Woman's Hour - Rape investigations, Ashley Dalton MP, Winter Paralympics, Comic novel Motherfaker

Episode Date: March 10, 2026

The government’s independent advisor on rape, Professor Katrin Hohl, is warning that despite an overhaul on how to investigate rape, there is a lack of awareness of the changes across courts in England and Wales which is affecting the outcomes of trials. Also today, the Justice Secretary David Lammy is launching a new national Legal Advisors service for rape victims, as well as a pilot project that will look at shifting the focus of rape court cases from the victim to the perpetrator. It will be led by Professor Hohl who joins presenter Nuala McGovern to discuss it along with Nogar Ofer from the Centre for Women's Justice.As the Winter Paralympics get underway, we look at why women remain under-represented. Only 26.5% of Paralympians are expected to be women, and just 24% of Team GB. Meanwhile research from Activity Alliance and Women in Sport shows that disabled girls are far less likely than boys to see a future for themselves in sport. So what’s holding them back, and what needs to change? We’re joined by Phil Smith of ParalympicsGB, Kate Baker from UK Sport, and Paralympic champion Kelly Gallagher, all live from Italy.Ashley Dalton, the MP for West Lancashire, announced last week that she was stepping down from her role as Health Minister to focus on constituency work and her health. Last year she revealed that her breast cancer had returned, and metastasised. This means living with advanced breast cancer everyday – it can’t be cured, but it can be managed. She joins Nuala to discuss her decision.How far would you go for a year off work? The character at the centre of new comic novel Motherfaker is prepared to fake a pregnancy. After her husband disappears with her life savings, teacher Barri Brown is dreaming of escape and a new life, but has limited options. So begins her great pregnancy heist. Anna Brook-Mitchell discusses the inspirations for her debut novel and its key themes from grief to connection and being child-free by choice. Presenter: Nuala McGovern Producer: Sarah Jane Griffiths

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. It's 2009 and we're in the German mountains. A man straps himself into a car on the world's most dangerous racetrack. He whispers to himself, It's time to put my balls on the dashboard. As he starts the engine. In 15 minutes, he's in an ambulance, unconscious. In 15 years, he's a billionaire.

This is Total Wolf, Formula One's most powerful team boss and the breakout star of Drive to Survive. This week on Good Bad Billionaire, How Toto Wolf Made His Billions. Listen wherever you get your BBC podcasts. Hello, I'm Nula McGovern, and you're listening to The Woman's Hour podcast. And while you're here, I wanted to let you know that the Woman's Hour Guide to Life is back. You might have listened to some of the episodes from the first series, including ambition without burnout, or turning aging into your superpower.

Well, we've got six new episodes for you. Over the coming weeks, that will give you practical tips on issues like self-promotion without feeling awkward, caring for aging parents, navigating infertility with family and friends, and also how to love your face, whatever your age. I'm really excited about this series of The Woman's Hour Guide to Life, so I really hope you'll join us. You will find the episodes in the Woman's Hour podcast feed on Sundays. It's only on BBC Sounds. But now, back to today's Woman's Hour.

Hello and welcome to the programme. This hour, the government's independent advisor on rape, Professor Catherine Hull. She is warning that despite an overhaul on how to investigate rape, there is a lack of awareness of the changes across courts in England and Wales, and that it is affecting the outcomes of rape trials. We'll speak to her in a moment. Also today, we celebrated the almost gender parity at the Winter Olympics, but that's not the case when it comes to the Winter Paralympics.

Just over a quarter of the competitors are women. To discuss what's very much a work in progress, we have a wonderful line-up from the Winter Paralympics taking place right now in Melanchortina. It includes Great Britain's first Winter Paralympic gold medalist Kelly Galaher will be here with us to talk all about it. And this hour we have the MP Ashley Dalton in studio. She resigned as health minister saying she needed to make reasonable adjustments

as she continues to live with advanced breast cancer. We're going to speak about how she made that decision to step away from her ministerial duties and also how she's feeling about it now. And although you may not be a minister, you may also have had to step away from something that you loved very much or worked very hard to achieve. What was it? How did you decide?

What was the conversation that you had to have with yourself? When I have a difficult decision, I know I write a pros and cons list, but at times, to be honest, It doesn't always help, but I would like to hear from you and your experience. You can text the program. The number is 84844 on social media. We're at BBC Woman's Hour.

Or you can email us through our website for a WhatsApp message or voice note. The number is 0300-100-400-444. And did you know you can buy a fake pregnancy belly online? I didn't until I read Mother Faker. That is the debut novel of Anna Brooke Mitchell, whose protagonist fakes a pregnancy to try and get some time off work. So we will also speak to Anna this hour. But let me begin with Professor Katrin Hul,

who is the independent advisor to the UK government on criminal justice responses to sexual violence. She is warning about a lack of awareness in courtrooms and the impact of this on rape outcomes. This comes on the day that the Justice Secretary, David Lamy, has launched a new national legal advisor service for rape victims and also announced a pilot project that will look at shifting the focus of rape court cases from the victim to the perpetrator.

Catherine has now been commissioned to conduct this pilot and joins me along with Nogar Offer, head of the legal advice team and policy advisor at the Centre for Women's Justice. Good morning to both of you. Good to have you with us. Catherine, let me begin with you. You've been critical of what's been happening in the courtrooms. What is it that you've seen? So when we begin with the police and the Crown Prosecution Service stage of when somebody has come forward to report a rape or a sexual violence incident, we've seen that the police and Crown Prosecution Service as a result of Operation Soteria have much greater knowledge of sexual offending behaviour and how to focus on the suspect's actions. So for example, if it's a rape that's reported that happened at the end of the night out, to look at what the suspect did earlier that night, did he attempt to try and get other victims to come with him and so forth, rather than to primarily and almost only focus on the credibility of the person making a report, the complainant.

So we've seen a really big shift at the police and the Crown Prosecution Service stage where charging decisions are made. we've seen there's a much greater number of cases being charged. We've seen that police have become much better at collecting evidence around the suspect's behaviour and we have seen police sticking much more closely to the law of not disproportionately over-investigating the credibility of the victim delving into their mental ill health history delving into counselling notes, making vast downloads of victims' phones. Now my concern is that, that this work has stopped at the stage of charging decisions and no such work to date has been undertaken towards the courtroom.

So when these cases reach the courtroom, at present, I have no confidence that this case would be taken further along similar principles because none of us has been undertaken. So I'm really delighted the Ministry of Justice has decided to fund this pilot study to begin to look into the courtroom also. interesting. So Operation Cateria, you mentioned there. It was launched back in 2021. Some of the aspects you've outlined there when it comes to police investigations. Can you expand a little bit more than it? And why didn't it reach the courtrooms? Because we're talking about, you know,

almost five years later. So Operation Ceteria had a very specific focus on the police as a first instance and then the Crown Prosecution Service the CPS decided to do similar work so that was just a remit the courts were never in the remit at first there's also the peculiar aspect of how the criminal justice system

is looked after by the government which is the police falls into the home office's remit while the courts fall into the Ministry of Justice so that was the initial setup and I don't think there was an issue with that and you do have to begin at the start so absolutely did we need need to look at the police stage first. And as we began to undertake this work, it took a little bit

of time to first through the research, then it took time to develop solutions, and then it took time for the police to implement that. Five years on, we are very much at the stage where every police force in the country is implementing this new approach. We are very much at the stage where we are seeing a much larger number of cases being charged. So now is the point in time where we do need to look at the courts. I don't think there was a sort of ball intent. It's just you've got to start somewhere. But I'm now at the point where I'm thinking we must look at the courts because anecdotally we are hearing that when we go into the courtroom, it is

back to how it always has been. The focus is on the credibility of the complainant. The law is not stuck with when it comes to protecting victim rights and intrusions into complainant. background. Let me throw that over actually to Naga, who's also listening to this. And you've been following some of the rape trials. What have you heard and saw? Yeah, I mean, we're very much as Catherine was saying, we see that there are sort of, there is a new approach on the ground in the way investigations are being done. But when it gets through to trial or when gets through to those management hearings, particularly when the defence are requesting the victim's personal

records or her GP records or counselling records and so on, suddenly we're getting all these orders being made that are much more intrusive. And sometimes, you know, police officers say, you know, when we try to push back on a request and say, well, that's not a reasonable request, the police will say, well, I know it's not a reasonable line of inquiry, but the judge is just going to order it anyway. So there does seem to be a sort of discrepancy now between the approach that the barristers and the judges are taking and the way that the police and the CPS are, have a much better understanding of the privacy rights for victims and citizens. survivors. But this is really important because it has come up in many times when we spoken on Women's Hour about how much personal data should be released and how that may influence the outcome when it comes to a trial, even going ahead as opposed to a verdict. I mean, how do you decide, let me start with you now again, then I'll throw it back over to you, Catherine. What is

reasonable or proportionate? Well, there is quite clear guidance on it. And one of the one of the key things that the requests are not supposed to be speculative. You're not supposed to say, well, let me just have a look at all these records, just to check if there's anything there, because that is really intrusive and it's really disproportionate. You wouldn't do that to a robbery victim or a burglary victim, you know. So there needs to be some specific reason why they think there is some particular piece of evidence that actually is relevant to this case. Now, the police are getting much better. We're not seeing those kind of blanket requests that we used to see a few years ago where they just have a list of like, right, we need to see everything, your social

services records, your GP records and so on. But then when it gets to case management hearings and the defence are saying, right, we need to see all these things. Judges seem to go along with that. So, yeah, it's that proportionality. And that information being released kind of, of course, affect a victim survivor and their decision to go ahead. Catherine, you are going to head or head up a pile of project. What about that aspect of the victim's personal data? How are you going to approach it? So the way we're going to approach it is we're going to look at cases that have recently concluded.

We will look at how the police saw the case, the decisions they made. We will look at how does Crown Prosecution Service make decisions. And then we look at how it played out in the courtroom to see where there might be divergent reading. of the very same law, we must keep in mind that all of these agencies work within the same legal framework. The letter of the law is the very same for everybody. But the law in practice, how it's understood, how it's implemented is different. That shouldn't be the case. So we are going to try and identify where the gaps are, where the understanding diverges, to try and come up with solutions. And what's really important to me here is that we do have to have a consistency

between the courtroom and the earlier stages of the process, imagine somebody who has gone through all of this investigation, has gone to the moment of a suspect being charged, and finally, likely some years down the line, the trial comes round, and then these intrusive requests are being made, and we know that the courtroom, it's a competition between the story told by the prosecuting council and the defence council. And sometimes these requests are not made in good faith. They are made because there is a knowledge that some complainants might just pull out. It might just be the final straw.

So it's not made because there is a genuine belief there's something there. It's a tactical move. We also know that it can result in a trial having to be rescheduled because the police are now told they have to go away and get these additional materials. That undoubtedly isn't helpful in a system where we need. no too many trials have to be rescheduled. It contributes to the long delays. It contributes to the malfunction of the courtroom.

So there's a very high price to pay for something where the defence is playing a tactic. And what we see is that judges, because this has always been the way, let it happen. So maybe things will change with the pilot that you're going to run. I believe it's in London. I do want to get to one other aspect, however. of the announcement the government has made today. That is of a new national legal services, legal advisor service, excuse me, for rape victims.

What do you expect? So to me, this is a fantastic announcement. So the government has long committed to doing it. Now it's come through as funded. What I do expect is that it's going to give complainants to confidence that they have someone in their corner who can advise them, who can tell them what their rights are and he can push back when mistakes are being made at the police stage.

So I am expecting that that will improve the quality of decision-making at the police stage, that it will give perhaps more victims and survivors the confidence of coming forward and that ultimately it will contribute to the smoother running of cases because that legal understanding is brought in much earlier. Let me put two aspects back to you, Noggett,

the legal advisors, but also, you know, Katrin was bringing up as were you, about what could be seen as intrusive requests for information. There are many that will question. What about fairness to the defendant, for example, because we know sometimes a defence can base that defence upon some of the notes that are taken from the victim? So firstly on the independent legal advice scheme, as Katrin said, that is really great news. We've been waiting for this since the general election. It was an election manifest commitment. And we've been running a pilot in London for almost two years now of that kind of scheme that's funded by the London Mayor's Office. So we've seen the difference it can make to survivors on the ground.

And in terms of the defendant's rights, I think the law as it is now is intended to balance those two rights. absolutely, if there is some particular reason why there is relevant evidence, then the law does allow access to those records. What it doesn't allow, when the Court of Appeal said this as far back as 2020, is just sort of blanket speculative trolls just to see whether there's anything, you know, somewhere in your past where you were sort of, particularly, for example, say women who've grown up in care, there might be all sorts of things about their bad behaviour. You know, it just sort of reinforces the idea of the perfect victim.

If you've ever done anything wrong in your life, that's it. You don't have the protection of the law. So it certainly does allow defendants to access records when there's a good reason for it. Nogh Rofa and Professor Katrin Hul. Thank you both so much. Now, Winter Olympics, were you captivated by it? I was.

And the good news is that the Winter Paralympics are now well underway, so bringing us another wave of incredible sporting performances. You might remember that the Winter Olympics was widely praised for achieving near gender parity, almost a 50-50 split between male and female competitors. But the picture looks different at the Paralympics. Current predictions suggest that only 26.5% of athletes will be women. Within the Great Britain team, the figure is lower, 24% female representation. And the story goes deeper than elite sport. Research from Activity Alliance and women in sport reveals a striking

ambition gap among young people. So far fewer disabled girls feel that a future at the top of the sport is within their reach compared to the boys. So what's stopping disabled women and girls from progressing in sport and what would it take to change it? Well, we have a number of

guests to answer that. Phil Smith is Chef Domitian for Paralympics G.B. Kate Baker, Director of Performance at UK Sport. That's the government agency responsible for investing money into athletes in Olympic and Paralympic Sport. And we also have Kelly Gallowher, Paralympine Skiar, who became Great Britain's first winter Paralympic gold medalist.

That's a Sochi in 2014. They're all joining me from Italy, Milan Cortina. Welcome. Phil, tell us a little bit. You have a jumper on you. You're ready for the cold weather. Tell us a little bit what it's like. Absolutely.

Yeah, good morning. Welcome, live from Cortina. But we're on day four of the games. It's not quite as snowy or cold. as it was during the Olympics. But it's been fantastic to build on the success from the Olympic team and just really get going. We've still got five to six days of competition to go.

So it's pretty early in the competition. But with this question, Kate, non-parity of gender, I suppose, when it comes to the Paralympics, 26.5% compared to 47% in the Winter Olympics. How do you understand that? It's a really complex area, and I know that's quite an easy answer to give in this space, but a lot of the challenges that we see start well before they get to our space,

so here at the Olympics or Paralympics. And actually, when we look at all female participation, it's a challenge. We know it's a challenge to keep women and girls in sport, and particularly post-16s who remain competitive. When you layer on living with disability on top of that, it compounds the issues significantly. And what we know from the cohort studies that we've already done is that most of the female Paralympic athletes

don't arrive to us until 21 and yet the boys might have been well involved from 12 years old. And so the way in which we encourage people is really, really important. So let's talk about that because that is fascinating to me when I was reading into it. You know, lads will often be picked up at 10 or 11 for women. They've already gone, you know, all through high school without ever, I don't know, picking up a pair of skis or whatever.

it might be. Yeah, and it speaks volumes, isn't it, about the way in which we treat and talk to women and girls in society. And so as a young girl, we know that generally they tend to be less signposted towards things which feel aggressive or risky or, you know, physically outgoing. And that becomes compounded when you have disability on top of that with such small numbers. You know, we're talking 2% of young girls living with disability, even signposted to take passing physical activity, the ability to just get access, to get the joy of movement at a young age and in areas which have been so constrained or not available to them is so important. So what would it look like to have those signposts sticking up somewhere for that young girl?

So I think it starts with schools and PE and the ability to get access to physical activity and the BPA are running a fantastic initiative towards equal play that every individual who, who lives with disability at a young age, should have access to school sports. And that just doesn't happen at the moment. And that's boys and girls that that really matters for. And then I think also being able to access clubs. Now, we know that skiing clubs are not necessarily going to be your first port of

calling Great Britain. But of course, you know, the ability to access athletics clubs, for example, triathlon clubs, swimming clubs, etc. They can be the gateway to come on and do something else. And if there's one thing we're fantastic at at the elite and it's translating brilliant athletes in one sport into being brilliant. I love when I see that as well

when people change sports. Yeah, it's fascinating. BPA, the British Paralympic Association, for those that are coming perhaps new to this story. Phil, let's talk about categories, classifications because this is also

a key area when it comes to opportunities for women within Paralympics as well. Explain why. Well, I mean, I think the biggest challenge at the Winter Games in particular around the classification is that currently the team sports that are at the games, which obviously make up a large number of the athletes, whilst they're all mixed predominantly and historically, they are sports that are still played by men. There is only one female athlete in the mixed competition of Paralyse hockey, which is obviously something that we would love to see changed. And actually, in Great Britain, we are one of a small but growing number of nations that now have a thriving women's para ice hockey team. And there is a real dream and desire that women's para ice hockey will end up as a Paralympic sport in the world.

the future. And as I say, there's the strong representation in GB and in Europe and certainly across North America where they have that history of para Isles. That would make such a difference. And there is a great article on that particular point on the BBC Sport website. But you know, you talk about history there. And of course, that often, you know, if it's a legacy sport, that will bring people along as well as we see in various countries. And there's quite a bit of history when it comes to the Paralympics. The Games grew out of a therapeutic project for injured World War II veterans dominated by men. Do you think that's part of the legacy that I suppose is difficult to overcome?

I think if you go back far enough, probably, but I think that the world has changed in our terms. I mean, when we look at a summer games, I know we're talking specifically about the winter games now because that's where we are. but we were over 40% representation by females in our summer team and so I think that we are working really closely towards gender parity from a summer perspective and I think some of that challenge therefore is quite specific here to the Winter Games for one or two of those reasons that we've talked about

but you've said their visibility perhaps the history of the games was male dominated but actually from a Paralympics GB perspective the medals we've won over the last three games, over 90% have been won by female athletes. And we've got athletes on this team now who have been inspired

by seeing those athletes. And that's made them want to go out, want to learn how to ski. As Kate said, we don't have many mountains. It's not very easy, but we do have dry ski slope. And we do have opportunities for young athletes who want to go and try it,

having been inspired. And hopefully, that's what we see after this week as well. Could there be a better segue to bring in Kelly Galaher, para alpine skier, who became Great Britain's first winter Paralympic gold medalist at Sochi in 2014. Kelly, great to have you with us. I mean, what about your journey to becoming top of the mountain, top of your sport? How would you describe it?

Well, I would describe it that when I was a child, I literally used to get my mummy to help me write notes for my PE teacher to say how I didn't want to bother with P.E. because it was so inaccessible for me. And here I am as an athlete ambassador for Paralympics GB running around my homeland of the bottom of a ski slope, kind of with athletes that literally did get inspired by my gold medal. And what I would definitely say is that when I did decide at 17, that skiing was my thing,

and I threw myself into it, because I was one of those children who just had tenacity and wanted to find a place for myself. And I found that freedom and excitement through skiing. Like I didn't feel disabled once I was skiing with a guide And I just found other people to come with me And then once we could prove that we were investable And that we could win medals

And we could, you know, compete on the world stage And we had national lottery funding And then it boosted us into the best in the world And now there are athletes coming into the village And they're going to be competing on the 13th And they saw Charlotte and my medal And now they're competing and they're going to be able to go to 2030

and they're going to be able to move on. And those are girls, they're young girls seeing us. But until we're performing our best, how can someone else dream it? It was just that I decided as a tenacious little girl but actually ski barby is who I want to be. And so here I am.

Ski barbies who I want to be. But you are visually impaired. And you mentioned very briefly there, your guide as well. Can you explain a little for our listeners what it is like to ski, being visually impaired because you talk about tenacious. I mean, there's so many other adjectives I could add to that.

I feel that in my ordinary life, I am very much restricted. I find the world quite inaccessible to me, even though I do have some vision. But when I ski with a guide, the freedom, the excitement, we go at 90 kilometres per hour. Like, I'm never able to drive a car at home or anywhere, really. And even cycling, even walking my children to school, it's kind of dangerous, you know. it's risky. But being on skis doesn't feel risky because the trust, communication and the work that we've put in, like, we're elite athletes and skiing just, it just lifts my spirit. I'm, I'm on the top of the mountains at the moment. I'm living like an actual dream world and this,

before I was retired, was my whole life. So I can't express enough how the coming of Paralympian really just kind of like lifted me away from feeling so restricted. I don't feel restricted when I'm skiing and when I'm amongst other Paralympians and skiers and we all have this kind of shared understanding. We really do need that support at home and we really do need it so that in order for us to be able to have that parody, whether we're women or disabled athletes, we do need to kind of lift ourselves out of

the kind of restrictions that we have in our everyday life. And you are a girl, obviously we can feel it there in your passion coming across who dared to dream. But you may have heard me mention as well, Kelly, that there is only 36% of disabled girls who dream of reaching the top in sport compared to 61% of disabled boys with that ambition. Why do you think that might be?

I think very much so when you have a visual impairment and this is why it would be very easy to lend your voice to the Equal Play campaign that Parliament's GDB are running because it's very much trying to get the society to change their attitudes towards, you know, children and young girls in their schools help the teachers to be able to be more inclusive so that we're kind of welcoming children into that space and saying, this is a space for you. Sport is for you, recreationally, elite sport. And certainly I can definitely commend UK sport and the National Lottery and the fact that when I was ready to receive that funding, it was parody. They weren't saying, you know, you can't have funding because it's just a gold medal, a girl's gold medal that you're going to win. I was the first woman to win, you know, winter Paralympic gold medal. And I'm seeing that elite performance kind of, you know, enhanced through the mechanisms that we still have in the Olympics.

It is quite, you know, parity between the Olympics and the Paralympics. And so I think if we can get more women and girls into sport, you will see us all kind of float the boat, if you will. Well, definitely sounds inspiring, listening to you. Who are you watching out for Kelly during this Paralympics? Oh, my, my, my. I was sad to see Joe, the compatriot of Joe and Jason. They were so sad and they did so great in their interviews. I'm really excited to see Nina the snowboarder,

who is our first female. Nina Sparks. Nina Sparks. Without putting pressure on her, I've really enjoyed her journey. I've enjoyed her hard she's worked. I've enjoyed usually getting really great results. She's coming into the village and I just hope the best for her because we're all behind her and we're just really hoping that she has a really great performance because she's done so well

to be our first female snowboarder and I'm just really, really excited to see her. And pretty much I'm behind every single one of these athletes today and every day until the games. And afterwards I'll be there with them. Yeah, I'm just really celebrating the spectacle that is the Winter Paralympics because it's such an amazing show. And on snow and ice, it's incredible. You're behind them, but you're also in front of them. I even heard you were stuffing some cushions for Team GB to make it nice and comfortable for them.

Yeah, and I'm trying to get myself an accreditation because I've heard that there's an athlete karaoke in the village this evening. I'm hoping to get in for a thing song. But you can hear my voice is already pretty tired. Do you have a particular song? I was going to go for like aerosmiths. I don't want to close my eyes. I'll be on my own and they'll just turn off the microphone possibly. Let me throw back to Phil and Kate that are together.

Anybody else we should be watching out for Kelly there was mentioning Nina Sparks, Phil? I would go. We're really excited to see Hester Poole, who is another of our visually impaired skiers. She was someone who absolutely was inspired by Kelly and Charlotte winning that gold. As I understand it, 12 years ago today as well, it's Kelly's anniversary. today. I think Hester is a 19-year-old athlete. She's exactly what we've just been talking about.

She is someone who saw an athlete who looked like her go out and do something incredible for the nation, and that has inspired her. We had some pictures across our social media channels a few days ago when her selection was announced, and the guide she was skiing with was Charlotte Evans, who guided Kelly to Paralympic goals. 12 years ago. And so that's a beautiful full circle moment, I think, for Hester to be out here now.

She arrives in the athlete village with us today. She's competing over the next few days. And I think that's a really beautiful story for us as Paralympics, GV. It's really great to take that moment. And congratulations again, Kelly. What a lovely day to be welcoming people. Kate, the legacy of these Paralympics?

Well, I hope the legacy will be one of inspiration, not least to the young girls that we've been talking about. And so it's really important. I hope that anybody who's listening who knows a young individual living with disability, male or female, finds a way to get to this place because it's incredible when you get here. And we've got a number of talent identification days running over the summer to give opportunities to young people.

We know that accessibility is a difficult thing to get into elite sport, whether you're living with disability or not, the ability to run these through Paralympics TV over the summer and pick up some new. faces for the next games, which again will be in the European time zone, is such a brilliant opportunity for us and the legacy will be in those people. So I can't wait to see who we find. I want to thank all of you for joining us this morning, Kate

Baker, Phil Smith and Kelly Galaher. And I do want to let people know as well. You can keep up to date with all the Paralympics action on the BBC Sport website. TV coverage is on Channel 4. And we did reach out to the International Paralympic Committee who sent us this statement about gender parity. It says in recent edition, of the Paralympic Games, we've made great strides in terms of increasing opportunities for women to compete at the highest level, but fully acknowledged that more still needs to be done.

At the Milano-Cortina-26 Paralympic Games, it is the fourth successive games where the number of female athletes has increased. Much of the funding we provide to our member organisations to develop sport is dependent on their commitment to develop female participation and talent. It's 2009 and we're in the German Mountains. A man straps himself into a car on the world's most dangerous racetrack. He whispers to himself, It's time to put my balls on the dashboard. As he starts the engine. In 15 minutes, he's in an ambulance, unconscious.

In 15 years, he's a billionaire. This is Toto Wolf, Formula One's most powerful team boss and the breakout star of Drive to Survive. This week on Good Bad Billionaire, how Toto Wolf made his billions. Listen wherever you get your BBC podcasts. Now, artificial intelligence. It's changing the way we live, work and learn.

And the BBC has produced a week of programmes to tell those stories and explore what AI means for you. As part of this new collection, CBB's parenting download has been looking at what this means for parents and how families can use AI safely and effectively. Joining presenters Katie Thistleton and Governor B on their upcoming episode are the singer-songwriter Camille and the BBC's tech editor Zoe Kleinman.

I think that AI tools are a kind of second brain. And I don't think there's anything wrong with that. I don't think there's anything wrong with bouncing stuff off them. I think as long as you remember that they're not people and that they are giving you one point of reference in that given moment. And if you ask it again five minutes later, perhaps it will tell you something else. But I personally think you need to lean into it because your kids are going to be asking you about it. You know, use it, familiarize yourself with it. Don't let it take over. Question it. Don't just assume that what it's told you was right, but be comfortable with it and talk to your kids about it.

You know, decide between you as a family. I think that's really important. Like, how can your kids use it? How can it help them? Everyone's kids are different. Everyone's technology thresholds are different. And I just think that familiarizing yourself with it is actually really important. And it can help you within reason.

That's Zoe Climb and one viewpoint there. You can listen to that episode in full by searching for CBB's parents. Download, where you'll find the full collection of episodes covering a range of parenting topics. Now, to my next guest who's just arrived in studio, Ashley Dalton, the MP for West Lancashire, announced you might have seen last week that she was stepping down from her role as health minister to focus on constituency work and her health. Last year, she announced that her breast cancer had returned and metastasize. This means living with advanced breast cancer every day.

It can be managed, but it cannot be cured. you're very welcome back to Women's Hour. Thank you. It's great to be here. Now, can we get into how and what made you make the decision to step down as health minister? Yeah. I mean, so I've been on chemotherapy for about nine months now. So I was being a health minister, you're still an MP. It was almost like doing two full-time jobs simultaneously. And I was on chemotherapy.

And one of the big side effects of my chemotherapy is fatigue. And, you know, it develops over time, you know, it didn't sort of happen instantly. But it got to the stage where I was thinking, actually, I'm really struggling to, you know, to find any time for me. But also I was actually stood at the dispatch box doing the oral statement for the National Cancer Plan. and I was talking about how it's really important that people with cancer have care as well as treatment and I thought, hold on, I'm not really getting any of that. You know, literally I pop the pills and I work 12 to 14 hours a day

and then I go to sleep and that's not sustainable. Care as well as treatment because you led for people who aren't aware the National Cancer Plan and on the parliamentary committee that worked on the rare cancers bill which is set to be become UK law. And you mentioned there that you, it's like having two full-time jobs. But actually, I think you have another job because you're also a carer. Yeah. I mean, less so now, my dad died towards the end of January, but my mum's still alive. She's 91 this month. So, you know, they live with us. So mom and dad have lived

with us for about five years. And dad was very poorly. And mum's very, mum's quite elderly. she doesn't need as much care as dad did. She doesn't really need personal care the way he did. But it is about, you know, we live together and it's about being able to be there for her as well, particularly now because she's on her own. What do you have around your neck? I'm seeing courage calls.

Courage calls to courage everywhere. Yeah. Do you want to tell me a little bit more about why you wear that, if not on your sleeve on your chest? Absolutely, yeah. So, you know, her name's completely just gone out of my head. head. It's, oh, Nan Sloan will be furious with me.

Is it where the quote comes from? Yes, absolutely. So it's a Labour politician, suffragist, and her name's completely going out of my head, which I'm furious about, but that's chemo brain for you. Was it?

Millicent. Yes, Millicent. Forcet. So, and it basically means, you know, she's a courage course to courage everywhere, which is about show courage and it will inspire courage in others. and that's kind of like, you know, a motto really for women, particularly in politics. And I suppose what I've done is a bit of that, actually. It's a very courageous decision because it's something you have worked very hard for.

It's a huge achievement to become a minister. But to be able to decide to take care of yourself. when you're surrounded by so much noise, I suppose, is a good way to describe it and other jobs to do that I'm sure you wanted to do as a minister. It takes a lot of courage to step back. Yeah, and I think it is a brave thing to do. And I suppose, you know, that's the thing that's really important to me. A lot of people think, oh, people think, I'm so sorry you've had to do this.

No, I didn't have to do this. No. I chose to do this. And, you know, I own that. And it's about making decisions about, you know, what are your priorities? We can't all do absolutely everything all of the time. So you're saying that to me very decisively now. I'm a person that weighs things up back and forth a lot before I make a big decision.

What was the process like for you? I mean, I didn't make this decision overnight. I'm sure. It took a long time. But I was absolutely, I started to think about it probably before Christmas. But I was absolutely certain that I wasn't going anywhere until I'd launched the National Cancer Plan. because that's a real priority for me. And I was so honoured to have been asked to lead on that,

particularly as somebody living with cancer. So I thought, what I'm going to do? Wait up, see what happens. And I thought I'm going to make a decision during the February recess. And I did. And I thought, this is it. Do you know, I've been a minister for a year. I launched three national strategies in that time.

The men's health strategy, the first one ever. The HIV Action Plan. which I was on Women's Hour talking about in December and now the National Cancer Plan and I think sometimes it's about saying, okay, I didn't want to be a minister to be something I wanted to be a minister to do something and I've done lots of things.

You have. So now it's time to go and do some other things. And also, I mean, as you will have seen and heard there was such an outpouring of people of support for your decision, but also for the work that you had done, the National Cancer Plan aims to ensure 75% of all cancer patients in the UK are still alive five years following a diagnosis. How do you feel about that figure? Do you think it's possible?

Well, it wouldn't be in the plan if I didn't think it was possible. It is ambitious. You know, we can't escape that. But it does mean, you know, leaning in and taking advantage of new technologies, new opportunities, being agile about how we react to those, and being really laser-focused on improving cancer outcomes. and you know that's that's what we aim to do with the cancer plan it's not going to be easy but it is possible and I'm going to be you know I'm not I'm not walking away from that I'm going to be continuing to of course to push that from the backbench what is the biggest challenge the trickiest part of that I mean the trickiest part is that actually that cancer is a wily beast and it doesn't behave like you can't just give everybody the same treatment and expect It doesn't do the same for everybody.

Your cancer is as individual as you are. You know, it's got its own biology and you've got your own biology. So not all treatments work for all people. But essentially what it's about is making sure that we get early diagnosis wherever possible because it's far more treatable and curable the earlier that we get it. And we have, you know, this country had missed every diagnosis and treatment target for cancer for the last 10 years. You know, we've not hit those targets since 2015,

which is really shocking. So it's about saying, you know, we've really got to focus on doing that again. It's not okay to say, oh, well, that's the way it is. We've got to change the way we do things. We've got to get people in to get their diagnosis quicker. That's why we've got community diagnostic centres open at the weekends and in the evening.

So it's more accessible. Yeah, yeah. And, of course, the pandemic was a big part as well, I know when it came to people going to appointments or perhaps getting out of the habit, which we're talking about as well, trying to get people to go earlier. It took two years, I understand,

for your initial cancer to be diagnosed. You're at a different point now. And I'm wondering how you live with uncertainty. I talked about you're living with cancer, obviously, day to day now, advanced breast cancer. You've a lot of work to do, I know. You're busy, I know. Yeah.

I mean, I'm actually less uncertain now than I was before I got my secondary breast cancer diagnosis because when you've had a primary cancer and particularly one like breast cancer, which can come back 20 years later, you have to learn to live with that uncertainty every day because cancer changes you forever. You know, once you've had that diagnosis, it's easy to be really fearful that that's going to come back. So, you know, the thing I lost and I did when I got my primary cancer diagnosis was the thing I didn't even know I had until I lost it, which was that ability to shake off a pain or a cough and go, oh, it's probably nothing. Because you've learned that actually sometimes it's not nothing. But once you get, you know, now I've got a secondary breast cancer diagnosis. I know that this won't be cured.

you know, so there's a bit of more certainty around that and it's really just a case of managing it as an ongoing condition. I don't know how long that's going to be. I don't know how long I'm going to get. Who does know how long they're going to get? Nobody. None of us. But most of us are blissfully ignorant at the fact

and we can make an assumption that it's going to be a certain amount of time. I've no idea. You know, I've met women that have got similar breast cancer to me that have been on treatment for 20 years. But then I also know women that have died after two. You just don't know. But what I do know is that I'm on chemo at the moment and I feel fit and well.

And the adjustment I've made to my workload is going to make, you know, it means that I can carry on working as an MP and that's the most important thing to me. So let's get back to where we started, which is this decision that you made. How does it feel now on a day-to-day basis? I feel good.

I feel really good about it. it was absolutely the right decision for me to make. The level of fatigue that I was experiencing, I thought all the fatigue was purely down to the chemotherapy. Turns out working 14 hours a day and about four hours every Saturday and Sunday. In a high level. It's actually quite tiring. So quite a lot of that fatigue has lifted,

which means that I'm far more able to focus my. energies on doing the constituency work, which is great. So, you know, I'm, yeah, I was a bit worried thinking, am I just going to be this tired anyway? How am I going to manage? But actually, I'm far less tired than I was. I'm more able to focus on what I want to do. And I'm going to spend some time in the next week or two thinking about what are my priorities

now that I'm on the backbench. What is, what's rumbling there? What's underneath the surface? I'm going to be doing a lot more talking about secondary breast cancer because that's my experience. But there's all sorts of other things that I want to do, particularly for my constituents. It means that I can do more around,

we've got a decision on Friday about the configuration of children's A&E in my constituency. That's really important to me about maintaining, you know, emergency services and provision for my constituents. We also have issues around things like flooding. We've had, we've secured 20 million pounds Pride in Place funding for Skelmersdale. So I'm really looking forward to being able to really lean into those constituency issues as well.

I'll have you back in false. No, you never went away. But that is definitely, I think they'll see you perhaps even more around. I'm so glad that you were feeling well. Ashley Dalton, MP. Thank you so much for joining us this morning. My pleasure. Thank you. Now, let me move on.

8444 if you'd like to get in touch, particularly if perhaps there was a difficult decision. that you have to make, that you had to walk away from something perhaps you loved or achieved. Really interesting to hear Ashley Dalton and her process going through that. What about this as we talk about work? How far would you go for a year off work?

Well, the character at the centre of the new comic novel Mother Faker is prepared to fake a pregnancy. After her husband disappears with her life savings, teacher, Barry Brown, is dreaming of escape and building a new life, but she has limited options. So on a whim, she begins her great pregnancy heist. At the heart of this very funny book are some more serious themes,

including the way society treats women who don't have children. The author is Anna Brooke Mitchell. She's joining me in the studio this morning. Good morning, Anna. Thank you so much for having me. It's so happy to have you on Women's Hour. This is your debut novel. Yes.

And it is quite the idea. Where did it all come from? Well, I had the idea about 10 years ago, I suppose. I was temping in an office. And I sort of really picked up on this slightly taboo, I suppose, kind of politics between sort of the parents and the non-parents in the office and how there was a kind of expectation that people without kids might do a little bit more to sort of help. And I thought it was just quite an interesting sort of nutty subject matter.

But it wasn't really, at the time, it just felt like a great idea. someone faking a pregnancy with a time off work. And then I was in my mid-30s, 10 years later. And then I just thought, you know, I suppose the declining of my fertility was sort of very much front and center of my mind. And so I suppose the subject message just became so much more relevant to me. And being child free by choice, it wasn't really a thing people spoke about 10 years ago. But it's definitely something that people are speaking a lot more about now.

So, yeah. Shall we listen to a little taster? So this is where we first. meet your protagonist, Barry, who's had a run-in with a family in a cafe who have called Barry a Karen. So in a derogatory way, what would you say,

kind of putting her in a box or considering her a woman who's complaining about aspects of life around her. Yes. My name isn't Karen, by the way. It's Barry, B-A-R-R-I. Elegant written down, but when spoken aloud, which is how names tend to be used, people just hear Barry, which sounds like the name of a gruff lorry driver from East London or a chuckle brother. There is a world in which a 35-year-old woman named Barry makes light work of it.

She's tall with the sveled body of a weasel, eats Nordic yoghurt, a party animal who also loves wholesome activities like getting up early to go on a trail run or socialising, whereas I, Well, that lorry driver, whack him in a generic smock dress, give him curly reddish hair, wide calves, and if the practical shoe fits, I often think about how different life would have been if my sister Lara's felt weasel type had been named Barry and I, Lara, but still, we move. That definitely gives us a little insight to Barry,

who's unapologetically herself. She has a lack of a filter, I think it's fair to say, with people around her. Is there any of you in her, or are you projecting? I mean, I actually think everyone wishes they could be a bit more Barry. I'm such a not a rule breaker, and I suppose it was very liberating for me to sort of write a character like this.

But I think she also voices a lot of things that I've felt and people, I think, who don't have children, sometimes you can be made to feel sort of othered or less, or, you know, you have to sort of must. in and just sort of fit around everyone else and conform. Or accommodate might be the word as well, which Barry brings. But she decides to push back against it in some ways by buying a pregnancy bump and pretending, faking a pregnancy. I actually went online and saw you can buy them quite quite easily for various months,

two to three months pregnant, seven to eight. And tell us what happens to Barry. Like society kind of changes their attitude to her. Well, it's interesting, isn't it? because people, the communities rally around pregnant people. It's kind of a thing that we kind of do. And so the minute she kind of tells the world that she's pregnant, suddenly she becomes accepted.

And she's somebody who's quite lonely. Her husband has just sort of left. And she starts to connect with people for the first time in a very long time. And so then she begins to understand the true cost of kind of what she's doing and the fraud. But I think it's also quite an interesting thing because I think you, realise that, you know, there are lots of people in the world who potentially are lonely and like the way society sort of rallies around pregnant people. Like maybe actually we should think more broadly about, you know, helping other people. Because it brings up some issues, right?

I mean, in a way that Barry, if she did go the more conformist route of having a baby, she could be brought into the fold and be happier. Is one way of reading your book? I don't think so. I think the most important message of this book and it's something that I really felt really strongly obviously being child free by choice is an absolute privilege and there are lots of people who would love to have children and can't have them and I suppose the message that I have with this book is that

just because you don't conform, just because you don't do these things that society asks you to do, you know, get married, have children. It doesn't mean you don't add value. And I think the thing that this book really celebrates is those relationships that we all have in our lives with people who are not our biological parents, but who play a really important role in shaping who we are. So, you know, teachers, aunties, uncles, family friends, all those people

who, the good ones, they really do make their mark on us. And I don't think we talk about it enough. You know, how do we sort of celebrate those people? And because you've dedicated this book to your aunt, who died very young, actually, and quite shockingly as well, I'm sorry for your loss. And you said you wanted to pay tribute to these people who aren't our parents, but have that meaningful impact. What was her impact on you? Auntie Linney, she was the most incredible tour de force. She was, you know, she was so generous. And there are elements of Barry with Auntie Lynn, you know, she was very particular. But unlike Barry, like she was, Barry is quite selfish and Auntie Linny wasn't selfish at all.

She would do everything for anybody. And, you know, I think it was really difficult because when she died, people didn't really understand how much that affected my brother and my two cousins. because she didn't have children. And so we were like her children. And there isn't like necessarily the language to talk about those things. And you don't even get, you know, government bereavement leave for losing an aunt or an uncle. And, you know, she was like a parent.

And, you know, it's Mother's Day on Sunday. Mothering Sunday, yeah. And I really wish, I suppose, my biggest regret, I suppose, is, you know, I never really thought to send her a Mother's Day card or Mother's Day. and we never like had that, I suppose, that conversation, that she really did make her mark and she has a legacy. Well, she hasn't right now. You're speaking about her and your book is dedicated to her.

Did you worry about offending, because you know yourself when it comes to issues of parenthood or fertility, people can feel very strongly about these issues. Were you worried about potentially offending any group of people, parents? I'm not worried about a feeling. spending parents. A lot of parents have read it and really like it. I think that the people I was most worried about and concerned about were people who would love to be parents and can't be. But I think there is a lot in this book that those people can relate to too because the world is,

you know, when you parents are constantly moaning about how hard it is. But, you know, that's frustrating for everybody else around because it's kind of like, you know, you knew what you were letting yourself in for. So, and obviously that's controversial. And it's, but I think that's why books like this are so important because it all feeds into the same issue, which is, you know, parents aren't supported and other people, you know, pick up the slack and it's not, you know, separate. We're all in it together. Yeah, because some might feel that, for example, when pregnant, that they weren't given the support by society that they feel they should have been, for example, you're showing it from another aspect. And I do have to also mention that it's all set in Guernsey. Yeah. Now, like another character in the book, why?

Well, Guernsey, my mum's from Guernsey and a lot of my family are there. And it's a very, obviously, a very small island and everybody knows everybody. So it's kind of like the perfect place for somebody to keep a secret like this. It's a very conservative place. But it's also a lovely, beautiful, stunning island. The people there are very trusting. And so it just felt like it had like lots of different things that kind of really sort of feed in to sort of. of Barry's and raise the stakes for her as a character.

But also, I love the idea that, you know, at the beginning of the book, she wants nothing more than to escape from there. But by the end, you know, she really reconnects with her home. And it's a beautiful island. And yeah, I just, and I wanted to write something that felt really authentic to the Channel Islands. Also, in my last minute, I believe you're still working as a PA. Yeah. So this is just doing it on the side.

When were you writing? I know you had a little break from work. And you kind of got down to brass tacks. Yeah, and I'm a screenwriter as well. Yes. And an actor. So it's a lot to juggle. I must tell people, because you do have one of your comedy shorts,

Man Eater on BBC I player now. So people would like to see that, which is silly and also serious. Which perhaps is your signature style. Yeah, I mean, I think a lot of the stuff I write is sort of fueled by female rage. Yeah. But laughing. Like there's humour there. Yeah.

Well, I think humor is a really good way to sort of talk about these difficult topics, you know. It gets people because it puts people, ease and then you like throw in something a bit controversial and it makes people a bit uncomfortable but I think it's important to be talking about this. So continuing as a PA? Yeah. At the moment I mean they're all

listening. They've been amazing my work I've been really supportive. But there is a TV adaptation of Mother Faker underway. It's in development. Yeah. They're a lovely UK production company. Because you were, you did acting as well as my understanding. Like am I looking at

Barry? I don't think so. I think we'll try and go for someone a bit more well-known than me. Do you have an ideal? I've got a few, yeah. Do you want to give me one? I mean, there's a couple, Amy Lewood or Mia McKenna-Brews. Oh, yeah. Both have sat in that seat. Have they? So we're manifesting it now. We're manifesting it. So great to have you in. I need to let people know that Anna Brooke Mitchell's debut novel, Mother Faker, is available in shops now. And do join us again tomorrow, Anita. Well, oh, no, I'll just meet tomorrow.

Excuse me, it's Wednesday. Join me then. We've got Elizabeth Newman and Strictly Champion Ellie Leach. I'll see you then. That's all for today's woman's hour. Join us again next time. What would you do if your deepest secrets were held to ransom? In 2020, every patient who had used a Finnish psychotherapy service called Vastamor

had their therapy notes stolen and held to ransom by a face. Remorseless-Ramseless hacker. It could be some extortionist gang from Eastern Europe or it could be somebody living next door to me. I'm Jenny Clemen. Join me as I discover just how vulnerable our deepest secrets can be. I think I'm going to have a heart attack. From BBC Radio 4 and intrigue, this is Ransom Man.

Listen first on BBC Sounds. It's 2009 and we're in the German mountains. a man straps himself into a car on the world's most dangerous racetrack. He whispers to himself, It's time to put my balls on the dashboard. As he starts the engine. In 15 minutes, he's in an ambulance, unconscious. In 15 years, he's a billionaire.

This is Toto Wolf, Formula One's most powerful team boss and the breakout star of Drive to Survive. This week on Good Bad Billionaire, how Toto Wolf made his billions. Listen wherever you get your BBC podcasts.