned briefly that she could come back in again. Her victim statement was read out on her behalf she talked about how she felt violated. She didn't feel safe in her own home. She said she was still hyper aware of every noise she hears. But as a result of the case, there was something at the end of it, that statement where she said, I no longer feel trapped. I can begin to live my life again. And I refuse to let this define me. Phil, thank you very much. Phil Mackey there. I'm going to bring Sukvindra in now. Sukvindar, you work for Sikh Women's Aid, the UK's first national female organisation supporting Sikh Punjabi women experiencing domestic abuse, sexual violence and harmful

practices. Thank you for joining us this morning. Am I right in thinking that you are actually in contact with the victim? And may I ask how she is? Yes. So we've been supporting the victim since the horrific ordeal she was subjected to. And honestly, it has been our absolute immense pleasure. It has been, she is such a remarkable woman. And, you know, she's doing as well as can be expected. I mean, I think for her now, the real journey of recovery starts post-trial, and she has kind of requested that, you know, she wishes to return to her life. Because we've got to remember she's fought relentlessly to bring dismanted justice at such a personal cost and under the weight of such public scrutiny as well.

And she had to face her attacker in court? She was determined to face her attacker in court, because for many victims of sexual assault, who go down the criminal justice route, facing them, seeing them being sentenced, gives them some measure of closure and also some measure of safety that they need to see with their own eyes that, you know, something that Phil mentioned earlier

was that, you know, in her own home now, this man came into her own home. So home is now unsafe for this woman, any small noise. And we see this a lot with them, survivors of sexual assault and violent sexual assaults, where the place where the incident it happened, it becomes unsafe. And when it's your home, you know, compounding that trauma for

her. This attack, Sukvinda, came just weeks after another racially aggravated rape that took place about 10 miles away in Oldbury. And that happened in broad daylight. I think it gives us a sense of how the community is feeling. I mean, we actually hosted a community meeting such was the fear and apprehension because we've got to remember this is the South Asian community. We were brought up and bred in in the West Midlands. Our grandparents walk the same streets that our children walk today. And we had calls from people in the public saying, I walk down this road where this attack happened.

And we had one woman actually wanting a grant so she could get taxis to send her daughters to school because she had to go to work. And there was a real sense of terror and fear. and a sense of targeting just because there was, you know, on top of these two racially motivated rapes, there were also other racist attacks against members of the Sikh community in that period of time. So there was an absolute sense of fear. So has it, so what are you hearing about, like how is this changing, I guess, behavior within the Sikh community in the West Midlands?

Or just further afield, I guess, any woman of color, I suppose, you know, or any woman. I mean, this is just absolutely terrifying. What happened? I mean that I really want to say that when we held that community meeting, there were women of all race, colour, creed. And women saw themselves reflected in this incident. She did nothing wrong. Like Phil said, she was on a public transport. She was walking home to her own home. She did nothing wrong to be targeted.

And that's where we saw ourselves through her experience. This could have been any of us on that bus and it was that fear. So in the aftermath, women were purchased, we were giving out free panic alarms into the community. Women are now downloading apps like Holly Garden, Life 360, so family members can track their movements. So I don't think life has kind of gone back to normal for women across the Midlands. They are now, you know, even myself, I'm walking on a street and I will just be unconsciously looking over my shoulder. And it feels so awful, but there could be two men walking behind me. And women have said this to us that we're crossing the street, we're walking into shops,

we're no longer going to the gym alone. I used to go jogging in the park. Now I will do that with friends. Some women went as far as canceling gym membership, so they were going with family members. So it did have a profound effect. And whilst the sentencing is absolutely welcome, and it has given that sense of safety, the views and attitudes that this man held, they are very prevalent across society. so I don't think there is that sense of women have just gone back to normal.

I think women are living an adjusted life now. And this is not just sick Punjabi women. This is South Asian women. And I would argue women across the Midlands, irrespective of a race or religion. Yeah, I mean, absolutely. And it's what we were saying earlier, that feeling that you can be attacked in your own home,

which is your safe space. It's your home. It's your refuge. It's such a terrifying concept. what has the police response been? I mean, what we witnessed, we couldn't have asked for more from West Midlands Police.

The suspect was apprehended within 24 hours. The fact that this has come to trial, you know, within several months and often very victims can be waiting years to come to trial. And I think she really needed that so she could move on with her life. And, you know, the victim did praise all the officers that helped her in the buildup

to the case who supported her through the preemptive. trial and you know we couldn't have asked more because there is an ecosystem around the victim when they go through the criminal justice process and we couldn't have asked for more. I mean, you could really sense that in the courtroom on sentencing. I was there and there was a real sense of strength, solidarity and outpour of real concern for the victim. She was the priority in that and that really set the standard for me that this is how all, you know, sexual violence offences should be treated by the criminal justice system.

Sukh Vind the call from Sikh Women's Aid. Thank you. And also thanks to Phil Mackey. And if you have been affected by any of the issues mentioned, there is information on support on the BBC Actionline website. And of course, seek women's aid is there as well, should you need to reach out to them. 84844 is the text number.

Now, what do you make of this? while the bird is among you will have correctly identified that as a yep a robin but you may be surprised to know it's a female robin not a male so much of what we think as beautiful bird song has traditionally been attributed to males but a new book is asking us to rethink that assumption and to pay closer attention to what female birds are contributing to the soundscape about time it's a particularly timely conversation because this Sunday marks the people peak of the dawn chorus, the surge of birdsong that happens around sunrise, especially during spring.

Well, joining me to explore this is researcher Lucy McRobart. She's contributed to the sound approach to birdsong, second edition, which was published last week. And she's also a calmist for Birdwatch, the UK's leading birding magazine. Lucy, welcome. Hello, good morning. So I'm very excited about this item, actually, because I'm going to hear lots of birdsong for your pleasure this Friday, everybody. Why is that bird's song, why is it that it's been so often attributed to males and not females? What's been happening in the world of birding?

Oh, I mean, it's exactly the same as when you look at any of the other hobbies, exactly like the two lovely ladies you had on talking about chess earlier. If you go back into history, so much of birding or nithology was conducted by males. And in the Victorian era, that was done with guns. So when they were going out, they were experiencing new species and they were collecting them, It was much easier to find the males, but they have typically brighter plumage and they're singing much louder. And also, they kind of look better on mantel pieces because these birds were being collected and bought home. So a lot of the focus was on the male of the species and that attitude has just pervaded through the whole of ornithology ever since with the male bird defining what we perceive as a bird.

So Jasmine Donahey, who's an author, wrote a brilliant book called Bird Splaining about this a few years ago. And essentially, yeah, it's an amazing title. She's an awesome lady. And she explains this so well. The male defines the species. When you say, oh, I've seen a hen harrier. Quite often you'll hear a male bird to turn around and say, or was it a male? It's not even what sex is it?

It's, is it a male? And the male defines our experience. and gives more pleasure. We are very clear that we want to challenge this. We want a lot more attention put on female bird song and a female bird biology as well so that we can understand more and do more to conserve these species. So this book, which is a delight, by the way, I love it.

It's written by Mark Constantine. He's one of the founders of the beauty brand lush. But his true love is birdsong, as is yours. So why did you want to come together to understand more about female birdsong? Well, I've worked for Mark for about three years, really weird combination of bath bombs and bird song. But he really is a really inspiring guy and he's so passionate about birdsong and I now work with some of the best bird song experts in the world and it takes geekery to a whole new level. If you've ever thought I've got imposter syndrome,

I have that all the time because these guys know so much. They just, they know so much. You can be walking along and they just get distracted. They're not listening to you. They're constantly listening and analysing birds. It's amazing to be part of that. Mark's been rewriting this book for a long time. And we started doing research. And we kind of just went down a rabbit hole. I always said that most people know what they want to write about before they start. Mark didn't.

He just started writing and hoped for the best. And we went down this rabbit hole of female birdsong. And we found a paper from less than 10 years ago. And it said that the two major bird sound collections in the world, so the biggest ones with literally millions of recordings, For both of them, less than 1% of the sounds were labelled as female. Wow. So we have literally forgotten 50% of avian life when it comes to bird sounds.

And that is terrifying. So what have you discovered? Oh, we went back into our own recordings, and it turned out the sound approach were doing better than these libraries, which, thank goodness. We had about over 40% of bird sounds, like, labelled female, which was good. That was a good, strong start. But we started looking at things like garden birds. So, for example, you heard a robin there.

Oh, should we re-listen to the robin? And then we can talk up. We'll dip it behind us. Let's get some lovely beautiful birds on. Okay, so tell us about this recording. This is a female robin. Yes, this is a female Robin. And they are incredibly hard to sex unless you are holding them at a very certain time of year in the breeding season.

They look identical, the males and the females. you just can't separate them based on how they look. So for a very long time, everyone assumed that the robins that you heard singing were males. And actually, female robin's song at certain times of year is just as complex, beautiful and so on as the males. This one's actually recorded in September. So this robin is probably beginning to hold a winter territory. Or is it trying to hold a winter territory? Some migrate, some stay where they're born and where they're raised.

So this one is probably thinking, OK, I want to defend my territory for the winter so it's ready for next year's breeding season. What we did discover with Robbins is you still can't separate them based on their sound. They are so similar at certain times of year that it is just impossible and you have to do it in the hand when they're being ringed in the breeding season.

Okay, we're going to move on to what I believe is your favourite bird, the swift. Let's have a listen. Okay, what can we hear? Well, so a lot of people will be thinking that is awful. Why is that your favourite sound? This is the sound of summer. So Swifts are arriving back now. So depending on where you are in the country,

you'll be seeing and hearing Swifts coming back. And these guys were actually filmed in a nest box. And again, there are species that's very hard to separate, especially when they're flying around that fast, just screaming at each other. If you look at the sound on a sonogram, which is the way we visualise the sounds, it looks a bit like an M shape.

the first of the arches of the M is the female and the second one is the male. So they're actually duetting. They're singing to each other in their nest and they are reaffirming their pair bond as a partnership. And my colleagues, I shouldn't say me because I can't do it, but my colleagues can tell which, basically now they can identify female SWIFT's based on how that sonogram looks and it's basically, it's more modulated.

The female has a very slightly coarser voice than the male, which is slightly cleaner and crisper. But yes, they are singing together. They are reaffirming their connection for that season. And they are announcing that their nest is taken. There you go. You've turned what started out as quite a shrill sound. I have to say, sorry, Swift. We are enjoying you on Radio 4 this morning and just painted such a lovely picture of what we're listening to.

And thank God for technology. Should you move on to another? Let's have another bird. This is the northern wheat here. I'm really enjoying this by. the way. I hope everyone listening is finding this as pleasurable as I am in my headphones. So what can we hear there? Tell us about that. I always think this one sounds quite robotic, almost like sound effects from Star Wars or something.

And essentially, this is a northern we ter so this species breeds in like the north and west of the UK. And this is the female of the species. She's got a mate and they are singing at another pair close by. So she's probably actually singing at the other female and saying, Stay away from my fella. This is my territory. Because birds, we like to think of birds as being terribly virtuous. And oh, they mate for life. Most birds don't do that.

There's constant rivalry competition, extra pair copulation. They're not faithful in most cases. So she's probably warding off that other female and saying, nope, stay back, stay away. This is my territory. This is my fella. And he also will be doing the same to the male of that species. Sorry, I just, Dolly Parton's Jolene, just popped

into my head then whilst we're explaining that. Maybe that was a detail too far of what goes on in my head. And let's finally hear the one we started the program with. This is the mallard, the most common duck species. Yep, yep, we get the picture there, don't we? Nice and clear. So tell me what we're listening to. Oh, she is tenacious, isn't she? So when you think of a duck quacking, again, it's very easy to go out. That's a male duck with the classic like green head. that's a mallard and even the French word mallard comes from wild drake is what it directly translates as. Female ducks do not have an easy life and if you've ever kind of been to a park in the breeding season you will have seen like a female being relentlessly pursued by male ducks. They'll chase her into the air. They'll chase her onto the water.

Female ducks can even get like drowned in the breeding season because the males are so relentless and so tenacious. but that quack is part of their display. And if you imagine a kind of quack, quack, quack, quack, quack, quack, quack that you hear if you go to a park or a canal, that is always a female. That descending quacking that goes down is always the female. And if you imagine the voice of like Donald Duck, he has been misgendered, frankly. Donald should have been Dolores. His voice is categorically female. And female mallards, I've been called.

constantly overshadowed. They have it really tough when they're out in the wild. And we need to do more to appreciate female mallards because that quack, quack, quack that we all associate with ducks, that is female. In my head, that is a sign of feminism in the bird world. This is brilliant, you see. This is why they needed to do more research in the first place. And then Donald Duck would have been given the right voice. Why is it important that we understand the sex of the bird we're here? Well, it's one of those things in science where we've always made assumptions in ornithology about what birds mean and how they're communicating and we're learning all the time. Bird populations around the world are in freefall in many cases.

We are losing our dawn chorus. It is nowhere near as varied and enriched and as speciesful as it would have been even 20 years ago. If we can't even correctly sex the birds that we're hearing, How can we possibly understand the complex biology and ecology that is needed to save these species? At the sound approach, they're using bird sounds to identify new species, to drive forward kind of conservation initiatives. We have to be able to understand what is singing, how it's singing, why it's singing and where it's singing, if we're going to protect the areas that will ultimately save the birds. What got you into birding, Lucy?

Oh, that is a very tricky one. I kind of got into it after university. And I met some really amazing people doing it. It's very intimidating as a young woman trying to pick up a pair of binoculars. It is really scary. Luckily, there's lots of groups out there now that have kind of popped up in the past few years and a really kind of good community of female burders. And there are a lot more women involved. But God, when I was like 20 years old and just starting out,

it was really scary and I was lucky to have a lot of support from some really great male birders who helped me get into it. and I got the column a couple of years later. So I've always felt quite welcome in the community. Well, look, we're intimidating. We want everyone to do it this Sunday, right? Whether we're birders or not, and whether we know anything about this song or not.

I mentioned the dawn chorus. Tell us about what's happening this Sunday and how we can hear it best. It is international dawn chorus day. So no matter where you are, even if it's just a case of opening your window, about 5.30 at the morning, you'll begin to hear all of the birds starting to sing.

And they're setting up their territories, are advertising their availability. They're trying to attract mates. And it is just the most magical time of year. Oh, Lucy McRoberts. Thank you so much for all of that. And the sound approach to birding second edition is out now. Thank you, Lucy.

Really enjoyed that. And a message in saying so excited to hear you mentioned International Dawn Chorus Day this Sunday. The 3rd of May is our wedding anniversary. So every year we celebrate by setting the alarm for 3.30 a.m. Head outside to enjoy the amazing chorus in Norfolk. How lovely. Thank you. And keep them coming in. 84844. Now, Pippa Cleary is the first female British composer to have three musicals in the West End. She's co-written the Secret Diary of Adrian Moor and the Great British Bake Off musical. And now she's teamed up with Rob Madge after the huge success of their show, My Sons Are Queer, for a joyous new celebration of community called The Bank of Dave. Based on the true story of Dave Fishwick, who fights against elite financial institutions. to set up a community bank in his hometown of Burnley.

And I'm delighted to say Pippa is in the studio with me now. Pippa, welcome to Women's Al. Thank you so much for having me. Absolutely our pleasure. Now, Dave Fisherick's story, many people of our listeners will know, some may not. It's already been a best-selling book, a BAFTA award-winning documentary, global Netflix hit. When you were first approached to turn this particular story into musical,

what was your gut reaction? What made you say yes? Well, basically, Dave is a Barnum character. It's often that question of why. should this be a musical? But for this one, it was so easy because he's such a showman. And he breathes this amazing enthusiasm and energy into the room. And it's basically like I always feel like he's about to burst into song whenever I see him.

So it was quite an easy. Oh, there's so much joy here. There's so much heart. It's such a relatable story. So it was a really easy, yes. Tell us. Bring us up to speed. For those who don't know the story, give us a quick overview.

So Dave set up, wanted to set up a bank in his hometown of Burnley to help the community. he was lending people money and was really struggling to get the accreditation he needed to be a proper bank and so he basically went on this big battle with the establishment to get the accreditation and it turned into a real, yeah, a battle and him against them basically

and he's still doing it and it's now he's lent so much money he's done so many amazing things and it's basically about fighting for your community and helping people and he's just such an inspiration. And so when you begin on a project like this do you draw on the film?

do you go to the documentary and sort of how do you kind of try and find a new angle to tell the story? Well, I think with musicals, you're always finding a slightly different way of telling the story because you're kind of going into the heart of people's feelings and emotions and their core motivations. You're not necessarily as kind of plot driven. You're not looking at action thrillers.

So you're looking at the stories through a different lens and going, when would this character want to say something that they might not say if it was a scene or a documentary or a film, but they might be thinking in their head. And that's when you kind of go, I would sing this. But yes, we took inspiration from the real life, Dave, obviously, the documentary, the film, as many conversations as we could have.

He's written a book. Rob has done their research incredibly. So kind of all the things, but you don't want to get too married to any of them because at the end of the day you are trying to tell this story in a new way. I've got so much respect and admiration for your skill. Thank you. As someone who goes to theatre, a lot, that experience of being able to tell a story through music and then make people feel in that space, you know, the kind of.

kind of human connection is overwhelming for me sometimes. So now Dave's story is rooted in Burnley, north of England. How much did that geography shape the language of the music? Very much. And it's close to where Rob grew up. So all the language of the characters is very much in that world. And we have a lot of cast members from that part of the world as well. So it's been really lovely to just...

Because basically we've tried to do a bit of a big Broadway sound. There's even moments that sound quite Disney, but with northern accents. Brilliant. And that's been the really lovely thing is that you can tell, you know, it is a smaller story in one town, but it's big. The message is big.

The singing is big. The dance moves are big. Everyone, it's a larger than life show and that's what's been so enjoyable about it. Big sounds. I love it one. I've been able to go super epic with this one. It's been so lovely.

So you and Rob Madge, you've collaborated before, as I mentioned earlier, including the hit show, My sons are queer. So what does the partnership look like in practice? How do you work? Well, I wish I could say it was very structured,

but it's a lot of bounding around the room, having the voice memo app constantly going. Rob will do all the voices, I'll be at the piano kind of scatting or improvising. Until we find something that we kind of like, we will often, I'll be singing nonsense lyrics, like it can be very funny. The car that went to the shop in the pop of the ludded,

you know, to kind of find something that we like and then we'll go back and finesse. But we're very in the room writers. And I do collaborate with people remotely as well. It's possible, but I really love that being in the room together and bouncing off someone else, it's really special. You've spoken about being visually impaired since birth

and how your exceptional musical ear is central to how you work. I'm fascinating to hear more about this. How do you think that's changed the way you do work and you compose? Give us a little insight. I would say for me, collaboration, collaboration, collaboration. I've always maintained that it's only 50% of the job is how good you are at it and the rest of it is how well you work with other people. And because I have this vision impairment,

I don't read music as well as I would like to. You know, I've always struggled with that. So I rely more on musical directors and my team to kind of help get the music from the piano songs that I will write all the way through to beautifully produced parts. Massive shout out to Tom Curran, the orchestrator on this project, who makes my songs sound amazing.

And it's basically just more, I completely rely on that back and forth of how can we help you, you know, this is what I can do, this is what I can't do. But you bring this and communication with the team is the most important thing. So you play the piano. And did you learn by ear?

Well, I tried to learn by reading. So it wasn't completely impossible. And my mother was amazing at making music huge for me as a child. And we had like reams of A5 paper. But at the end of the day, I can't really scan a page. My sight recused me from kind of, you know, reading fast. So I would try and then I'd get really bored. And then I'd make it up.

And I remember my piano teacher saying when I was like eight, oh, that's lovely. But it's not quite what Mozart. wrote, Pepper. You've learnt the first half, painfully slowly, and now you've got bored and you're making it up instead. So yes, I learnt by ear. And it makes me quite probably irritating to work with because I don't follow the school, but I can still tell people when they're playing it wrong. Yeah, but girls don't. You've girls done good regardless. You're one of the very few female musical theatre composers. Why do you think that is? I think it is, it's a tough industry

and it has predominantly been, you know, a male-dominated industry and finding opportunities as a woman is just that little bit harder. You know, when I was growing up, there weren't as many role models. Like there isn't a female equivalent to Andrew Lloyd Weber. I was looking at Jason Robert Brown, Alan Mencken, Stephen Schwartz.

You know, but now, of course, there are so many more, you know, Candida Caldercott, Tasha Taylor Johnson, Kate Marley, Lucy Moss. But it is a tough industry to work in as a woman. You know, it's unforgiving in terms of the hours. You don't get things like maternity pay.

It's not very stable. You've got to be constantly fighting for those meetings and advocating for yourself and front-footed. And it's so much better. But obviously these things, like most industries, take time to kind of shift. And it's beautiful to see that it is shifting.

Yes. And you are doing that. Thank you. You're also the only female British composer to have had three musicals produced in the West End. How does that feel? It's pretty cool. It's pretty cool.

Sounds good. Next stop, Disney. I'm just waiting for that cool. Are you really? I'm getting a little bit impatient. Not going to lie. What would you like to do next? I'd like to write music for an animated movie for Disney.

If you could make that happen, We have put it out there. It is in the ether. Many people listen and you are working towards it. So you know, you never know. I'm putting it out there, wishing it for you. Now, every big musical needs a big moment like the helicopter in Miss Saigon or the chandelier in Phantom. What is that moment? There might be a helicopter moment. I don't think I can say more than that. You'll have to come and watch it and see it. upon what you were saying about the need for collaboration. Yeah. And I wonder what, you know, what is it like in the rehearsal rooms for you? Honestly, it's the most important thing. And I have a fantastic music team on this team. I mean, a fantastic team in general,

but it's when you trust those people, whether it's your director, your co-writer, the actors, the music team, the lighting person, the choreographer, like everybody, you have to have a trust and a respect and a space to go, oh, I'm not sure about that. What do you think about this? And that's really important.

and it takes time to foster. And I think sometimes people don't take that time to really make sure that that space is how it should be and that's when problems occur. So for me, making it clear how I like to work, what I can and can't do because of my sight, what I'm going to struggle with, where I might need your help. I have all these chats so much more now

at the beginning of a process because it's so important to get those relationships right. And how did you become a composer Pitha? I would start writing songs, much like Rob Madge's journey in my living room when I was a child and I would force my brother and my cousins to, and there is video footage of this, I should post it,

to do these little mini musicals. And my poor family would have to watch these dreadful, fairy, dragon, you know, Prince Disney-esque type shows that I would write when I was eight. But yeah, I've always loved writing songs. And then I was lucky enough to sort of meet two of my best collaborators, Jake Brunger and Luke Shepard at university. And we took a show called Jetset Go to the Edinburgh Fringe. So we had a really nice time to start out.

like testing the waters at the fringe with a show and seeing what we thought and luckily it went well. There you go. Tenacity and passion. A lot of passion. I'm going to read out some of our messages because we've got loads.

Oh my gosh. I ask people to tell me about the nature that they see on their doorstep because of this dawn chorus that we're all going to be treated to us. I'm inspired to write something for this dawn chorus. Are you really? I mean, all the bird's hands,

you know, there's lots you can do. Do continue. No, no, no. Please tell us. Oh, no, I haven't got a fully-fledged idea yet. I know, I know, but we are going to get it live now on radio. What are you thinking? Oh, gosh.

What could you do? Well, you have to assign an instrument to each bird, you know, much like Peter and the Wolf. And then there could be a lovely, you know, maybe David Attenborough could narrate a lovely thing. You could be, you know, all sorts of things we could do with it. I know a country file presented is available. Okay, so some of these messages, there we go. The greatest day each year is when our House Martins return to our little village in Cornwall all the way from Africa. And that's it, isn't it?

It's just the thought of how far these. birds have traveled to arrive in our gardens or whatever to sing their beautiful bird song. Catherine in Hampshire says, I was on my regular early morning walk today and experienced a moment of joy and wonder when I heard a nightingale for the very first time, truly magical. Another one here is saying, Shamila says me and my seven-year-old twin daughters listen to birdsong every day on the way to school. Today one of them stopped and said, wow, that's a beautiful new song. We took a moment to listen. We live in East London and we were standing right next to the West Ham Football Stadium.

it was quite a lovely moment of presence and bliss. And that's what it's all about. It's been wonderful chatting to you, Pippa. Good luck with Oliver. It's been lovely to be here. Thank you so much. And Pippa Cleary, Bank of Dave, the musical opens at the Lowry and Salford on the 2nd of May before heading to the curve in Leicester. And thanks to all of you for your lovely messages.

Let's read one more. I'm currently a third-year student, midwife in Norfolk. My favourite part of a 13-hour shift is coming outside to sit in the hospital grounds. I often see a family of Muntjacx. are very friendly as well as a variety of birds. Enjoy the dawn chorus on Sunday. That's all for today's woman's hour. Join us again next time.

Hello, I'm Tyler West. And I'm Alfie Watts. And this is The Detour, the official companion podcast to race across the world. This is the post-episode checkpoint where you'll hear the latest chat around each episode from us and our race superfan special guests. Plus, I'll be joined each week by a resident travel expert, Alfie.

That's you, ma'am. I'll be revealing my optimal. way to travel through each leg, including visits to all of those unmissable detours along the way. And we'll also have some not seen anywhere else exclusive content at the end of every episode, I cannot wait. The detour will land straight after each episode of Race Across the World. You can watch on EyePlayer or listen on Sounds, where you'll also find extra bonus content. We'll see you then.