Woman's Hour - Sislin Fay Allen, The situation for women in Afghanistan, Miss, Ms, Mx or Mrs?, Women & Pensions, Women & Munitions

Episode Date: August 27, 2021

Two explosions hit Kabul airport yesterday, killing some 90 people and at least 150 people were also wounded in the attack. The UK government has just announced the final stages of the evacuation... which means the processing centre at the airport has been closed and no further people will be called forward. So what is the situation on the ground for the women and children in Afghanistan? Anita speaks to Mahjooba Nowrouzi, from the BBC Afghan Service. Raffaela Baiocchi is an Italian obstetrician and gynaecologist based in the Panjshir Valley in Afghanistan. She works for Emergency an Italian NGO and is responsible for emergency reproductive health, co-managing the maternity part of the Panshir hospital. Her staff are continuing to come to work going through now Taleban-controlled check points from other provinces, but less than half of the female patients, who would normally attend, are coming into the hospital in the last week.Do you like being called a Miss, Ms, Mx or Mrs or none of them at all? Why do some organisations still ask us for a title when filling out a form? Anita talks to Stella Sutcliffe, the Founder of the ‘Go Title Free’ Campaign, and Dr Amy Erickson a Reader in Feminist History at the University of Cambridge. We’ve received a large number of emails from a group of women born in the 1950s known as Waspis (Women Against State Pension Inequality). Many were given very little notice that they wouldn’t be receiving their expected pension at 60 years old - with delays of up to six years. Last month, The Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman found the Department for Work and Pensions ‘guilty of maladministration’ in the way they dealt with communicating the change in State Pension Age. Anita discusses with listener Jane Cowley and Daniela Silcock, Head of Policy Research at the Pensions Policy Institute. Catherine wrote to us and said: "Please would you consider doing a piece about Sislin Fay Allen, the first UK black female officer, in 1968. She died in Jamaica in last month. Commander Alison Heydari is the most senior Black woman police officer in England and Wales, talks about being inspired by Sislin and about her own experience. Listener Lavinia wrote to us to say: It puzzles me that no mention is ever made of women who worked in munitions during the war. Her mother had worked at the munitions factory in Woolwich, but it was never spoken about. She joins Anita along with Vikki Hawkins, Curator, Second World War Galleries at the Imperial War Museum.Presented by Anita Rani Producer: Louise Corley Editor: Karen Dalziel

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. Hey guys, what's up? It's Eve from the podcast Constantly Evolving here. Before you get into Women's Hour, I just want to let you know about my show. Every week, I'm joined by a special guest from the receipts to Paloma Faith

to chat to them about how they get the most out of life. So, just like Women's Hour, I'm in the business of having inspiring conversations that will make you think. So once you've listened to Women's Hour, why not move over to an episode of Constantly Evolving? You can find it on the BBC Sounds app. Just search Constantly Evolving.

Enjoy today's Women's Hour. Hello, I'm Anita Rani, and welcome to Women's Hour from BBC Radio 4. Good morning and welcome to Friday's Woman's Hour, bringing up the rear of Listener Week. We have had a great week of stories generated by you and today is no different. So we're really looking forward to talking about the issues you want us to explore. Like whether or not we should still have titles. Miss, Mrs, Ms. How do

you feel about them? We all seem to use one. We have to, don't we? Especially when it comes to filling out forms. But what's the point of them? Or are they outdated? And is it time we thought of something new? I'd love to hear your thoughts on this and everything else we're talking about today. You can text 84844. you can contact us via social media or email us via the website then we had a letter in from hilda fulton who wrote in to say as a woman who's lost many thousands of pounds of pension with no warning from the government i'd like the pensions debacle debated and what decision might be made on compensation. I've had to take equity out of my house to survive the last six years and so my mortgage-free house can no longer be fully bequeathed to my daughters.

They're also going to suffer from this appalling decision by Westminster. Between that and the news that some may have to work until they are 70 years old also puts jobs for the younger generation into question. If the population don't have money to spend, then the financial situation in this country will only get worse. And of course, the old and the disabled are being targeted as usual. Very short-sighted from those who are supposed to be caring for this country and who seem to be lining their friends' pockets instead.

And that's regards from angry listener Hilda. It's noted and we will be talking about this shortly. Then Catherine got in touch and asked about Cicelyn Faye Allen, the UK's first black female officer. We'll be finding out about her. And Lavinia wants to know more about what her mother did during the war as she didn't discuss it with her. So

we will be doing that. And as today's the last day of Listener Week, we thought we'd have a little musical contribution. I love this. Amy Webber, hello Amy if you are listening, sent us in our own bespoke jingle. We thought we'd give it a play.

Oh Amy, it's perfect. And another gold for Team GB in Tokyo. Kadena Cox setting a new world record in C45 500m track cycling, winning Britain's seventh gold of the tournament,

and it's only day three. Go team. So lots to get through on the programme. And of course, we want to hear from you. You can text us on 84844, email via our website, or it's at BBC Women's Hour on social media. Today, we are at your service. But first, two explosions hit Kabul airport yesterday,

killing some 90 people, among them 13 US military personnel. At least 150 people were also wounded in the attack, which the so-called Islamic State group say it was behind. The UK government has just announced the final stages of the evacuation, which means the processing centre at the airport has been closed and no further people will be called forward. So what is the situation on the ground for the women and children in Afghanistan? Well, Majuba Naruzi is from the BBC Afghan service and she joins me now. Majuba, good morning. Welcome to Woman's Hour. You've been talking to people in Afghanistan.

What's the situation? What have they been telling you? Thanks for having me. I try not to be, not to sound negative, but it's very difficult, I must say. The Taliban takeover has exacerbated multiple crises that already existed in Afghanistan, unfortunately. And because multiple crises are happening at once, and it could turn Afghanistan into a catastrophic humanitarian crisis. And some experts described Afghanistan as a perfect storm, because at the moment confidence is falling into the Afghan economy. Afghan currency is falling badly.

Civilians are basically relying on foreign aid. On the top of all of this, Afghanistan is in the middle of a devastating drought, which is, according to the UN, has left around half of the country's children malnourished. Afghanistan already had the second highest level of food insecurity in the world anyway. So high rates of poverty and health system at the breaking point due to the COVID pandemic. And now this, the economy is standing still and the brains are fleeing the country and civilians are trying to escape the country by any means possible. What are those options? How are they escaping? The options are very, very limited. And as you said already, the UK's processing centre at the airport is closed and they are focusing their efforts only on the people who are already at the airport and ready to go and that's one example and all the borders are closed

and there are no flights and the people who are contacting me and they are absolutely desperate so majuba tell to who is speaking to you who have you spoken to and what is the situation like particularly for the women if you're a young woman a young woman in Afghanistan who doesn't have dual nationality, who doesn't have particularly a lot of money, but is desperately and she's supposed to come back to Afghanistan and she's absolutely desperate to go somewhere else because Iran is refusing to keep her in the country and she has got relatives who are in the Taliban group and she has already been warned so many times to stop her activities as a women's activist and as a human rights activist, but she didn't. And she's a famous women's rights activist. And she has been told that if you return, you and your 11-year-old daughter will be killed.

How did she get to Iran? She just escaped from the neighboring province of Herat in the Western Afghanistan. And now that's one example. And the other example is another woman that I've interviewed her on numerous occasions. And she's very active. She used to be very active in the northern city of Mazar-e-Sharif. And she told me yesterday, and she sent me some voice messages and saying that the Taliban have a black list of all these people who were active and were promoting women's rights and LGBT rights or human rights. And they go door to door, knock on the doors and search for these people. But the Taliban are saying, no, that's not true.

That's the US propaganda. That's the Western propaganda against us. And we are not doing that. But what we just see from the ground, from Afghanistan, from these provinces and from the eyewitnesses, and they are telling us a totally different story. They are saying, no. They even send us some video clips and some images

that they take secretly uh and uh on the ground the situation is different it's a chaos panic and every woman wants to who were active wants to leave basically and what are their options to leave right now because we were hearing a few days ago that borders are open. What's the situation now? Russian Uzbek and you can cross the border between Mazar-e-Sharif and Uzbekistan. Or you can, if you tried, I don't know whether it's possible or not, go to Iran or Pakistan. And yesterday we had this Pakistani official, the security advisor, telling us that the border is open, Spin Boldak border is open, Afghans can go to Pakistan. But it's very difficult for people from other provinces of Afghanistan to get to the border. And that's another, I mean, this is, at the moment, there's a huge crowd already waiting to cross the border. So, I mean, getting to the borders on itself is a big issue,

especially for women who don't have any means of transportation, who do not have any male person accompanying them, because under the Sharia law, they are not allowed to travel on their own. So you can now imagine how difficult it might be. And Majuba, do you have any family in Afghanistan at the moment? And how concerned are you for them? Yes, I mean, it is difficult to talk about it. I mean, it's not only me and all my colleagues. I mean, it's very hard to be focused and do our jobs,

but we are doing our best. Of course, Majuba, thank you very much for speaking to me. That was Majuba Nooruzi from the BBC Afghan service. Now, Raffaella Biachi is an Italian obstetrician and gynaecologist based in the Panjshir Valley in Afghanistan. She's been based in a hospital there, one of the three main hospitals in the country for many years. She works for Emergency, an Italian NGO,

and is responsible for reproductive health, co-managing the maternity part of the hospital. They deliver around 6,000 to 7,000 babies a year and see around 10,000 gynecological patients. The Panjshir Valley is not under Taliban control, but in Rafaela's words, they are at the door. Her staff include 132 women doctors, nurses and midwives, and they are continuing to come to work

through Taliban-controlled checkpoints and from other provinces and from Kabul. And Rafaela joins me now to tell us more about the situation. Rafaela, thank you so much for joining us. You're only a couple of hours from Kabul. How did you respond when you heard what had happened at the airport? Our hospital in Kabul was the one that received the biggest number of wounded patients, 13 dead on arrival, I think. So we were worried for them. And, you know, I'm in this country more or less, I know this country more or less from 15 years and it's a never-ending tragedy.

A person, a young lady that is working with me that was near the airport for other reasons yesterday sent me a message that was saying, we Afghans are born to die. I was not able to reply. I think in her words, there is all the tragedy of these people that cannot see a future, especially after what happened yesterday. That's like you say, you cannot reply to a message like that. Where you are, the Panjshir Valley, which is only a couple of hours from Kabul, the Taliban have not entered this province. How have they been kept away? Sorry, how?

How have they been kept out? I think for several reasons. Panjshir Valley itself has a big tradition, as to say, as the metery of the armies, as they push back the Russians in the 80s and the Taliban during the first regime. They are... Sorry. Sorry. So, yes, there are very... So, there is a very strong... There's a strong militia keeping... One of my doctors calling me, so... You are talking to us from the hospital in Afghanistan.

I can imagine it's very busy. So, yes, the area that you're in, the militias have been able to keep the Taliban out. Can we talk about the work within the hospital? We've got 132 women doctors, nurses and midwives working with you. Are they still able to come to work? Absolutely, yes. During the very first days, I think a couple of days after the Taliban took Kabul, for sure we had not full staff because there was the panic of the first hours to say, and now what we are going to do, can we go out from the house, how we can go out from the house, can we reach the hospital. So some families forbidden also the girls to come. Consider that the 99%

of our staff is coming from Kabul or neighboring provinces, all under the control of Taliban. But a good number of brave ones came, tried to come. And with a big surprise, they were saying that no any problem to come, consider that our staff is transported by emergency staff bus from their area where they live to the hospital and back. And the composition of the people in this staff bus is not according to the gender, of course, but it's according to the area where they're coming so this bus where and still are mixed with men and ladies and ladies

wearing normally normal scarf like they are doing usually without burqa and this bus have to cross big roads where there are several checkpoints, the ones before from the regular army, now from the Taliban, that they are stopping, observing, asking where they're going, but no any comment, no any remark, no any threat, just the facilitation to go to the job. This is what our staff was telling us.

Yes, so the staff is still arriving, and you've been working at the hospital for about a year. Can you describe the work of the maternity hospital and how many women attend and if they're still attending? And we've lost the line with Rafaela there. She's just frozen in time. You have been contacting us all week with emails about Afghanistan.

Let's see if we can get back to Rafaela. Rafaela, I was just wanting to know whether women are still attending the hospital. Much less in this. I can hear you. Great, we can hear you too. Pretty much less since the Taliban took the power because even the patients are not sure. Most of them come from other provinces, Kabul as well, other provinces. So we had a reduction of ladies, especially reduction of critical cases.

We are specializing in critical care in obstetrics. So our ICU is always full. Our OT is always running. We are full, full, full of patients. Now we are working more or less at 30% of our current activity. So it makes us very worried. We ask to us where these ladies are and their neonates. But there is a slight increase of the flow in these days but still we are pretty much lower than our usual target so women are not attending in the numbers

that they once attended um and what about your own situation rafael are you staying yes we are staying we are in are in Afghanistan since 20 years. One of our hospitals, the one in Helmand, was under the real war bombing and whatever for 17 years. They just released a bit now that the Taliban took the town, and that area was full of insurgents, Taliban and whatever. and we managed the hospital also during that time so we are going to respect our mandate again until of course we can run the the activities in a safe way rafaela thank you so much for talking to us this morning that's rafaela

be actually speaking from a maternity hospital in the Panjshir Valley in Afghanistan. And we have been receiving emails from you about Afghanistan during this week, including this one from Fuchsia. Following on from our item on judges yesterday, she says there are huge numbers of people all across the country who've been opposing the Taliban over the past months and years, men and women who are now in immense danger and are receiving threats but no help. I understand that foreign governments have to prioritise their own citizens and those who've worked with them, but we must not forget the swathes of ordinary people who are also in grave danger. And we will continue to bring you stories. If you'd like to talk to us about anything we're discussing this morning,

we would love to hear from you. 84844 is the number to text or you can email via our website. Now, in the run-up to Listener Week, we had an email. And it was from listener Penny Bates who asked, I wondered if other women are irritated by the fact that they are asked to share their marital status when completing forms or ordering products. Men can only ever be mister, whether married, divorced or single, with master being no longer in use, while I'm expected to explain my marital status when this is not significant to the transaction I wish to make.

I'm currently single, have divorced some time ago, but when recently purchasing a new floor covering for the kitchen, I bet that was satisfying, it wasn't enough to simply give my name Penny Bates. As soon as I did so, I was asked if I was Miss, Mrs or Ms. Is there a legal reason why women have to explain their relationship status when making a purchase? Or does this go back to a time when husbands operated the purse strings and dinosaurs ruled the earth? If so, in 2021, I would like to be simply Penny Bates without a miss, Mrs or Ms. Well, Penny is not alone. We put this up on our Instagram page and you feel very strongly about the subject. Kay said, unbelievable that women are still addressed according to their marital status.

Get rid of Mrs and Miss. Kath said, I am forced to choose a title when giving my details online. I pick what I fancy on that day. I get posts for lady, professor, doctor and reverend. Rachel says, why on earth do we need titles at all? Weirdly essential on any form, order online, survey, etc. But why do we need them? And you're still getting in touch on them.

We've had a tweet in just now saying, if I choose Miss, I sound like an unmarried school teacher from Austin Times. Mrs. and I'm married and Miss, I'm sure, was used for people divorced or widowed, which is a horrible way to assign someone. I'd love to know what I'm meant to do. Wouldn't we all? Well, lucky for all of you, I'm joined by Dr. Amy Erickson, who's a reader in feminist history at the University of Cambridge. And you're going to enlighten us all. Welcome to Woman's Hour

Amy. So let's go back to basics. What does it all mean? What do Miss, Mrs and Ms mean, each of them? Let's go through them all. Well interestingly Miss, Mrs and Ms are all abbreviations of the same word. They're all abbreviations of Mistress and And mistress was the original exact equivalent of master, which we now pronounce mister. And all it meant was a woman of some social status, a woman with capital, a woman who employed servants or apprentices. So anybody who had a bit of money or a bit of status would be mistress that's it so when did it all just when did it change when did missus come in well missus is is just mistress and that was the abbreviation but it had no marital meaning at all the first marital designation for women is actually miss

because that used to be used for girls only, for women under age. And it was only in the later 18th century that it started to be used for adult women, and then only very elite adult women, basically because they wanted to distinguish themselves from their employees. So their upper servants were also called Mrs. just like them. So they had the same title. So you couldn't tell the difference between the lady and the servant. So the lady would use

Mrs. and then the servant would be Miss? No. Servant was Mrs. And the unmarried lady was Miss. Got you. Okay. So when did Mrs. become associated with marriage? absolutely not until 1900 you still have the unmarried use the status use of missus on straight through the 19th century

so it's really a 20th century development this is insistence on marital status on this or missus and that created such a problem problem because obviously sometimes you don't know a woman's marital status, how to address her, that actually Ms. was introduced in 1900 as a solution to the problem. So it has no connotation for divorce or widowhood. It's simply a solution to the problem of not knowing a woman's marital status. OK, I'm going to bring in Stella Sutcliffe here, who's spent the last three years campaigning for organisations and businesses to stop requesting, using and storing marriage titles through her campaign Go Title Free. Morning, Stella. What made you set it up? Go Title Free. Well, gosh, I've been nodding profusely and smiling at the letters you received.

How wonderful. Well, I set up Go Title Free three years ago after receiving a letter addressed to Mr. and Mrs. G Sutcliffe, the G being my husband, of course. And I wondered how many other women had ever felt shortchanged at having their identity sometimes misrepresented, but actually entirely removed in this case. So I set about researching titles because I strongly felt that without the title, nobody could address me like this. They would have to use my first name to be able to address me. And one of the first things

that I discovered was that titles are not part of a person's legal identity at all. They are purely social and therefore they really can be challenged. They're very recent. Amy Erickson and I had a real meeting of minds just over a year ago on this. It bothered me that as a woman who's changed surname and title several times, I've not only had to go through the written law of changing my surname, but also, you know, suffered the confusion regarding marital status titles and what I should put in that drop-down box that comes first on everything. And this is something that neither my father or my ex-husband or any other man that I've never known has had to go through because unless they have a gender identity crisis they are Mr. They've always been Mr. and they always will be and I started with businesses because I felt that

titles are not used amongst friends. They're not used amongst colleagues. They're mainly used by companies and organisations communicating with us, trying to be polite. And why do they want to know that information? Why on every form do we have to put our title? I have now written 35,000 words on this subject and interviewed around just under 2,000 people. The only reasons I can think of that an organisation needs this information is to get a little bit of juicy data on you.

And because marketing is extremely powerful, but they're getting a little bit of information about women that they can't get about men. And so I do think it's to be polite in a world where, which is the English speaking world that we live in, where we don't have a familiar and an unfamiliar. We don't have a to-do variant. So we don't have a way of addressing somebody in the English speaking world that denotes respect. So very difficult to do that for some businesses, very difficult to make that shift. But I wanted to find some solutions for businesses and for this campaign not to be an echo chamber.

And I don't know if we could do it the Indian way and start calling anyone who seems a bit older than you auntie. I just don't think that would go down very well here. How is it done, Amy, in different parts of the world? Well, in the last century, different parts of the world did have the same, different parts of Europe anyway, which is what I know about, did have the same distinction between married and unmarried. But basically, they've all now dropped it.

And all adult women are addressed as the equivalent of Mrs. And all children, young, under 21 women would be the equivalent of Miss. But there's no marital distinction at all in the other European countries. As far as I know, England and English speaking countries are the only ones which preserve that today. And let's talk about what we say when we're talking about groups of women, because we had another listener email in asking, how do you describe a group of women? Personally, I don't like the word ladies,

but I feel, for example, when addressing a group of women, morning ladies, that ladies fits the bill and women doesn't. To say girls isn't quite right either so i'm seeking clarity as i'm often addressing women on social media and i know some people don't like ladies either so what's the best way to address a group of women and another listener fiona clark asks about the ubiquitous use of guys as a collective noun for any group of people once again using a male term as the normative uh once you're aware of it you notice how common it is hey guys what's the problem with guys i don't know what the problem with guys is

what do you think amy well i think that normative male use is exactly why we have problems finding a word for groups of women i mean how often do you address a group of only women in what context would that be so if we think of good morning women as exactly the equivalent of good morning men good morning ladies exactly the equivalent of good morning gentlemen those are the words and either we choose to reclaim them or we think of something completely new which is which is um harder in some ways um we could try good morning people good morning people okay we'll try we could try that um um we Good morning, people. OK, we'll try. We could try that.

We just had a message in saying, I want to be called a woman, not a lady, not a girl. Can we discuss why there is such reluctance to call women, women, ladies? So archaic. A girl is so disempowering. A girl is a child. Hope you'll take the time in the program to give this some air. We are indeed. Give us your name if you are going to message us.

84844. Stella, what can we change it to? Because obviously you spent a lot of time, 34,000 words you said, you've talked about titles, 2,000 women you've interviewed. What's the alternative? What can we use? What have you come up with? What about MX? What's MX? MX is the newest, newer title on the block. It's still been around since the 70s. But I think there's still a lot of confusion still around Ms introduced or popularized by Sheila Michaels in the 60s. I think if there's still confusion around Ms, which some people think means divorce, some people think means you're a lesbian, some people think it means you're a lesbian. Some people think it means that you are a spinster. Then we've still got a long way to go when it comes with MX. I think you've proved my point brilliantly on this radio show, Anita, which is that you introduced us ever so politely. You've talked to us so nicely, so warmly. And why can businesses not just do that?

That is my solution. It's not very groundbreaking. How radical. I called you Stella. Radical. And Ava. Yeah, exactly. Say no title at all. Check you're speaking with the right person and then just speak to them. Just speak to them. I feel like we've scratched a nerve here. We've definitely tapped into something because the messages are still coming in. And and on twitter i mean on our instagram page so many of you've been talking about this back to you know what we can call a collective group of women um hate being called girls i'm not a child says jess um and someone else says why don't we just call ourselves queens

well lots of options i know we'll come back to this at some point we've not even started talking about whether or not we should take our husband's surnames i mean that's a whole another topic for another day amy erickson and stella thank you so much i know this debate will continue online um you can go to our instagram because lots of you are talking about it there it's uh at bbc woman's hour. So get in touch with us. Now, we've received a large number of emails from a group of women born in the 1950s known as WASPIs,

Women Against State Pension Inequality. Many were given very little notice that they wouldn't be receiving their expected pension at 60 years old. Instead, there would be a delay. And in some cases, this was as long as six years. We've covered this issue a lot on this programme, but there's been a recent development.

Last month, the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman found the Department for Work and Pensions guilty of maladministration in the way they dealt with communicating the change in state pension age. It's a subject you feel very strongly about, particularly if it directly affects you. If it does, we'd love to hear from you. We had a letter in from a lady named Sue. She says, I was born in August 1956. I always expected my state pension when I was 60. It was the most awful shock to receive a letter from the DWP in

July 2013 advising me my new state pension age was to be 66. My husband and I had always planned to live in Portugal when we retired and he's two years older than me. He agreed to wait until I was 60. So when I got the news that my state pension was being delayed for six years, I was devastated. The DWP had given me just three years notice for a six year delay, which gave me no time to change my financial situation. Had I been informed in 1995 when the law changed, I would have set up a private pension and joined my employer's pension scheme sooner.

I'm living on savings and my husband helps support me. I've always been an independent person and I hate having to rely on someone else to pay for me. He doesn't mind, but I do. It's a loss of independence for me, not being able to pay my way he doesn't mind but I do it's a loss of independence for me not being able to pay my way it's demeaning well one listener Jane Cowley was a head teacher who retired early at 57 in order to care for her husband and elderly parents believing she could manage financially

ahead of receiving her pension three years later Jane was shocked to find this wouldn't be the case and would have made a very different financial decision had she been informed earlier. Jane is with us this morning and also joining us is Daniela Silcock, Head of Policy Research at the Pensions Institute. Let's come to you, Jane. Tell us about your situation. Hello, Anita. Thank you very much for having me on this morning. Yes, I was working as a headteacher at 57. My husband was in ill health. My parents were getting more elderly and it seemed a sensible thing to do to take early retirement from my job, take a reduced occupational pension and live on my savings for the three years actually informed that my state pension age was not going to be 60 but it was going to be 66 so that's a huge gap there really I mean it's a big loss in income it's a big again I'm like the other listener who's written in I've had to rely to some extent on my husband's income and I've lived as an independent person all my life.

And although I love my husband very much, I don't really want to be having to rely on him financially. There are, of course, there are other women who are also having to rely on partners for financial support who are in less happy circumstances. We are really angry that it's taken all this time for the parliamentary ombudsman to finally vindicate what we've been saying since 2015 that we weren't properly informed we've had government minister after government minister letter after letter from the dwp telling us that we were wrong that

actually we were told properly and now this report has come out to actually say what we've been saying all along that proper notice wasn't given um what's actually making things even worse now is that the government seems to be well first of all we've had no statement from therese coffee the minister yeah um actually acknowledging that this maladministration has happened and saying what she intends to do about it um and also several, lots of Conservative MPs are sending out what seems to be a standard letter, trying to hide behind a smokescreen of equalities legislation. Well, our campaign has never been about equalisation. We fully support that. What our campaign about is this lack of notice and not being told in good time.

Of course, because you would have made preparations differently, as so many of you are telling us. I'm going to bring Daniela in here. So a victory for the cause. But are this generation of women one step closer to getting compensation? Well, that's quite difficult to say. The parliamentary ombudsman has said that they won't be able to say that they'll fully refund all of these women what they missed out on in terms of state pension because of the government statements. So compensation may be on the ombudsman's sliding scale, which varies depending on how severe the impact of the injustice was, which goes from, I think it goes up to £10,000 or more from £500. So that's going to be the next step to see what they recommend and whether or not the government has a response.

Right. So you're still waiting to hear on that. Why weren't these women given enough notice? What happened? Well, it's quite complicated. What you have to go back to understanding is changes in life expectancy over the last century and how rapidly they started increasing. So life expectancy did increase after the state pension ages reset at 60 and 65 for men and women. And I think those ages were solidified around the 1940s. In the 1980s life expectancy began to increase much more rapidly and around the world people weren't really doing much about this so it was really towards the end of the 1990s when countries started realizing both their private pension systems and their state pension systems were in danger in terms of sustainability because they were going to have many more pensioners living for a lot longer than they

expected. So the state pension age rises that we're experiencing now are really trying to catch up with what happened in life expectancy, just to contextualise that a little bit. In 1908 when the first state pension was introduced life expectancy at birth was 40 years for men and 43 years for women and in 2016 it's 91 years for men and 94 years for women and also in 2016 around 85 percent of people actually reached state pension age whereas in 1908 only 24 percent of people did so we're seeing many more people actually reaching state pension age and then people living for much longer in receipt of state pension sure so state pension age is rising but it still doesn't explain why it took them so long

to to tell jane jane come on in thank you thank you yeah i accept everything that daniela has said and she's quite right that you know know, pension age did need to be probably increased, although we don't like it. But it certainly needed to be equalised. And that's never been something that we fought for. But what I would say is that the report that's come out showed that, for example, in 1997, the then minister said that he didn't see a pressing need to inform women about this change to their state pension age. In 2000, the DWP had research which showed that many women were unaware of the change. And that research carried on. There was further research in 2004 which showed the same. And the DWP chose not to act on that research, which is clear maladministration. That's what the WASPI campaign is fighting on. It's not about equalisation. That really is a red herring in this discussion,

if I might say so. Our brief is about not being told in good time to, as you say, Anita, make sensible financial arrangements to cover that increase in time until we got our state pension age. What would you have done differently? Because you retired at 57, to look after your husband and your elderly parents. What would you have done differently? Because you retired at 57. And you know, to look after your husband and your elderly parents, what would you have done differently? Had you known? I think if I'd known that I had to face six, sorry, a further, well,

nine years from 50 from 57, I probably would have perhaps tried to work part time rather than retiring. And I mean, again, that that would be a sensible decision as you come towards the end of your working life. Many people do take that decision to reduce their hours and to free up time for caring responsibilities, which so often fall on the shoulders of older women, whether it's for grandchildren, husbands, parents, whoever it might be. And this is before we've even hit a pandemic, which for your, you know, for WASPI women had another impact. Like what, how, how has, how has it been for you? Has it been a real struggle? Well, I think, I think, you know, I can think of one woman whose case I've heard about who was made redundant age 60.

At 60 to find another job as a woman is very difficult. She didn't just sit back. She actually set up her own business at that point to support herself until her retirement age. Obviously, the COVID simply knocked the business for six now. She's used up all her retirement savings and she's relying on universal credit, which doesn't pay her bills and is really in a very difficult financial situation. Daniela, what other adjustments can be made to help women affected by the state pension age rise who are in this bracket? So there's a few things that can be done and have been considered. One of the debates that's been going back and forth is extending

pension credit to women who are particularly affected. So perhaps women of certain ages or or um having pension credit be extended to people um via the older timetable um i i believe that that waspy itself is not necessarily in support of this because um it doesn't necessarily because because pension credit is means tested it means it wouldn't necessarily um recompense um every woman who's affected. I think Jane's situation is actually quite typical in that a lot of women have had to leave work early because they're providing care to parents or partners. So other options could be done through carer's credits, some sort of recompense through carer's credits. And I think also Jane's raised some really good points, which is that part of the issue is that working age benefits don't pay at the same level as state pension benefits. So there may be some real motivation here to look at working age benefits and whether they provide people with a decent income.

To some degree, this isn't necessarily just a pensions policy problem. It's really about benefits in general and whether or not people who are vulnerable or, you know, on low incomes for particular reasons are going to be supported at every stage. Jane, Daniela, thank you very much for joining us this morning. I'm sure we will be coming back to this. Mary Baker has emailed in to say, I didn't find out until I was 60. I wondered why I hadn't been contacted about my pension. I was horrified. I was devastated. I have to, I've had to work an extra six years, quite physical work, driving and tour guiding.

I'm now crippled with arthritis and angry beyond belief. I was never notified. Rubbish reliving longer and now going down. We paid in and they should pay out. If you want to get in touch with us via email, then go to our website. Now, it has been Listeners Week and you've been getting in touch,

telling us what you'd like to hear on the programme. And Catherine wrote to us and said, please would you consider doing a piece about Cicelyne Faye Allen, the first UK black female officer. This was in 1968. She sadly passed away in Jamaica last month. She served in both the Met Police and in Jamaica. She's an inspiring, trailblazing lady who should be known by the wider public.

And when she died, Boris Johnson paid tribute to her from the dispatch box in Parliament. Here he is. Mr Speaker, I'm sure the whole House will wish to join me in sending condolences to the family and friends of Cicelyn Fay Allen, who died earlier this week. She was the UK's first black female police officer and she served in the Metropolitan Police. That was Boris Johnson talking about Cicelyn Fay Allen. Just to say that we have asked the DWP for a statement. And should we get one before the end of the programme? I will bring it to you. Now, our listener, Catherine, isn't a police officer

who got in touch with us about Cicelyne. She works for the NHS. But she went on to tell us in her email, I think Cicelyne shows that despite barriers, her determination opened doors for both women and police officers of colour and demonstrated that joining the police could be an option. Well, Commander Alison Hedari is the most senior black woman police officer in England and Wales and joins me now to talk about her.

She didn't meet Cicelyne, but got to know all about her after joining the police 20 years ago. And you were inspired by her, weren't you, Alison? Absolutely. Cicelyne will have been such a brave person to have joined the Met at that time. She joined the Met in 1968. She was 29. She was a nurse. She was working in Croydon at the time at the Queen's Hospital. And she, like myself, saw an advert in the paper to advertise for police officers to join the Met. She applied and got into the Met and she joined in 1968. And her experiences, I know, were incredible.

So I have, as you say, I didn't ever meet her, unfortunately, but I have listened to some of her interviews. So she was working here as a nurse she came from Jamaica as part of the Windrush generation? That's right yeah that's right and she you know she had a quite a varied career actually she started in Croydon, she went on to work at the Missing Person Bureau at New Scotland Yard and then ended up at Norbury Police Station. She resigned in 1972 and went back to Jamaica and as you probably know in Jamaica she joined the Jamaican Constabulary there as a police officer. But you know thinking about her experiences it's quite incredible.

We must talk about this. I mean she is, I'm so happy Catherine got in touch to say, can we discuss this amazing woman? Because she is a trailblazer. She joined the police force in 1968. Enoch Powell's River of Blood speech, yeah, that's in the backdrop. And she's the first black woman to join the police. I mean, what a brave and courageous thing to do at that time. She must have had with members of the public. But she stood by her decision to join the police. And in that way, she is absolutely inspirational.

I didn't know very much about Cicely when I joined. But since joining the police, I've learned more about her and she's inspirational. What made you join? What was your motivation? So my motivation, it's a shame i don't have more time to talk to you about this but like cicely and i saw a tiny advert in the paper in the local paper i was living in hampshire at the time and um as a joke to my husband i said oh they're advertising for uh for officers um i was looking for a complete change in in my job and my career and my husband said I think you'd be fantastic.

And I said, are you sure? And actually, I had quite a tick list. And one of the things that I was really interested in is serving the community, making a difference in communities. And I wanted a job that was different every day. And when I thought about all those different things, I went on a ride along. And as a result of that ride along, I decided to join. Did you have any reservations?

My reservations really were around shift work, to be honest with you. I joined knowing at that time. So it was around 2000. So you can imagine all the discussions around racism and within policing. Part of my inspiration really was to go into policing because I knew that they needed more black people to join but I also wanted to make a difference to communities and those were two of my top priorities. It takes a real strength of character just like like Cicelyne, to do that, knowing the figures around how few people of colour join the police, particularly black women. In the Met alone, there are just 1,357 black female officers of character to think I'm going to make a change. There's also, you know, stigma that comes with joining. There's a lack of trust within communities.

And also, you know, questions about how you might be treated once you've joined the force. Yeah, absolutely. And I have to say that I have been the subject of hate crime within policing. But my team and the person that I was with when that happened jumped straight in and arrested the person. So I had that support. So it is a reality of policing, unfortunately, but there is so much support that you can get from your peers and from the organisation when you suffer hate crime. And what about within the force, after Black Lives Matter,

after the demos, there was an article in the papers written by a black officer which said, I've seen and heard how an environment of microaggressions and white privilege affects BAME officers in the force, forcing them to carefully navigate a minefield while feeling hemmed in on either side. You know, you talked about the hate crime that you experienced. The author went on to say a BAME officer is twice as likely as a white officer

to be subject to a misconduct allegation. I mean, Cicelyne would have been incredibly sad to read that, wouldn't she? Oh, absolutely. But I think she would have been impressed as well to see the amount of work that's going into addressing these issues. And it's not only the issues around race, but also how we can retain female talent within policing and, you know, black female talent. So there's a lot going on in the Met. And nationally now, there is a focus on looking at how we can really support those officers within policing.

I mean, they've got two incredibly strong role models in yourself and now we're learning about Cicely. How keen are you to encourage more young black women to join the police force? Absolutely. I mean, when I think about what I've been able to achieve and what I've been able to impact on, especially public confidence, I've been able to assist my own staff. I do a lot of mentoring and coaching. I have been able to spearhead some really impact of community engagement policies and practice and I look back and I think actually this is one of the best jobs in the world you'll probably say the same Anita but I actually do believe that I've got one of the best jobs in the world and I would love more black females to experience that we are

pushing in the Met at the moment and we're looking at encouraging black people to come in and do a ride along and to speak to our officers about what we do. And I would encourage as many people as possible to do that. You're absolutely right. I would say the same thing. Best job in the world. And, you know, when you've worked hard to get somewhere, particularly when you are one of the few women of colour in that environment, it's an incredible feeling. And you know that you can implement change and you know that people look to you and are inspired and see you as a role model. But with it comes a lot of struggle as well. I'm sure you would have had your own struggles to get to where you are. Absolutely. And it has been very, very hard work. I have to say that my family

have been incredibly supportive, especially my husband has just been amazing. But it has been a struggle. But I do believe that when you achieve, things are hard work. But when you achieve stuff, you feel as if you've really done something great in the world. And if you've been able to contribute and I would love more black women to be able to experience that feeling. Alison Hedari, Dr. Alison Hedari, thank you so much for joining us to speak to us about your own career and also that of Cicelyne Fay Allen. Thank you so much, Catherine, who wrote in to ask us about Cicelyne Fay Allen. I hope you enjoyed that as much as I did. Now, by 1945, 6.7 million women were contributing to the war efforts,

with a further 2.5 million in the voluntary sector. Woman's Hour listener Lavinia wrote to us to say, it puzzles me that no mention is ever made of women who worked in munitions during the war. Her mother worked at the munitions factory in Woolwich, but it was never spoken about, and she wants to know more she joins me now along with Vicky Hawkins who's curator at Second World War galleries at the Imperial War Museum very good morning to you both so Lavinia why did you contact us tell us about your mum there you go hello sorry it's all right you were on mute it's a classic mistake but now we got you laughing clear um it's just that my mum well none of my family ever spoke about anything in the war and i know my mum worked in the arsenal but you can't find anything on google about it really

because of secrecy and i wonder if they had to sign the Official Secrets Act and then they never spoke about it. What did she say to you when you asked her or you asked her about her time? I did ask her what it was like in the war and she said it was really boring because she was sort of, she was born in 21 and so she would have been a teenager, sort of early 20s and I suppose it was just like now with the kids in covid there's nothing to do is there and did she was she a londoner was she from that area yeah yeah she came from hoxton and she used to be in um's tailoring. And then I think because her sister lost her husband at Dunkirk,

I think, and she was a nurse, I think they separated their time to look after her sister's children. Right. That's the only reason I can imagine that she would have changed jobs. But she told you nothing else? No, none of my family, none of my family ever spoke about the war. My uncle was a sergeant in the Eighth Army. He never said anything. I just find it strange. What was your mum's name?

Etty. Etty. Ethel. Ethel. Ethel. All right. Well, let's see. We have got an archive clip of a woman named Margaret Amosu. She was interviewed by the Imperial War Museum in 1996,

and she worked at the Hawker Aircraft Factory in Perry Vale in London from 1941 to 1944. So similar. Let's have a listen to this clip. This is Margaret. By the time I got there, we were working from 8 until quarter past 7, 8am to quarter past 7 in the evening, with half an hour for lunch. And in morning and afternoon, hardly a break. They brought us a cup of tea. So you could say another quarter of an hour was spent drinking two cups of tea in the afternoon. And we were standing all the time, working at our benches, not sitting. Well, you could sit if you had a

far-off well job, but I mean, there weren't that many. Most of the time you were standing and working physically, working very hard. So when the afternoon tea came down around, you sort of collapsed onto your stool, you know, you were really exhausted. Really exhausted. Right, we're going to find out more about Etty from Vicky Hawkins, who's the creator at the Second World War galleries at the Imperial War Museum, or at least try and find out the sort of thing that your mum might have done. Vicky, what do we know about the women who worked in the factories? How old were they? How many were there?

Well, so from December 1941, Britain conscripted women to join the war effort and unmarried women from under the age of 30 had to join either the armed forces work on the land or in industry and by 1943 that went up to the age of 50 um there were some exceptions so pregnant women or those who had children of a very young age um uh they could they could choose not to or they could volunteer um And there were also, as it sounds like this example, people were still expected to look after their families. So wartime nurseries were established and funded under the Ministry of Health to help with that.

But there were certainly really, really long days in the factory. Twelve-hour shifts was not uncommon. And it was exhausting work. The kind of sort of examples of the types of jobs could have been sort of filling or painting and stacking shelves, operating machinery, weighing the powder that was going to be going into ammunitions and explosives. It was often very repetitive.

So you had to stay very focused as the work was checked and needed to meet some very required specific standards. And Vicky, Lavinia said, did her mum not talk about it because she was asked to sign the Official Secrets Act? Well, I'm not so sure about that one specifically, but I think that if they were engaged potentially, as I know they were at some points at the Royal Arsenal in explosives research, there's potentially a possibility that they would have not been able to talk about those experiences outside of doing that. But I think a lot of people didn't really feel like they wanted

to share their experiences of the wartime. And what we are trying to do at the Imperial War Museum in our new Second World War galleries that open on the 20th of October is really tell some of those experiences to our visitors, a huge range from across the world so that we can talk about it. Fantastic.

And we will all come and visit, particularly Lavinia. We'll have to get you down there. Thank you, Lavinia. And thank you, Vicky. We have had a statement from the DWP saying both the High Court and the Court of Appeal

have supported the action of the DWP under successive governments dating back to 1995. both the High Court and the Court of Appeal have supported the action of the DWP under successive governments dating back to 1995, and the Supreme Court refused the claimant's permission to appeal. In a move towards gender equality, it was decided more than 25 years ago to make the state pension age the same for men and women. We have thoroughly enjoyed Listener's Week. I will be back tomorrow with Weekend Woman's Hour. That's all for today's Woman's Hour. Join us again next time.

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's 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.

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