Woman's Hour - Scottish Government consultation on gender recognition laws, Hazel Hunt, Pragna Patel, Rosie de Courcy & Megan Nolan

Episode Date: January 5, 2022

How widely is the Scottish Government consulting on its plans to allow people to legally change sex without a medical diagnosis? Emma Barnett speaks to Lisa Mackenzie from MurrayBlackburnMackenzie, an Edinburgh-based policy analysis collective who say the SNP is breaking a manifesto promise, by only meeting with groups representing trans rights since last May’s Holyrood election. Military mums rally in protest at the decision to award former Prime Minister Tony Blair a knighthood. Hazel Hunt, whose son Richard died in Afghanistan, is considering sending back the Elizabeth Cross that her family had received as a mark of protest. Southall Black Sisters was founded in 1979 to address the needs of Asian, African-Caribbean and minority women and to empower them to escape violence. Pragna Patel was one of the founders of Southall Black Sisters and today is her last day as Director. We talk to her about the chages she’s witnessed and the role she’s held for over 30 years.It's ten years since the popular fiction writer Maeve Binchy died and forty years since her first best seller Light a Penny Candle was published. What has been her legacy for the generation of Irish women writers that followed and what is the role of editors in creating best-sellers? We talk to Rosie de Courcy Senior Editor at Head of Zeus publishers and Maeve's long-time editor, and Irish author and journalist Megan Nolan.Taking photos or video recordings of breastfeeding mothers in public without their consent is to be made a crime in England and Wales, punishable by up to two years in prison. We catch up with the woman who started the campaign Julia Cooper.Presenter: Emma Barnett Producer: Lisa Jenkinson Studio Manager: Donald McDonald

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. I'm Natalia Melman-Petrozzella, and from the BBC, this is Extreme Peak Danger. The most beautiful mountain in the world. If you die on the mountain, you stay on the mountain. This is the story of what happened when 11 climbers died on one of the world's deadliest mountains, K2, and of the risks we'll take to feel truly alive. If I tell all the details, you won't believe it anymore. Extreme, peak danger. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.

BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, I'm Emma Barnett and welcome to Woman's Hour from BBC Radio 4. Good morning and welcome to the programme today in which I'm going to be joined by a lot of women fighting for change, campaigning, lobbying or demanding action. From Pragna Patel, one of the founders of the campaign group Southall Black Sisters, on her last day as director of that organisation, a role she's had for over 30 years, to Julia Cooper, who's just won a change in the law to make taking photos or videos of women breastfeeding a crime.

Yesterday, we talked about New Year's graces, gifts to yourself, kindnesses instead of resolutions. So many of you got in touch with what you're planning on doing. Well, what's your fight this year? We're still in the first week of 2022. What are you going to be focusing on? What are your efforts on, your energy? What's that being directed towards?

What are you channeling? Who are you campaigning? What are you campaigning about? Perhaps it's not a campaign. Perhaps it's something you feel that needs to be a change. And it doesn't require a lot of people. Perhaps it requires you to do something much smaller on the home front. Or it's a bigger thing and you're getting together with others.

Tell me what it is. 84844. You're going to hear from a lot of people trying to make change today. A lot of women. And I'd like to hear from you and have your voice in this. And of course, if any of their campaigns, any of their fights are the ones that you will be lending your voice to, please also get in touch. The numbers then that you need, 84844 is the number you need to text me here at Woman's Hour. Text will be charged at your standard message rate. On social media, we're over at BBC Woman's Hour or email me

through our website. But my first guest is someone taking on a former Prime Minister, alongside nearly 700,000 people who have signed a petition calling for Sir Tony Blair to have his knighthood removed. On the 1st of January, Sir Tony finally became a member of the Order of the Garter, England's oldest and most senior order of chivalry, 14 years after leaving office. The ex-Labour leader, who was in power from 1997 to 2007, was given the title as the New Year's honours were awarded.

But petitioners complain that his role in the Iraq war makes him personally responsible for many deaths and they have accused him of war crimes. Now a group of mothers who lost their soldier sons during the war in Afghanistan have written to the Queen to urge her to strip Tony Blair of his knighthood, of course, also covering what was going on in Iraq. And they say the former prime minister caused untold misery when he sent British troops to fight in Helmand province and Iraq on a bed

of lies. Hazel Hunt is one of those military mothers who lost her 21-year-old son, Private Richard Hunt. He had been in the army for fewer than two years when he became the 200th British soldier to die in the war in Afghanistan in 2009. Hazel, good morning. Good morning. Thank you very much for joining me today. I wanted to start by asking why you've chosen to write this letter to Her Majesty. I believe five of you as military mothers who've lost children in war. Yes, that's correct. Well, we wrote to Her Majesty because the gift of the knighthood

is directly in her charge. It doesn't come from the government. It is the royal prerogative. Therefore, she is the only one that can rescind it. Why do you think she chose to give it to Tony Blair? I don't know. I know that there's a lot of people say, oh, he's done a lot of good in his time. But as far as we are concerned as a group of mothers, he's a war criminal and that overrides everything

that he may or may not have succeeded at. Indeed, you say in your letter that this award makes a mockery of your children's lives. Yes. Well, you know, while he's tucked away safe at home with all his security and his family, we don't have that privilege anymore because we've all lost members of our family in a fight that wasn't justified. In terms of what you hope to achieve by this, you've obviously written to the Queen. There is this petition as well, as I came on air, was nearing 700,000 people. He's accepted this. I mean, some would actually say they're surprised he's accepted the knighthood with everything he had to say. This is a political point, of course, about modernisation and new labour being against sort of medieval religious monarchical,

potential monarchical institutions that which the Order of the Garter is. Putting that to one side, do you think you can actually change this? Well, you'll never know unless you try. And that's the one thing that anybody who's had anything to do with the military knows is that you've got to keep trying. You don't give up. And in terms of how this came about, I presume you heard the news like other people. And what happened? Did you know these women already or did you get in touch with each other? How did the letter come about? Well, like everybody else, we heard it on the media to begin with. And I think from talking to everybody on Facebook, which is how we tend to communicate, everybody was of one feeling.

I think the majority of us probably burst into tears, couldn't believe it. We were hoping that it was something that would never happen. And basically we got together as the Bereaved Military Mothers Group and Mums for Justice Group with a lovely lady called Rosie Dunn, who has done numerous stories about us and for us regarding everything from the fallout of the wall to what the injured at home should be expecting or should have got. So it's covered a wide range. But to be honest, I don't think I've heard one single voice of dissent

in what we're doing from the bereaved military mothers. You also appeal to the Queen, to Her Majesty, as a mother and as a grandmother to go some way to understanding what you describe as your collective plight. Yes. Yeah, well, obviously, you know, she is, all of those, as are we. The only thing being is, of course, that having lost our sons or daughters, that particular branch of our family, we never will have grandchildren or great-grandchildren. And also from the point of view that the Queen, of course, as the head of the armed forces, has always been intensely interested in them.

And we're just trying to appeal to those sides of her to try and set this precedent of taking away this honour, which the man should we feel should never have been given in the first place. May I read to you something that one of our listeners has written in, Alison, who's listening. She says calling him a war criminal, calling Tony Blair a war criminal is totally unjustified since he hasn't been convicted of anything. You may not have dissent amongst the military mothers, but there will be those listening who perhaps have that sort of view on this. Yeah, well, that's because he's never actually been taken to court, which he should have done. It's been proved by Sir John Gilcote's report that the intelligence that he supposedly took us to war on was extremely dubious

and in no way should he have made that decision as it was. And the fact was there was a very real threat at the time of the Parliament actually overturning it, but he pushed it to its limit, he and his cronies, and the fallout was 179 people of our sons and daughters killed in Iraq and 457 in Afghanistan, which you can lay directly at that decision. Not having to go over that report and of course, people be familiar with it or not. They may have read it. They may have gotten through some of the summary of it.

But I suppose taking a step back, you mentioned it yourself that some would say there's a great deal of good that Tony Blair did as well in this country. I'm reminded of a Labour MP yesterday, Peter Kyle, told one of my colleagues on The World at One on Radio 4 that he was happy about the knighthood, talking as a gay man. He says almost all of the freedoms I enjoy as such were granted by the Blair government and others, I suppose, on social media who haven't signed that petition, cite other successes and improvements to their life that they put down to that time in government, whether it's tax credits, minimum wage, they talk about what happened in Northern Ireland, him as a man of peace. Do you understand why some are comfortable with this decision? No, I'm afraid I don't because I'm afraid I have the exact opposite view of that. The fact is, the peace in Northern Ireland wouldn't have happened without Bill Clinton.

It wouldn't have mattered who particularly was the Prime Minister of Great Britain at the time. And as for all the other rights and things, those would have all come about eventually anyway, no matter who's in office in the number 10 Downing Street, because that's the way the world was turning anyway. Julia's written in to say, may I say how much I agree with your guests talking about the Tony Blair honour.

This is an utter disgrace. He should never have been offered it. He's a hypocrite to accept it. And just because he'd never been convicted of war crimes, it means nothing. So firmly on your side, as I say, close to 700,000 have now signed this petition. I know you say if you don't try, you don't know.

But are you hopeful of at least a reply from the Queen? And are you hopeful of any movement on this? Yeah, absolutely. Her Majesty, I've written to her and other members of the family before and they always do reply and as I say you you never know unless you try and I know it's been a very difficult decision perhaps for the Queen because of there is you know this president that all PMs seem to get this knighthood but just because they get all get it doesn't mean to say they deserve it. So hopefully, fingers crossed, something might happen. Several of you have threatened to return your Elizabeth Crosses,

which are given to bereaved military families, in protest against this honour for Blair. Are you going to do that? I seriously, seriously thought about it. I got it out. I've got it here on the desk. And it breaks my heart to think about it. But it's pushed me to that limit where I feel that I needed to make a gesture. But having thought about it for a couple of days, and many of our family friends have urged us not to do that because it is recognition of

Richard's service and his sacrifice but it's just so emotive that on one hand you're honouring my son and yet on the other hand you're then honouring the man who sent him to his death. So on balance you probably will keep it because of the memory of your son? Yeah, I've been urged by so many people not to send it back because it's of the fact that it's his service to the country and to us for our freedoms. But I never, ever thought that there would come a day when I would feel like that.

And it's still chewing over in my mind. Can I ask about another theme that's coming up on the messages from some of our listeners which is you know it's a question really around we don't have conscription in this country and signing up to the armed forces I mean this message here says you know why did these mothers that these families allow their sons to join the armed forces if they were not willing to see them risk their lives. That's the point. There may be a time when their life is risked, be it in Iraq, Northern Ireland or anywhere else.

Sadly, the real world requires brave sacrifices. And her son was brave enough, your son was brave enough to put his life at risk. And while it might not seem worth it now, in a generation or two, the change in that region will show it was a price worth paying. I understand the grief, whether it was a war justified or not. It doesn't change the fact if you join the armed forces, the whole point is your life is at risk and you are prepared to take that risk. What do you make of that? That is true. They were prepared to take the risk, but the risk should be as minimal as possible. And unfortunately, the way

that the campaigns were directed directly by the politicians led to numerous deaths that could have been avoided. Richard's death in itself was because they were being asked to do too much and being overstretched. He should never have been crossing unsafe ground that the troops could not keep safe because it was too far in advance from where Kandahar was to the Green Line. Now that was directly at the behest of, tis true, the then Gordon Brown as Prime Minister, and it was too much. And that is the trouble. we have such a small armed forces these days they are constantly overstretched but couldn't you say that i was just going to say if i may couldn't you say that i suppose of all conflicts because of the situation with the armed forces a

lot of the time this was different this was not a world war as as other conflicts have been um ireland uh northern ireland in itself was a particularly small area and particularly close afghanistan and iraq are over 3 000 miles away and unless you have direct uh connections with the military or the middle east it's it's it could be a whole planet away as far as most people are concerned. Well, indeed, and I know that you looked into what happened to your son in a programme, a documentary with Sir Trevor MacDonald, which was called Why Did My Son Die? So you have looked at this in some detail and try to understand. I thought, if I may, we could end our conversation by me asking what your son was like, what Richard was like as a person, because, you know, I'm very aware there's a person at the heart of this that's driving your particular campaign with your fellow mothers.

Yeah, well, he was typical out of his age. He loved his football. He loved his music. He loved fun and games, going out on a Friday night and having fun with his friends, walking his dog, probably bullying his sister. He was a normal lad, but he loved the outdoor challenge that the army life gave him. He loved all the exercises and that kind of thing. And, you know, he could be a pain in the backside when he wanted to be. He was no angel, it is true.

But, you know, he was such a big presence in so many people's lives. It's not until you've lost somebody like that that you realise just how big a circle he influenced or was part of. And, you know, there is a huge hole that can never be filled. Well, Hazel, thank you very much for taking the time to talk to me and all of us today. OK, thank you very much for giving me the chance. Hazel Hunt there, one of the military mothers who's come together to write to Her Majesty the Queen over the extreme displeasure that Tony Blair, Sir Tony Blair, has been given

a knighthood. She lost her 21-year-old son, Private Richard Hunt, who'd been in the army for less than two years when he became the 200th British soldier to die in the war in Afghanistan in 2009. Many of you getting in touch off the back of that interview. Please do continue to do so. I'll return to your messages as and when I can. But you're also getting in touch this morning as we are talking to a lot of women fighting for change, campaigning, lobbying, and what your fights are going to be this year.

Maybe they're a continuation of what you've been working on for many years. But let us know, let me know this morning what those campaigns, those fights, those causes close to your heart are. Because my next guest personifies campaigning, lobbying, fighting. And the Southall Black Sisters was founded in 1979 because my next guest personifies campaigning, lobbying, fighting.

And the Southall Black Sisters was founded in 1979 to address the needs of Asian, African-Caribbean and minority women and to empower them to escape violence. During that time, the organisation has successfully campaigned on many issues, including the rights of migrant women, religious fundamentalism that traps women in traditional roles, forced marriage, a change in the definition of the word provocation in the cases of battered women who kill their violent partners. At the heart of this, Pragna Patel, one of the founders of Southall Black Sisters. And today is her last day as director, a role she's had for over 30 years.

Pragna, what a day to be talking to you. Thank you for joining me. Thank you. It's good to meet you. Yeah, well, it's looking at the work and the body of the work, there's a lot to cover. But I thought we'd start with perhaps how you're feeling today as you prepare to stand down. A profound sense of loss at, you know, at the situation I find myself in, having been so closely associated with Southall Black Sisters, it's my political home. It's my spiritual home. I have, you know, had the pleasure and the privilege of working with many ordinary black and minority women over the years whose individual accounts of resistance and courage has inspired me and motivated me to do what I've done, you know, over the decades,

despite the changing political landscape. So a profound sense of loss, but also a profound sense of excitement at what lies ahead. I mean, I think the key thing is that Southall Black Sisters is just a vehicle for a struggle that is continuing and must continue. As a feminist, as an anti-racist, as a progressive, it is not the be all and end all. And struggle takes place on many fronts, in many forms. So whilst I feel that sense of loss, I feel very much that I'm still in the struggle. I've just left an organisation. Well, I think no one would expect any less if they're familiar with you or your work, which I've been very much enjoying, if I can put it like that, familiarising myself with your specific campaigns and your specific

role. I'm just minded, you mentioned mentioned politics there of the fact that the Justice Secretary today, Dominic Raab, has announced that domestic violence survivors and victims to get two years now to report abuse. It was a six month limit. That's where it is at the moment. There's going to be a change. Is that something like that? Is something like that progress, a step forward? How do you receive news like that? Yes, I think that what's really interesting is to the extent to which domestic abuse, domestic violence and then, of course, more recently, concepts such as coercive control have become so much part of the, you know, sort of political agenda. And that is progress. I mean, these are incremental steps.

They're really, they're not necessarily, you know, going to revolutionize the patriarchal status quo overnight, but they are incremental steps in the right direction. And to the extent that, you know, whatever governments in power, they still have to acknowledge these issues that affect women, domestic abuse, gender related violence is so vital. And it's just such a testimony to women's struggles over the years to get these issues on the political map. So to that extent, of course, it is progress. But progress is never linear. No. At the same time that, you know, we see these kinds of announcements, we see other measures that are being taken by government, which lead us in a different direction altogether.

I was just going to say, to take your mind back to when the first Women's Centre for Black Women opened in Southall, you know, what was that like? It was a very, very frightening experience, if I'm absolutely honest, because when we set up the first advocacy and advice centre for black minority women in Southall, I really didn't know what to expect. I didn't know what the issues that women would present with would be. I didn't know whether we'd be permitted to carry on. It was a very hostile

environment. We were labelled home breakers, home wreckers within the community for the work that we did in supporting women escape violence and abuse. We had a very radical upfront name, Southall Black Sisters, which kind of announces our politics and our values on our sleeve. What do you mean? Sorry, just if I may, what do you mean by that for those who don't know? So black was a term that we adopted to signify unity across different ethnicities and nationalities and backgrounds. And sisters was very much a feminist term born out of our emergence from a wider feminist movement, the second wave feminist movement. So we were

radical and upfront, you know, in what it is that we were seeking to do within the community, which is to challenge cultural norms and values, patriarchal status quo, and also challenge racism that was rife in the 70s and 80s on the streets, in the workplaces, in institutions and so on. But we were very, very uncertain as to what it is that women would come to us with, what kind of experiences, stories, accounts. And very quickly, it was established that the issue that most women wanted support with was violence, violence in the home, violence in their relationships, in their marriages and so on, which actually is not so surprising because there were, you know, in those days,

neither the state was interested in gender based violence nor community institutions, which were very male-dominated. And so women had nowhere to go, particularly black minority women had nowhere to go with these experiences, with these, you know, sort of experiences of oppression and constraints. And so it was inevitable that, you know, they would come to our doors. And that, in a a sense has determined our agenda that's determined our program our campaigning over the years um it's very much

focused on uh challenging all forms of violence and control that women experience in the private sphere and related issues such as immigration insecurities homelessness poverty isolation marginalization racism and and so on how much do you think um identity politics is causing greater fragmentation greater divide and then bringing people together because of course just as you you've described there were services that you were providing and support that wasn't there before because black and minority ethnic women were not being seen or some of their specific issues were not being seen but we're in a very different place uh these decades on in some ways not in other ways i totally accept that but but how do you marry those two and what's your view on that um I think identity politics is a considerable challenge for us,

not just in the feminist circles, but actually within all social justice movements. I think identity politics has kind of taken root in a way that I feel is profoundly regressive. It is a focus on individual experiences of victimhood. It is a focus on individual experiences or victimhood. It is a focus on difference rather than unity that spring from individual experiences rather than an analysis, a political analysis of structural discrimination and oppression. My fear is that all social justice movements, including feminism, is now completely, if you like, tainted by a narrow form of identity politics that actually has fragmented our struggles, is preventing us from unifying, preventing us from coming together on common platforms for change. I think it is hugely regressive and it is extremely worrying because it really is leading us down a political

blind alley. We are not going to be able to challenge, whether it be women's oppression or racial oppression or other forms of oppression, without coming together. You know, I've always felt that feminism is an emancipatory movement, but it is not just about freedom of women. Actually, ultimately, women can't be free if society is not free. So it's not about only promoting sectional interests. It is focused on women's issues, of course, and women's oppression. But wider than that, it has to be concerned about wider civil liberties and human rights issues and social injustice. And I think that is true

for all social justice movements. And I'm always reminded of June Jordan's words, very wise words, when she once said, you know, identity politics may be important to get something started, but is nowhere near to getting anything finished and our problem is i think we've lost our way in terms of working out how do we get to the finishing line um if we are so caught up in this kind of inward looking backward looking sort of state of being which doesn't allow for us to reach out to each other to connect with each other whether we be as women or yeah or other groups and to understand our common humanity and universal values have you seen that around you have you seen people for instance not being able because they believe only i can campaign on this because I am this or I am that?

You know, to identity politics, kind of a clunky phrase, isn't it? Sometimes people not sure quite what you mean by it. But there is a fear that has grown that if you aren't that particular group, you can't speak on behalf of it or with those people? I think so. And I've spent my entire life in the 80s. We were so worried about where we would find allies in the fight against oppression of, say, South Asian women facing honour-based violence and forced marriage. The state didn't recognise these forms of violence and oppressions, but neither did, you know, other feminists,

a wider feminist movement. And partly it's that kind of paralysis of action that I'm talking about because what it does is it kind of engenders fear and censorship and it stops people from calling out oppression because they're too afraid to be offending other identities and sensibilities. If I can come in at that point, what would you say to somebody who perhaps would tell somebody off for speaking out, let's say? What would you say to somebody who thinks, well, it isn't your place because you don't want that paralysis? Have you advised people in that position?

Yes, absolutely. I've advised a lot of white women, like white feminists, white women's organisations who work in areas where there are no BME women's groups and who need to challenge honour-based violence, forced marriage, female genital mutilation, but are too afraid to do so and are afraid that other black women will tell them that they're being racist for intervening to support black minority women facing these kinds of issues. My advice to them is that we need to call out abuse wherever it occurs, regardless of where it occurs. And at the same time, be mindful of the need to challenge other forms of oppression, including racism and so on. So my advice has been to women that you call out these things from wherever you are. We should be able to call out the oppression of women in Afghanistan.

We should be able to call out the oppression of women in Poland. You know, that does not require us to be Polish or Afghanistani to do those things. It requires us to understand our common humanities and our common struggles. And what would you say, again, if I just come in here, to those who don't agree with that? For instance, those who are saying to people, well, you can't say that. How would you convince them of your view?

I think there's a difference between being racist and expressing solidarity. And I think that's the line that has to be drawn. And solidarity involves creating allies and creating spaces where you come together to understand commonalities and experiences. After all, all women have universal experiences, albeit in different cultural, religious and other contexts. So it is understanding those commonalities as well as analyzing why there are differences, whether it's due to race, whether it's due to class, whether it's due to other, you know, divisions of power, understanding those and addressing those

at one and the same time. That is not an easy struggle to wage, you know, both understanding difference as well as forging solidarity. These are not easy situations to be in, but I'm very much against those that argue that anyone who calls out abuse in any community must be inherently racist for doing so. But on the other hand, I'm also going to call out those who challenge, who take up issues such as forced marriage or honour-based violence for their own political agenda, racist agendas, or to instrumentalise these for political agendas. So I think it's being alert to those kinds of pitfalls at the same time. Pragamita, I could keep talking to you for the rest of the hour, but we do have to call our time to an end, sadly. But I hope you're at least getting some kind of celebratory cake or

biscuit or tea or something lovely today. It's a funny old time because we're not all together with our colleagues a lot. But I hope we can keep talking because it doesn't sound like you're anywhere near giving up any of your doesn't sound like you're anywhere near giving up any of your fights, even if you're stepping down as director of Southall Black Sisters. Pragna Patel, thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you very much.

All the best there. Messages coming in. A message here from Rachel. Excellent analysis of the problems with identity politics by Pragna Patel from Southall Black Sisters on Woman's Hour this morning. Pragna Patel, another one here from Eve's Charity,

cussing through the noise and nonsense and true to the fight against sexism, racism and religious fundamentalisms. We owe her and Southall's Black Sisters so much. Feminism, an emancipatory movement, but not only women, identity, politics is a barrier. So messages to that effect. I wanted to read a bit of a flavour to our conversation there.

With Pragna, we're keeping going with campaigns So Mercedes, to that effect, wanted to read a bit of a flavour to our conversation there with Pragner. We're keeping going with campaigns and with lobbying and what's going on perhaps behind the scenes. How widely is the Scottish government consulting on its plans to allow people to legally change sex without a medical diagnosis? The SNP included reform of the Gender Recognition Act in its 2021 election manifesto, committing to work, quote, with trans people, women, equality groups, legal and human rights experts to identify the best and most effective way to improve and simplify the process by which a trans person can obtain legal recognition so that trauma associated with that process is reduced. But a new Freedom of Information request has shown that the minister with responsibility for this area, a woman called Shona Robinson, has met with five groups representing

trans rights since last May's election and two public bodies, but no women's rights groups, according to the woman who put in the request, who I'm now joined by, the former civil servant, Lisa McKenzie from Murray Blackburn McKenzie, which is an Edinburgh-based policy analysis collective. I should say we did ask the Scottish Government for a representative to come on the programme, but no one was made available. I do have a statement to which I will come. Lisa Mackenzie, good morning. Good morning. I wanted to start by asking why you submitted this freedom of information request in the first place? Well, I think my colleagues and I looked at the manifesto commitments that the SNP carried in 2021 and found it quite heartening.

It promised a deliberative process for settling upon proposals for reforming the Gender Recognition Act. And you've just read out the commitment. It's very open ended. So we wanted to know what had happened in the eight months since the election. Who had the minister met with? Because it's important to say that the draft legislation is due to land in the Scottish Parliament any week now. So, you know, the deliberative process is closing in terms of time. So we put in a couple of FOI requests to find out who the minister had met with, having been promised this process. And when they came back, it was very disappointing to note that the minister had only met with five LGBT lobby groups. And I think it's fair to say that there's a great deal of cynicism.

There's two public bodies as well, sorry. Officials, civil servants met with those public bodies, but the minister met with five LGBT groups. And I think it's important to note that there's a fairly consistent theme that has emerged in the last few years. And your programme has covered this on numerous occasions now, that women are being overlooked in the policy and lawmaking process across a whole range of different policy areas. And not just at Holyrood, but also at Westminster. I mean, we look back at the Women and Equality Select Committee Transgender Equality Inquiry from 2016 and

advancing trans rights were seen purely through the lens of people who claim a transgender identity with no consideration given to the potential impact on women. So women's groups were not invited to give evidence. Now there has been a more recent inquiry where it was more balanced in terms of who came forward. So the concern is that this dynamic is still in play and that women's concerns are not being listened to by the minister. And just to clarify, when you talk about women's concerns and women's rights groups, what do you mean by that? Well, there's an emerging set of fairly recently formed grassroots women's groups who are concerned about the principle of gender self-identification

and what that means for existing women's rights, particularly enshrined in the Equality Act 2010. Do you consider yourself a campaigner as part of that? Well, I think the three of us, two of us are former civil servants and one is a criminologist. And we're very, probably our kind of uniting interest is an interest in the policymaking process. But we absolutely start from a principle that we believe

that sex matters in policy and lawmaking. And your organisation is based on women's sex-based rights? It is, at the moment, yeah. I mean, I don't think we ever anticipated that we would be doing this work three years down the line. We all have other interests in different parts of public policy and higher education, criminology. But we have found ourselves in this spot. And with that interest in how policy is made and also your background, as you say, as a former civil servant,

were these groups, as you define as women's rights groups, were they invited by the minister to come in? Well, that's not very clear. I mean, the way that the response we had from the Scottish government was worded was that they had accepted any requests for meetings with the minister. I mean, this is a... I suppose that's the issue. Just to pause on that for a moment is there's a difference between not inviting people, excluding people and actively going to groups and excluding others, isn't there? So I'm trying to understand what's happened here, because, you know, I did an interview with the chief executive of Stonewall recently. People can listen to that in full on BBC Sounds if they wished, if they missed it. And, you know, no one would be surprised that Stonewall is a lobbying group and lobbying happens by

lobbyists. So could you argue here that those who are the most keen for this legislation to go ahead have lobbied the hardest and have gone in? Well, I mean, it's not clear whether those groups request a meeting or whether they were simply granted one. But, I mean, I go back to the manifesto commitment, which was very, indicated a very open process. Now, let's be clear, the Scottish Government has run two consultations

in the last three years, to which they've had, in the most recent ones, 17,000 responses, of which a few hundred were organisational and group responses. They know who those groups are and how to contact them. So this is bread and butter stuff for policymaking by civil servants. I suppose there's another question then, because you'll be aware of how all this works. For instance, for Women's Scotland,

or these groups that you're talking about, have they had a meeting request turned down? I'm not aware. I know they've met the minister in the previous parliament. I believe they may have submitted a request for a meeting. But I still come back to the fact that this is bread and butter stuff for civil servants. Your job as a civil servant when you're making policy or when you're making law is to reconcile the interests of different groups.

I mean, when I took my civil service board almost 25 years ago now, there was a group exercise and all of the applicants sat around a table with a, I think it was a planning decision that we were tasked with. And we all represented different interest groups. And the idea being that when you take on a job as a civil servant and you're making policy, your job is to consider all the different groups and to consider how you resolve any conflicts of rights. Do you have to do that by meeting them, though? Because I'm looking at the statement from the spokesperson for the Scottish government. They say they recognise the concerns raised by some women's groups. As the Freedom of Information request states, the Cabinet Secretary has met with a

number of organisations that requested a meeting on proposed reforms to the Gender Recognition Act. These are all independent organisations. No group that has requested a meeting about the bill has been refused. Further meetings with a range of organisations, including those who've recently been in touch with the request, will take place ahead of the bill being introduced to Parliament. Are you reassured by that? Well, that's very welcome. I think that is very welcome. So, I mean, that gives heart to the organisations who would like to have some face time with the minister. I mean, the groups, and as I say, this is a consistent theme across policymaking where gender self-identification principles are coming into play in public policy,

is that women's groups are not consulted. Perhaps they've not been active enough, though. I mean, would you say that to them? Would you say, come on, you know, request more meetings. They won't be turned down. The door is open. I'm a former civil servant. They've got to be able to do this.

This is obviously, you know, the side of things that you've been looking at. Yes, but the one thing that I would do is I think it's important to draw a contrast here between the groups who habitually are seen and talked to by government. They're often very well funded professional outfits with annual budgets of six or seven figures. And that's certainly the case with the five groups who've met with the minister recently. And a lot of the groups who are expressing concern about gender self-identification principles and public policy are grassroots women's groups who are led by volunteers literally sitting at their kitchen table with laptops squeezing this kind of work around all the other responsibilities they have in their life whether it's full-time jobs caring responsibilities family responsibilities so these groups are not equal players on the field already. So it's,

and this is another reason why... And you talk about these groups, just to name them, Equality Network, Scottish Trans, Stonewall Scotland, LGBT Youth Scotland, LGBT Health and Wellbeing. I was just going to ask, do you want this legislation to go ahead? Well, I should say that my colleagues and I are absolutely in favour of reforming the Act. I mean, it's almost 20 years since the original Act was passed. I think what's become problematic is that reform of the Act has become synonymous with the principle of gender self-identification. And actually, I think, and my colleagues and I have produced an options paper for reforms that we think could be made to the Act

which would retain the medical oversight for people who want to change their sex and law. But, for example, at the moment, the legislation says that you have to provide documentation and evidence of physical changes you have made before you can apply for a gender recognition certificate. The fact is, you do not need to have made any changes to your body in order to change your sex and law. You can have your birth certificate changed from male to female or female to male. You need a diagnosis of gender dysphoria,

but you do not have to have undergone any medical or surgical treatment. So it seems completely illogical that the legislation should carry this requirement and deeply unfair. That is a matter of debate of which we could do if I had more time and perhaps we will. But you've produced a paper. Have you got a meeting in the diary then with the minister? Well, not with the minister. Before Christmas, we sent the paper to the lead civil servant and a couple of weeks later received a reply with the promise of a meeting this month. So as a woman who's concerned about who's having meetings, you're going to go and get

your own meeting and perhaps we'll talk again after that. And I hope also I can welcome a member of the Scottish government to talk about this, certainly ahead of those changes, as you say, that are expected very soon indeed. Thank you very much for your time this morning. And I look forward to talking again. Lisa McKenzie from Murray Blackburn McKenzie,

which is an Edinburgh-based policy analysis collective with her own paper there, but has looked into who's getting that time with the minister and within the civil service there in Scotland. Just to say, I read you some of that statement. There's a message, there's part of it that I hadn't at the end, which says, our proposals to reform the current Gender Recognition Act, which have been outlined in the draft bill published in 2019, this is from the Scottish government, do not introduce any new rights for trans people or change single-sex exceptions. In the Equality Act, we've now consulted twice on our proposed changes, first on the principles of reform in 2017 and then in 2019 on a draft gender recognition

bill. Of course, we'll continue to follow that story as it develops and those policy changes or potential policy changes. Now, 10 years ago, the much loved writer Maeve Binchy died aged 72. Her novels about love and romance in Ireland topped bestseller lists for more than 30 years. And she playfully described herself as a mother hen to the many Irish women writers who followed her and who she helped. Amongst her most popular novels, Light a Penny Candle, Echoes, Circle of Friends, Tara Road. And her longtime editor, Rosie DeCourcy, joins me now with Megan Nolan, author and journalist, whose widely successful debut novel, Acts of Desperation, is published in paperback tomorrow. But before we get to our discussion, just have a listen to this interview with Maeve,

recorded at her home in 2009 for Woman's Hour with Jenny Murray. And Jenny asked her why she thought that being described as a quiet feminist was one of the best things ever said about her. Well, I have this view which said I was a quiet feminist. I would cut out and stuck in a little frame because nobody ever called me quiet before. That was the thing. It was so lovely to be called quiet. I suddenly saw great degrees of calm and dignity and reflectivity in myself, which I hadn't seen before and didn't think the world generally recognized but I am a quiet feminist in that I don't go around beating a drum and I tell stories by parable as it were and point out that the people who don't take

control of their own lives are bound to repeat the same mistakes over and over again it's not that we're responsible for where we're born or for the what condition our country is going to be in or whether we live through war or peace or anything like that. Obviously, we can't control that. But we can control how we react to various disasters. At one stage, I thought to myself, I could have been a fat, lame schoolteacher whinging and whining about things all the time. Or I could have been adventurous and gone and done things. And I think it was Mark Twain who said that you're only sorry about the things you didn't do when you come to the end rather than things you did do. And I never regret any of the things I did do.

May I finish you there talking? And I think for you, long time editor, Rosie Ducourcy, that must be lovely to hear her voice again. Extraordinary. I absolutely adored her. What was she like to edit? She was wonderful to edit, actually. She was, in some respects, a mistress of disguise, in that she presented herself as being very expansive, very relaxed, very affable, which indeed she was, all those things, with an extraordinary sense of humour and a lively sense of the ridiculous,

as Jane Austen would have it. But underneath, she was formidable. She had such a sense of discipline and drive. And it took me a little time to realise that Maeve was never late for anything. Indeed, she observed naval punctuality. So to be on time was to be 10 minutes early. And I suppose we, our editorial relationship, slightly to the irritation of her wonderful agent, Chris Green,

who was also very important, we used to sort of wander off on what Maeve used to call village parallels. And so, and she was always brilliant at that. And she was a fantastic listener. So she would often ask me, you know, what I made of a character, if I had any similar experiences and things, and off I would go and drift. And there you'd find your anecdote sort of captured in one of the novels. No, she was tremendous. I mean, it was one of the great experiences of my publishing life.

And let me bring you in. Good morning, Megan, at this point. I understand some of these books were left dotted about, you know, summer holidays, on summer holidays, wherever you were staying, for you to read and take in. Yeah, not specifically targeted at me, but they were just sort of, they were so popular in Ireland

that they were just sort of a wallpaper in everyone's house, I think. There were so many of them around ambiently that eventually I just picked them up. But yeah, they were always about in my childhood. And what did they say to you? Well, they came to me at a great time, actually, because I was just getting into reading adult novels

when I would have been a pre-adolescent. And I loved that sort of expansive, world-building, Dickensian sort of way of writing. But I'd only read the big men before that, you know, like Dickens and Somerset Maugham and others like that. And so I really loved Maeve Binchy's work for being the first woman and an Irish woman

who was writing in that way. And I found that very important. I mean, your themes in some ways are very different to Maeve, certainly in this particular book that we're talking about coming out on paper, and there's coercive, controlling relationships, there's obstructive and destructive desire, there's violence. But of course, there's other themes that cross over. Do you think young female Irish writers like yourself or perhaps Sally Rooney, with whom you've also been held up against in the sense of or held up alongside, I should say, do you think you have a line through from her or is it very different?

It's a good question. I do think because of how pervasive her popularity was, I don't think she has a fair reception now amongst my generation, as in I think she's really worthy of a current, a contemporary revisit. You know, just because the popularity was so total and they were marketed in a certain way that maybe don't suggest how good they are to everyone. Or that was the way when they were about when I was growing up anyway. If you're a bit snobbish, as I tended to be as a teenager, I didn't gravitate straight towards them. I had to be kind of told by my dad, no, that's actually really good stuff, you know. I love that it was your dad as well, you know, telling you.

He's a big opponent of snobbery so he was he was very adamant that i should read them it's it's one of those things i mean maybe a contemporary visit 10 years on uh since she died uh rosie perhaps that is something that should be looked at because there can be snobbery oh there certainly can and i think i would have loved uh megan's father because I'm absolutely loathe both social and intellectual snobbery. And again, I come back to the mistress of disguise business because there's a deceptive simplicity to Maeve's writing, which actually conceals a universality, a timelessness, which gave her her worldwide readership. And I think she would be totally

astonished. I was over in Dublin to take part in RTE film tribute about her. And there we were in the Museum of Literature, Ireland, and she has a whole garden dedicated to her there. Circle of Friends is on syllabuses. There's a huge plaque with a quote from Circle of Friends, and I can just hear her now just getting a fit of the giggles at the whole idea, although she was very serious about what she did, of course. And I thought that was extremely interesting. Where would you start if you've never read A Maeve Binchy? Well, I suppose you'd have to start with Circle of Friends.

It was very interesting when I first met her. She told me what she wanted to do was to write a novel about best friends destroying each other. And her agent was appalled and said, but best friends don't. And Maeve and I looked at each other, caught each other's eyes and said, oh, they can. In fact, with Light Up Any Candle, she didn't write that, her first novel. She wrote about best friends supporting each other through thick and thin. But she did come back to that theme of betrayal in Circle of Friends and about somebody you utterly trust, a girlfriend, betraying you, taking your man, getting pregnant and actually lying about just about everything. So I think that, in a sense, represented some of the deepest themes

that Maeve wanted to explore. And also Benny, the heroine, is probably the nearest we will ever get to Maeve putting herself on the page. Well, that's, Megan, for you. I know as you continue in your writing, or I imagine, the sort of challenge to what you do next and how you keep developing it and, I suppose, continue to find those stories, isn't it? And the role of the editor is a big part still in in writers lives yeah I absolutely love being edited I'm I'm I like to think of myself as being like the opposite of

a precious uh person in that regard I I really love the relationship I have with both my agents who does a lot of my initial editing or did on my debut anyway and my editors at Jonathan Cape and I think because um it's really hard especially your first time out to identify how you feel about your own work sometimes so actually I find it very useful to for the constructive way but also you know if somebody says that they don't like something how I feel in response you know if I if I feel very adamant that I need to keep it then that's you know that's a great lesson that it really means something. And if I feel, okay, take out whatever you want, then it means it shouldn't be there. So I love it. And it's a very invigorating process for me.

Well, all the best with the next bits of writing, which can be torturous. I know. I don't know as much as you know, but even the hints of it, I'm aware of. Rosie Ducourcy, thank you to you as well for giving us some of your recollections and as to why Maeve mattered to so many people and especially to so many women. It's brilliant to be able to hear your recollections. As we say, 10 years ago the much-loved writer Maeve Binchy died at the age of 72

and Megan Nolan there talking her novel Acts of Desperation published in paperback tomorrow. But just let me finish the programme if I can with someone celebrating a win, a change in the law, taking photos or video recordings of breastfeeding mothers in public

without their consent is to be made a crime in England and Wales, punishable by up to two years in prison. Well, in April last year, Julia Cooper started a campaign to make it illegal after she saw that a man taking photographs with a long lens of her breastfeeding

in a park with, of course, her baby. And that was, of course, not something that you were expecting, I'm sure, Julia, or were very happy about. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, it was an immediate feeling of just anger and protection for my daughter. And shock, I imagine, as well that as to why that that was happening yeah and shock as well because before he got out his camera I saw that he was staring at me so I've you know I stared back at him um to sort of say I've clocked your gaze I'm not comfortable with it stop looking at me and I've got quite an important job to do here sorry and I've got quite an important job to do here I'm trying trying to feed. Exactly. Yeah. That's what I should have been concentrating on, not worrying about that man.

So I'm absolutely delighted that the government announced yesterday that they're going to be changing the law and will be protected as breastfeeding mothers. Now, the Justice Secretary has written a piece about it this morning, I should say, in one of the papers in The Telegraph, talking about, you know, this is key. It's also in addition to what I was mentioning earlier around domestic violence and making that amount of time longer to be able to report those accused. But the minute I mentioned this story right at the beginning of the programme, I wanted to tell you this, Julia, and tell all our listeners. I got this message saying, good morning. With regards to this story on breastfeeding, I wonder why women feed their baby so openly in public. I agree they have a right to do this,

but it is possible to do so discreetly. If you wouldn't display your breasts in public before, why now? Do you cease to be a sexual being just because you're a mother? Not really surprising some men will take an interest. That's from Jo. What would you like to say to that? Yeah, this is an argument that comes up again and again online in particular. I would say that, you know, the day that I was photographed breastfeeding my daughter, it was a cold day.

She was properly nestled in my coat. You know, I was trying to do it as discreetly as possible. And I think that that's why this man attached a zoom lens, because he couldn't get a proper look, and he wanted one. I know that breasts aren't just for babies. You know, they are sexual as well. And that's great. That's, that's what they are. But in the moment that you're feeding your child, they're not a sexual part of your body to be objectified. They are simply to give your baby life and to get them fed. And I know that some people do struggle with that duality. The law is on our side now, and I'm so pleased that breastfeeding mothers will hopefully feel more empowered to feed in public because it's the most convenient way to feed your baby. I'm quite an outdoorsy person and I wanted to breastfeed so that I could go out with my daughter on long walks. Well, that's one of the joys is it's extremely convenient.

If you are able to do it and you want to do it, you know, it is on demand. And, you know, you look down and you think, oh, well, this is what these were for then, if you do it into that situation. Just to say, the law being on your side, and of course, how you then use it, how you then, I suppose, you know, capture that person, grab an image yourself, or however it's going to be. But did you confront the man in question? I did. Yeah, I just had this split second decision of, do I go and challenge him about this or not? And I just found myself walking over to him and asked him, did you take photos of me? And he said, yes. I said, right, well, can you delete them? And he said, no, we're in public. I

can photograph whatever I want. And then when I spoke to Greater Manchester Police later that day, they said that, yeah, a crime hadn't been committed because we were in public. And that just felt so wrong that I had to do something about it. And now I suppose once the rule was passed or the law was passed, you could ring and report because that's the change that has been announced. Julia Cooper, thank you very much for talking to us this morning.

There you go, Julia Cooper. More messages I'm sure will come in on that, probably just as I get off air, which is extremely shortly indeed but lots of messages coming in about your fights today, what you're campaigning on and what you've been campaigning on for a long time. A lot of you write a lot of letters it seems to local

representatives and one here saying in 30 years as a qualified social worker I continue to do voluntary work in a local refuge. I'll be back with you tomorrow at 10. That's all for today's Woman's Hour. Thank you so much for your time. Join us again for the next one. Beating climate change is a tough job, but we've got a famously tough guy on our side. I think that we have to go and button up and work together in order to really conquer this problem. 39 Ways to Save the Planet is the podcast

from BBC Radio 4 that meets the sharpest brains with the best ideas to cut the carbon. And it's a podcast with a famous fan, Arnold Schwarzenegger. One of my favorite chapters was when you talked about the things that we can do right away, the nuclear power, when you talk about the smaller reactors, or for instance, the dry rice, or, you know, the carbon capturing and all of those kind of things. There's so many things that we can do technologically. If you want to hear more from Arne and a host of inspiring innovators all taking the fight to climate change, then subscribe to 39 Ways to Save the Planet on BBC Sounds. We've terminated problems in the past. I think that we can do it again. It's the bottom line.

I'm Sarah Trelevan, and for over a year, I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there who was faking pregnancies. I started, like, warning everybody. Every doula that I know. It was fake. No pregnancy. And the deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth. How long has she been doing this?

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