Woman's Hour - Sister Bliss, Lucy Easthope, Rachel Maclean on Domestic Abuse Plan, Ockenden Review

Episode Date: March 30, 2022

Do you have a soundtrack to your life that you return to again and again? Emma explores the power of music to affect our mood and well being with DJ and song writer and Sister Bliss and Professor Lauren Stewart from Goldsmiths who studies the psychology and neuroscience of music.Whenever there’s a catastrophic event somewhere in the world Lucy Easthope is likely to get a phone call about it. She’s one of the country’s foremost disaster planners and long experience has taught her that the line between our everyday lives and catastrophe is a fine one. Name almost any global disaster of the last twenty years from 9/11 to the UK’s 7/7 terrorism attacks, the Grenfell fire, to earthquakes, plane and train crashes and you’ll find she’s been there behind the scenes with the clear up operation. She helps identify bodies, support the survivors and carry out the painstaking process of retrieving and returning invaluable, tattered possessions to the bereaved. She joins Emma Barnett to talk about her life and new book “When the Dust Settles”.The government has today published its Domestic Abuse plan, bringing in new measures with the aim to tackle perpetrators and prevent abuse in the first instance. This includes plans to create the first national register of domestic abusers as well as offer more funding for victim support helplines and health services. This follows the Domestic Abuse Act introduced last year which updated the definition of domestic abuse to recognise a range of behaviours as abusive as well as establish children as victims too. But will these new measures protect women from domestic abuse and focus on taking tough action against perpetrators? Emma is joined by Rachel Maclean the Safeguarding Minister.The second and final report into one of the biggest NHS maternity scandals in history has just been unveiled. The Independent Review into Maternity Services at the Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust , led by midwife Donna Ockenden, has examined nearly nine thousand maternity cases in which mothers and babies may have been harmed or died, over almost twenty years. Emma speaks to BBC Health Correspondent.

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 the midst of world events, from wars to the pandemic, we're going to take some time to talk about the music that powers you through. One of my guests today, Lucy Easthope, you'll hear from her shortly, uses music, Eminem and Kanye West specifically, I'm told, to get her ready to head into disaster zones

and to be able to do her job. Personally, for me, before coming on air here every morning or if I've been going on to television perhaps when I was doing Newsnight, I write every single script listening to the music of Faithless. The beat, the words, the wall of sound provides the right headspace and it gets me in the zone. So it's very exciting that one of my guests today

is the Faithless DJ, Sister Bliss, who will be part of our conversation, helping us examine what music does for us and how it does what it does. For me, it's like magic. But how about you? What is the music that powers you through why how did you first discover it perhaps what you listen to has changed with age and of course there's

different contexts for music but specifically about that powering you on whether it's into a work context a difficult personal circumstance whatever it is I really want to hear about it and also people have very specific ways that they listen to their music as well. Tell me about those. You know I love detail. I hope you do by now. 84844 is the number you need to text me here at Women's Hour.

Do check for those costs. On social media, it's at BBC Women's Hour or you can email me through the Women's Hour website. Also on today's programme, I'll be joined by the Minister for Safeguarding. She's here with the Government's Domestic Abuse Plan, which is published today. And we'll have everything you need to know about the much trailed and long awaited final report into what's being called the biggest maternity scandal in the NHS's history, which is being unveiled as I speak. But first,

whenever there is a catastrophic event somewhere in the world, my first guest is likely to get a phone call about it. She is Lucy Easthope, one of the country's foremost disaster planners. She says she knows every major incident that the UK and its citizens have endured overseas since 1960 inside and out, and has worked in some way on the response to every single one since 2001. And of course, disasters here in the UK, I should say as well. That includes 9-11, the 7-7 attacks, the Grenfell Tower tragedy and of course the Covid-19 pandemic. Now she has poured this unique set of experiences into a book called When the Dust Settles and you may have just caught some of it before we came on air as it is also this week's book of the week on Radio 4. Have a listen to this clip as Lucy

approaches the scene of a disaster with a male security guard on the door. I recognise something in his face as he looks at me. He has been told to expect me but I am not what he pictured. I am a short woman rounded by years of trying to make babies. Arthritis has hobbled my gait to give me a rolling walk. I am clumsy. I am northern. No Bond movie would have cast me. I smile broadly at him. You learn early on that you can't show fear or weakness. The cards are stacked against you already for not being police or forensics.

And for being a woman. So, you perfect your swagger. Lucy Easthope just swaggered in here. Good morning, Lucy. Good morning. I love that. I wouldn't be put in a Bond film. I'd put you in a Bond film with what I've read about here. Thank you very much. It must be a funny thing hearing that, hearing your words come back to you. But serious point you're making is you've had to create a persona in this world that you're in. We'll get into some of the detail of that because it's an overwhelmingly male profession still. Yes, absolutely. Disaster planning had traditionally been a career that

men entered at the end of a long career in fire or policing. And so for many years, it was very, very male dominated. And even as more women became disaster planners in the UK and around the world, the profession itself was very masculine and very military. Do you, with that swagger, get people, specifically the men, on board, on side? Do you not have to bother? You're there, of course, to do very serious work. Oh no, it takes a lot of work. There's a lot of winning over. There's a lot of explaining what disaster planning is,

what advice you might need. You're usually looking, as with so much of women's work, you're always looking for allies. So you're looking for people who've perhaps worked with you on the last disaster and are going to say, oh no, she's good at what she does. And I think that will resonate with a lot of women. Your career, you say, has heightened your sense of risk and how fine the line is between normal life and disaster. Tell us a bit more about that. So I think we've lost the sense of how perilous life is, and that doesn't need to be a negative. We keep being surprised when life is full of risk and crisis and disaster,

and there's this real sense, I talk in the book about dis and astro the alignment the celestial alignment of the bad stars and one thing to remember is that potential disasters happen all the time actual disasters wars events happen all the time and i think one thing that's changed from perhaps generations before us is the way that we consume them is different and we're trying to live in in what psychologists would call a kind of state of heightened arousal, rather than accepting that this is life's sort of frailty. Yes. And for you, and disaster planning, and also response, what does that mean? What do you do in your job? I've mentioned how many you've had to respond to. So as a disaster planner, and I've been one in my working life for 22 years, the book might suggest I've been one all my life, but in my working life what we do is we constantly

calibrate what risks might be ahead. We make lists of risks, we plan for those events and then my particular area of work is for the part we call the aftermath. So I care particularly for the bereaved and the survivors and a particularly important part of my work is the care of the deceased. And that is, you know, you go into great detail about that because it's a very difficult area to talk about, but it is essential. And you do help with the identification of bodies

and also with helping those who have lost loved ones and how that is communicated and what you are able to tell them. Absolutely and that's vital work and you know you need to take two things from that. One is that again this is happening all the time in major incidents but also in sudden single deaths people are confronting some of these issues but also I think there's a great comfort in knowing that there are people who go in afterwards. There's a myth at the moment that there isn't that, you know, that everything's a surprise to government. There is some comfort in knowing that somewhere there are some steady hands, you know, ready to go to the next one.

And you also say how important it is to tell those who have lost loved ones the unvarnished truth. Why? There's an idea, I think, that only bad lies are told after disaster. You know, we have a lot of interest in who said what and who was lying. Good lies are told as well. So those are things like somebody was sleeping. You know, that was a very old school funeral director tactic in a train crash was to say, oh, that person didn't feel anything. It was instant and they were sleeping. And then the nature of death investigation and particularly the coronial investigation would highlight that that was a lie.

And then what you do to that bereaved family is you plunge them right back into the first day of grief. But also they then question everything. So we had a very large public inquiry in 2001 into the care of families after transport disasters in the UK, a very important public inquiry with recommendations. And that said, you know, the most important thing is to be honest, but that is hard. And the book explains, I think, it's not easy to say some of these things to families. But you think we must because of faith as well in public institutions and being able to trust those who are meant to be looking after us. It's a consensual relationship.

So a family will say to you, I want to know nothing. And you do two things there. One is you respect that. But two, you also have very, very difficult conversations with them about we can't completely protect you. You know, there is a media, there is a coronial process. there are other things that might mean you have to hear some of these things we can't completely guarantee that you won't hear these things um and then a family might say tell me everything and that's what i you know i'm inspired by things like very good police family liaison officers or very good funeral directors who learn how to have those conversations

and in my particular area of one thing I do a lot is the return of personal effects to people. And that's where I've learnt to be very, very honest about what they're going to receive. You've talked about the furniture of self. Yes. What do you mean by that? So it's a beautiful phrase from the disaster sociologist Kai Erikson

who's writing about what people have lost in their flooded homes in America in the 70s. And it's a phrase to describe everything we wrap ourselves in. And it was a particular pain that comes with losing your home and something that I saw a lot in things like floods and in fires. But it's also about, you know, the little things that make up somebody's, you know, handbag or their briefcase, what's in that. And often, particularly with bereaved parents, that is a huge comfort if we can return some of those things, particularly if we have not been able to return a body. Which is, I mean, there's some extraordinary stats and pieces of information in the book about that for instance with 9-11 I think I've got this right 40% of cases there's no connection between remains and names yet that those who are still

grieving haven't been able to to bury their loved ones or have anything no absolutely you have some families who just have they have nothing at all you have some families who just have a a tiny piece of charred debit card with partial name on and what you saw i don't know if you remember but in 2001 um just before the attacks the movie castaway came out and a lot of young children and adolescents of of those who died felt maybe that their dad or their mom had swum to safety somewhere maybe they could be found. Maybe they were living somewhere else in America with a new identity. And sometimes the personal effects help to lay rest the idea that,

yes, they were there that day. That was their wallet. You aren't just responding, though. You are planning as well. That is a big part of this. And it's striking to me that you say, with regards to the pandemic, that contrary to popular opinion, it was the most diligently planned for disaster. A lot of people would not feel that that was the case in the way that it unfolded, not least because there's now a COVID-19 public inquiry.

Well, for all of our planned for risks, we tend to see public inquiries, public inquiries, we would say are part of the the process. But there's a lot of anger that prompted the requests for that, especially from the groups who have sprung up from the bereaved families. And I think what you will see is them following a very similar path to all of the disaster families that I work with, which is just utter shock. Sometimes our very existence as disaster planners can be an affront. You know, the idea it's sometimes there's a comfort to be taken from the idea that this was unprecedented or a surprise. And we kind of appear on the scene and say we knew what was needed and perhaps sometimes we weren't allowed to deliver it. And that's a huge shock. And that's probably one of the main themes the public inquiry will uncover, was how much work

was done, and then how easy it is to erode that, particularly during times of austerity. So what happened with COVID? Why did we look so shambolic at times? One of the things is a disaster doesn't happen in isolation. So where you are at the time of the event is very relevant. And we went into a pandemic with a very, very depleted health and social care system. So the stronger your health and social care, the better your pandemic response. So a lot of us were very, very nervous. And we talked a lot about an influenza pandemic, but we still had our eyes on other things that could cause pandemic. And people focused that, you know, we'd only looked at flu.

We looked at corona. We also looked at some very, very, very terrifying scenarios. Like in 2014, we planned extensively for Ebola, which would have been a very, very different experience. So we assumed and we hoped that we would be listened to. And that was very difficult in 2019. Who wasn't listening to you? Our central government were very difficult to listen to,

very difficult to convince that this was a major risk. And really, we acted too late as a country. So how does that actually play out? Is it somebody like yourself who's in 10 Downing Street saying this is going to happen or there's a high chance of this? We need to have the following in place and we don't. Well, you know, one of the things I talk about in the book is that you start to see, for example, those meetings get more and more cancellations. So a pandemic was the country's highest and most likely national risk. And we wanted to test and exercise it constantly. And when we would do those tests, one of the things we would find was

that we really needed ministerial engagement to commit to certain resources, to elevate the need for a PPE stockpile, to fund aspects of intensive care better. One of the things I say in the book quite poignantly is we were told we couldn't plan for Brexit and a pandemic at the same time. It was too ridiculous to think of both happening at the same time they were too it was too uh ridiculous to think of both happening at the same time and so as disaster planners i think we started to feel very um very stymied in our ability to go into it in our best in our best uh in our best foot forward kind of thing who told you that or who who was that message from um for me personally generally it would come out as a sort of slow um erosion of priorities so example, in meetings would just be delayed. So by the time we got to January 2020, it was multiple meetings at department, ministerial department level had been had been postponed. And I think that's the sort of thing where that will be incredibly painful for the families to sit through. That's a key theme in the book, I think, is the revelations of disaster. That's going back to that point about

honesty. I think families, one of the things that is quite a common trick at the moment is to tell families that this was unpredicted, unplanned for. We're all in it together, come along with us on the journey. And only and only recently actually some of the bereaved families who are fighting for the public inquiry have met with me and their their pain is almost reopened all over again at the idea that there were people who had worked very hard to map this out you know we went into the pandemic being described as one of the most ready countries in the world there were reasons for that because we... But when I mentioned chaos, of course,

the things that come to mind were the lack of PPE. You know those sorts of details, of course, but just in case people are wondering which part of this we're talking about, because I remember interviewing healthcare professionals who didn't have anything to wear. So how could we be the most prepared for and it not be there? I mean, as disaster planners, we were devastated by the loss

of the PPE stockpile. So the essential part of the pandemic plan, which had been developed since 2004, was a major logistics contract that would manage the PPE that would mean, for example, we could put families into hospitals to say goodbye. You know, the iPad idea that somebody would say goodbye on an iPad is no consolation. So we did have it and then we didn't have it. Yeah, it was run down between 2017 and 2020 is my understanding, but I think that will have to be explored in the public inquiry. But certainly when we went to reach for it as disaster planners, it wasn't there.

And that was such a key tenet of our disaster plan that we then rallied. And we did, you know, at local level, we did some incredible fast response, but that was a, that I we did you know at local level we did some incredible fast response but that was a that I think you know future times will show that that left us very weak. Ukraine is in people's minds at the moment I mean I think a lot of people will be almost needing time to take in what you've just said about the pandemic especially that line we've been told we'll be speaking to a minister shortly you couldn't plan for Brexit and the pandemic at the same time. But with regards to Ukraine, which is very much in people's minds at the moment, what would you say about what people can do?

Because you are a responder of the highest level. Lots of people getting in touch with the programme yesterday. Yeah, well, I'm about to do it all over again. I'm about to say, of course, there are plans for this sort of crisis. One of the difficulties is the EU had had a major response plan for what's called mass sheltering and mass housing. And you actually are seeing that being put into practice now. And so for four years, there'd been a major EU piece of work that I was part of looking at what this sort of scenario would generate in terms of housing needs. And one of the things that you learn in disaster management is that billeting, so putting people into individual

back bedrooms, is one of the most harmful things you can do in the long term. But also the disruption of people's life scapes. So that's a theme I come up with in the book a lot, separating people out from their networks. So some of the things that work a lot more effectively are things like huge temporary villages, which don't look great for optics. They look very, you know, unwieldy, they involve huge resource. But there was EU work to make sure that could be available for a number of scenarios, including nuclear and chemical incidents, war, and also flooding scenarios. Have we seen any of that? We've just started to see the announcements around that.

I suspect some of the delays and the delays, I think you have a minister on for safeguarding, the delays have been devastating because the delays in decision making mean that the traffickers and those people that want to exploit women and children have really been able to move very quickly. But one of the other reasons for the delay was this is just like a disaster where people are trying to get what we call the sit rep, the situation report. They're trying to work out what it is. You know, where's Zelensky and Putin going to come to a deal and everybody could go home? What is this? And in that time, you're trying to make the best decision. And I think, you know, in the last couple of days, we've really seen EU initiatives ramp up.

Of course, we're not part of those. No, 35 days on into the war. It's too slow. You would say too slow. And of course, I know you've also been on your social media feeds saying, you know, it's not about sending stuff right now to the public. Yeah. It's, you know, people want to donate money. Yeah.

Fine is one thing if they can, but it's not about stuff, which I also found striking. Just let me give a final word to you on what we're asking our listeners today, because I know music does mean something to you. I mentioned, have I got it right? Eminem?

Yeah, a bit of Eminem, bit of Kanye in the car. But at the moment, I think just to get me through, it's all the big show tunes. Is it? Yeah. So I'm really interested in the next section because it's music is my major coping strategy because demobbing from this you've said one of the hardest things actually about your job is going back into normal life and the small

talk and remembering you know to buy the butter in the weekly shop or whatever it is after what you've got to deal with yeah absolutely and so you, one of the things I'll do when I go home is on that first morning back with my children is play some really big 90s and 80s disco tunes in the kitchen and just that's the sign I'm home. And then when I'm going to a scene, it is things like Eminem that really gets me ready for the next world that I enter. Because I have specifically asked what powers people on this morning

as opposed to, you know, what comforts you, what kind of cradles you, what looks after you with music. And I think there is a difference, isn't there? It's very striking to me that you've got to put something on like Eminem to get ready to go in. Yeah. So we call it, we have a hashtag on our emergency management social media. I coined it last year because so many of our profession was struggling. We call it the planthums. So things that get you, the planthums, things that get you in the mood for what you're about to do.

My goodness. I love that. What a great hashtag. Well, we know you have a way with words as well as what you do for a living because of the book, which a lot of people will have accessed through Book of the Week. But if they haven't, it's sitting in front of me. It's called When the Dust Settles, Stories of Love, Loss and Hope from an expert in disaster, which you very much are. And Lucy, I'm sure we'll talk again. There's much that you have seen and perhaps can foresee that would be well worth listening to.

Lucy Easthope, thank you very much. Thank you. Indeed. Well, you are getting in touch with some of the music that powers you on and the planthums, if you were, depending on your stage of life and what you're doing or where you are. I do like this. Before writing, I listen to Joni Mitchell and Blue while lying on the floor on my back with my feet raised on the seat of the chair. So where you are also seems to matter.

I'm a 63-year-old woman, Emma. I live on my own. Music's more important to me than anything else to combat the silence. I listen to Spotify every afternoon and evening while I cook. Other music providers are available. And in the car, it's the best company. I listen to Spotify every afternoon and evening while I cook. Other music providers are available. And in the car, it's the best company. I listen to Pink Floyd when I'm feeling low. It helps pull through,

pull me through difficult times, says Gemma. And with regards to Sister Bliss, he's coming up shortly from Faithless. Insomnia, of course, one of their most famous tracks, is simply the best dance track ever. Still is.

I cannot stay sitting when it's played. Can anyone really? Well, you're going to be up on your feet soon because I will do a blast of that for you because it'd be rude not to with Sister Bliss coming up. But first, the government has today published its domestic abuse plan with the aim to tackle perpetrators and prevent abuse in the first instance. This includes the idea of creating the first national register of domestic abusers, as well as offering more funding for victim support helplines and health services. It follows of course the Domestic Abuse Act of last year which updated the definition of it to recognise a range of behaviours such as psychological and emotional abuse as such as well as establishing children as victims too.

Rachel McLean is the Safeguarding Minister. Good morning. Good morning. Thanks for joining us today. Plenty to talk about, but the Register of Domestic Abusers, this is the headline many have picked up on. Is that going to happen? And tell us a bit how it may work. Yeah, so thanks for having me on. And this is a really huge piece of work. And it does come on the back of obviously the landmark Domestic Abuse Act act so this is the next stage and your right to focus on the register which is an important part of our plans what we need to do now is we need to look very carefully and work through with our partners obviously the police local authorities and other operational partners to make sure that

the proposals are workable and sensible and actually protect women against the highest harm perpetrators. So that's what we're going to be doing following on from publishing the plan. So it might not happen? Yes, it will absolutely happen. But we are just setting out in the plan the detail about how we will consult with frontline practitioners and experts, policing partners and others. OK, I was just I was just I wasn't trying to make it difficult. I was actually a bit confused when reading whether it was going to happen or this was a consultation.

So a new register will happen. But you're going to be talking to those who are involved, the key stakeholders, about how best to carry it out. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, we have the concept of the sex offenders register in this country, which is an established system that we have for protecting the public against sex offenders. Obviously, the number of individuals that would be a scope of a domestic abuse perpetrator system is going to be significantly greater. So we do need to work carefully through all the proposals to make sure that we have a workable plan. So that's why we're going to be setting out a white paper. And as you say, yes, we are going to be consulting with people and experts across the sector to see how we actually operationalise this.

How many people would be on it today if it was live? Well, I mean, it depends how you define it. I mean, the prevalence of domestic abuse is very significant and it came to the fore in the pandemic. It's one of these crimes that's underreported. So any number that we have is never going to reflect the scale of the offence. Could you just give us a sense of how large the register would be at the moment? I can't give you a specific number, but we do know that something like 2.3 million people in england and wales potentially experience domestic abuse um in the year ending up to march 2020 so obviously we would need to identify those who are the highest harm those re-offenders uh those people with a conviction

and then exactly to see how we are you are you going to be on the register presumably though you can only be on a register if you have a conviction. So that's exactly what we want to work out and work through the detail of how it would work. So what we're setting out today in the plan. No, no, sorry. Legally, how on earth can you not know that at this point? Legally, you can only be on an offender's register if you are an offender, surely? Yes, precisely. So the sex offenders register is a system that we have in the country, which has a number of safeguards for people to protect them from high harm offenders. But we would obviously be working through how that would, it won't directly translate into domestic abuse, because as I said, the number is significantly greater. It's, you know, it's on a much greater scale in terms of multiples of the number of sex offenders that are harmful in the country. So we are going to look at that.

I understand you're going to keep looking at things, but I thought this was, you said it was a big piece of work. I thought it was perhaps with more detail at this point. But the prosecution rates in terms of, if you look at the the report the number of reports of domestic abuse are up but the prosecutions and convictions are down so what's going on there because if you're going to build a register you want it to have those as many people who have been you know doing this as possible and yet if we actually look at the numbers, convictions are down. Yes, so we are still at the moment, we have seen a backlog in the court system throughout the pandemic.

So it is quite difficult to pick out precisely the impact of the pandemic where there was obviously an impact on the courts. A lot of that is now coming back up to full strength because of the investment that the government's put into the court system and a lot of other measures as well about focusing on how do the police actually investigate and prosecute and charge these crimes. But we have said all along we have got more to do on this and also rape prosecutions as well.

That's the work that we're taking that we are driving through government across government to increase our response and bring more perpetrators to justice and if i if i if i may emma i think it's really important that the overall work that we're doing today with this plan is setting out that we are moving the focus away from victims for too long it had the onus has been on a victim to seek shelter, seek safety, leave her home, leave where her community is and all her links are. That is completely wrong. We want to put the focus on perpetrators. How do we manage them? How do we prevent it happening in the first place? a number of really significant interventions, working with perpetrators, changing their behaviours, looking at what drives predominantly a man to abuse their partner so that we can

actually stamp it out. And I think that's where, that's the message that I want your listeners to have, because it is wrong that we have always put the onus on the victim. And again, that's predominantly a woman or a girl. In 2014 a scheme to let people find out from police if their partner had a history of domestic violence was brought in across England and Wales known as Clare's Law intended to provide information it could protect someone from being a victim of attack it's named after the 36 year old Clare Wood who was murdered by her ex-boyfriend in 2009. How well is that working?

That is a really important scheme. And that's why we want to look to potentially expand that and make it more efficient so that it can protect more women. Because we, again, we know that some of the patterns of this abuse does happen on a regular basis. We have those serial offenders who will target multiple women. And so we think it's right that we look at how that scheme works and how we can extend it. Well, it was a Conservative government that brought it in, still a Conservative government. How well is it working?

I mean, it's working very well. That's why we want to build on it and take those aspects of it that do work well and just look to where we can improve it so this would be alongside this and the new register could require perpetrators to take actions such as reporting to the police when changing address or opening a bank account with a new partner how will that information then be shared safely with, as it is predominantly, women. Yeah, exactly. I mean, that's part of the work that we need to do to put in place those safeguards and also strike the balance with the legal framework that we have in this country. But you mentioned in your opening piece that actually domestic abuse is more than just about physical violence. It's also about economic abuse. And again, this is something that's coming increasingly into focus

after we pass the Domestic Abuse Act. And we talk a lot about it in the plan. We know that perpetrators can manipulate that. There's a lot left to figure out in this plan, though, because every question I've asked so far about how this is going to work, you don't quite yet know. I don't think that's quite a fair comment. Well, I've got a list of answers. I've got a list of answers and every one of them so far.

I'm not trying to be difficult here. I'm just trying. I would have thought when the government goes out to announce a plan that you actually do know how many people may be on the register, how it's going to work, how you'll then safely share the information with predominantly women. It's completely normal practice for the government to announce the ambitions and plans that we have, but to also consult with experts in the field. That's a normal part of government policymaking. If you talk to any of the sexual violence charities, they will say that they welcome that approach. I'm very familiar with policy. We need to understand the impact on victims and we need to work through victims and make sure that we're listening to their voices.

Yes. And there's been there's been there's been great support from domestic abuse charities today, for instance, for the support and the money that's going to be given to helplines, which is also part of this. But I don't think it's unfair to say that when you talk about policymaking, if you then go out to announce the plan, that that the plan will be in place that our listeners today would be ready for some of those details hence why i don't know if you're announcing it yet so i think there's a lot of detail in the plan it's uh the document is over 100 pages long it contains many details of things that are already operating uh for example the work that we're going to do about tagging, expanding tagging on serial offenders. It includes all the work that we've done to fund the victims of witness services.

It includes all the work that we're doing to expand the independent domestic violence advocates and the independent sexual violence advocates. All of that detail is spelled out. Plus, and this is very important, how local areas will actually bring this to life in their local areas, how they will use the money that's allocated by central government to commission those local services. And often these are specialist services run by small organisations. And what they have all asked

for is that sustainable funding so that they can plan their services. All of that detail is in the plan. Well, I look forward to you coming back or Priti Patel, in fact, to talk about the register and how that will actually work. As I say, that is the headline across most of the papers today and is the new element of this that perhaps could be a game changer. It may not be, but it could be. And that's, of course, what you seem to be betting on. Just a couple of other questions while you're with us, Minister. There's going to be a free vote today in the House of Commons about whether measures introduced during the pandemic should be made permanent with regards to women and girls in England being able to access

early medical abortions by phone or video call. Do you know how you're going to vote? I think it depends whether there is a vote. At the moment I'm not entirely think it depends whether there is a vote. At the moment, I'm not entirely clear whether there actually will be a vote on that amendment. So I will have to see how the business proceeds in the House. But as you say, it is a free vote. So I'll be considering it very carefully. And if there is a vote, how will you vote? I am minded not to vote for that because my understanding is that it's looking to extend arrangements which were brought in on a temporary basis during the pandemic.

And I think that when you're making changes to something as important and as impactful as women's access to abortion, which is what we're talking about here, I think that it is the wrong way to do it through an amendment. It should be done through a full discussion in Parliament. That's a technicality, with respect, that's a technicality. If it's been good enough for women and girls throughout the pandemic, and this is backed by doctors and clinicians in their high numbers and the leaders in this field, why is it not good enough to stick around afterwards? With respect, again, it isn't a technicality because... You just said about bringing it through on an amendment.

I listened very carefully to what you say. You don't think that's the right way for it to come in. No, I don't. That's the technicality of how Parliament works. I'm not keen on that as a kind of almost part of the way that we discuss what is the fabric of people's lives. That's a mechanism, if you like, of Parliament. Do you not actually agree with women and girls?

And it's, of course, it's your right not to. Having this ability to do this from home as they've been able to from during the pandemic, because many, many doctors think this is what this country has needed for many years. I think there is a wide spectrum of views on this particular topic. And I don't think that what you've just said is a position that is either democratically tested or does commend widespread support of women across the country. I understand it may be your view. I have never mentioned my view.

I'm talking about the views of doctors, very, very clearly, who I've interviewed on this programme, the leaders of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, to name but a few. Please never confuse my view with theirs. I don't intend to do that at all.

And it may be the view of people on your programme. As far as I'm concerned, I have to represent my constituents and it is not the universal view of my constituents. So where we got to is you're not going to vote for it

because you don't think that's the right thing to do, as opposed to a technicality of an amendment. I was merely trying to get your opinion because you have a free vote. Can I just ask about another thing here? You're, of course,

talking about the safeguarding largely of women and girls. With regards to news that you broke at three o'clock this morning, a Welsh Conservative MP, one of your colleagues, Jamie Wallace, has become the first MP to announce that they are trans. It's been reported by

Politico that Boris Johnson began his speech last night at a dinner of Conservative MPs with the following words, good evening, ladies and gentlemen, or as Keir Starmer would put it, people who are assigned female or male at birth. Do you think that's a respectful way to talk or even joke about trans people's experiences in this country? I wasn't at the dinner last night, so I don't know how he opened his remarks. But what what the prime minister has said in response to what I think was an incredibly brave statement of Jamie Wallace,

who came forward and and and talked about his personal experiences, the prime minister has said that he has overwhelming support for Jamie and it is right that we all stand by him as he undergoes this incredibly difficult personal transition. And Prime Minister was clear also last week in PMQs and he said that if people are undergoing this type of transition, then they deserve nothing but our love and respect and support. And that is the position of the government and also the position of the law in this country. I recognise you may not have been at that dinner, but many Conservative MPs were, and that's being widely reported this morning. What you say in the Commons also, of course, matters. But what you say at dinners of your MPs is also worth hearing and reflecting on.

So that is a question I wanted to make sure we put to you. We just heard finally, with regards, many of our listeners getting in touch about refugees, they've signed up to house them. I don't know, have you done that? Are you able to do that? It's not something that I'm personally able to do. That's fine. Given my personal circumstances. Of course, and many MPs can't as well, you know, and there's a lot about responsibility. It's not a difficult question in any way for lots of people in the jobs where they feel they can't give it, but they also have thought about it. I recognise that might be in your mind. There's a report about yesterday, fewer than one intern applications to accommodate refugees have been approved. There's concern about the Home Office not moving fast enough in processing applications.

We just heard from Lucy Easthope, who is one of our foremost disaster planners, that that is devastating for the safeguarding, especially of women and children on the borders of Ukraine. What do you say to that? So I obviously am a Home Office minister and I know that there is a huge amount of work going on to, along with colleagues in other departments of government, to get this scheme up and running. And there have been visas issued. I think we've got the latest is we've got over 22,000 visas issued for the family scheme for Ukrainians to bring their family members over. And we also have 2,700, my understanding, visas issued for the Homes for Ukraine scheme. But there will be many, many more.

And I think it is important to say that we have designed this scheme from scratch in a very short period of time. And also, as safeguarding minister, I know that there are, unfortunately, there is a necessity to have those essential security checks to ensure exactly that safety of women and girls who are fleeing this desperate situation we need to make sure that they're protected at every stage so that when they come here they can genuinely rebuild their lives and that is absolutely the priority of the home office rachel mclean look forward to talking again thank you very much for your time safeguarding minister from the home office so course, very relevant to ask about that particular question that many of you were also getting in touch with the programme about yesterday. usually with oboes to power me through my desk job. Take Five by Dave Brubeck here from Val.

Love that. The first two bars transport me to a 1960s smoky jazz club in my head. It's in Paris. I was a teenager in the 60s and that's the world that felt exciting and just waiting for me. Many more coming in. As I mentioned, for me, I often reach for Faithless, in particular an album called No Roots,

a track called Mass Destruction or another one or Everything Will Be All Right Tomorrow. I oscillate between the two, make of that what you will. But of course, I'm also partial to the band's most famous track. I need to get some sleep. I can't get no sleep. Now, I mean, I could just keep that going for the rest of the time I've got this morning, but if that's not going to power you through, I don't know what is. I am joined by the Faithless DJ and songwriter, Sister Bliss. Good morning.

Hi, Emma. Good morning. Thank you for having me. Do you know how lovely it is to have you on this programme, especially when you've created so much of the soundtrack of my life? Well, thank you. That's very kind. What a massive compliment. But do you have any idea the effect that your music can create? Because I read that you said, to me, the music doesn't live and breathe until it has an audience. I think it lives and breathes in the studio. There's often a sense of wonder where there was just air and suddenly there are notes hanging in the air. There is a

phrase, there is a lyricism, there's some poetry and you get hairs up the back of your neck. That's when you know you're in the moment of creation. I guess you know there's there's a culture around any music that you listen to and how you understand that culture is also how you hear it so for me living in the world that I live in having grown up in the context of loving electronic music watching how people receive music you know at a rave in a club at a festival when it's performed live or me DJing music that I've made it's an immediate response you know when you make a record people have it at home and they listen to it in all sorts of different contexts but when you actually see how the music's affecting them how they're dancing

you can see people's faces literally shining that sort of moment of communion so yeah it lives and breathes in the moment of creation, but it definitely goes up to a whole other level when you're lucky enough to perform it to thousands and thousands of people in a big field, as I've been lucky enough to do over the years. And you keep doing it. And another one here, just a message that came in, totes with you on Faithless Emma, Insomnia is a tune.

I contrast dance tracks with some amazing, emotionally stirring classical music from the Welsh composer Sir Carl Jenkins, The Armed Man is awesome. I'm getting some good recommendations here. But it's fascinating how people can take what you've created, Sister Bliss, and then have it in their life, listen to it in a certain way and what it makes them feel and do. Professor Lauren Stewart from Goldsmiths with us as well, who studies the psychology and neuroscience of music. Lauren, what's going on in our brains when we listen? Well, a great deal, actually, Emma. So it's really, there's no single brain area for music. It's like a symphony of activity. So some areas are dealing with the pitch and the melody. Other areas are dealing with the rhythm and the harmony.

Our experience, of course, is a very holistic one. We have no sense that there's this distribution of activity that all comes together in this experience of the whole piece. But, of course, something really important about listening to music is that actually the brain is a prediction machine and music listening is a super stimulus, is a playground for us to seek patterns and to predict where the music's going to move next. And actually, this is hardwired into us to make predictions about what's going to happen in the world. And of course, the music listening is a very sort of safe situation in which to experiment with this. So we find we get rewarded when we're correct about predictions, but actually in the context of this safe space, we actually find it rewarding to be surprised as well

when the music doesn't quite go where we expected it to. That's interesting. So we develop that as well. I'm also interested in if things change as you change age as well. What do we know about that? Do we have different tastes? Yeah, we do actually and it's all because actually we're we're real experts as music listeners regardless of whether you can play any music we we basically become connoisseurs of how music works and of course over a lifetime of listening we we get more challenged because we've literally got a bigger, more complex listening biography.

So things that you might have once listened to when you were 15, looking back at your playlists, you might think, oh, why did I find that particularly interesting? You know, because you need more challenge and more complexity. Sister Bliss, I've just watched this film. I don't know if you've seen it called Ali and Ava. It's a love story, but it's got music at its core. And it's so striking to actually see two main characters well over the age of 40. I don't quite know how old they are, but they put their headphones on and they are just in a different place. mean I think as Professor was saying we're attuned to music it's in our bodies the beat of our heartbeat you know when we're in our mother's wombs nature

bird song even the sort of industrialized world we live in you know I feel I'm born of that and techno music house music electronic music it's all it's all part of that the sounds that that are inside of us and are sort of echoing around us every single day. But of course, music has that massively nostalgic pull as well. It can be so evocative for memory. We just actually did the most incredible project, which was to make Insomnia, which is the kind of epitome of sleeplessness. It's about a song about not being able to get no sleep that you would generally hear in the middle of a dance floor and we were approached by a CBD brand to do a

collaboration and actually make Insomnia into a completely different music which was about bringing on sleep and I'm thinking but people have experienced this at such sort of high points in their life there's no way they're going to be able to fall asleep to it and how on earth can I dissemble this piece of music? So it still has that nostalgic, nurturing feeling to it, yet it's actually going to calm people right down as opposed to getting a huge surge of adrenaline and excitement as you do when you listen to the original. Well, I think we can actually hear a short blast of that.

Have we got that clip, I think we do. Let's have a listen. And so pulling it apart like that, Sister Bliss, that is lovely. And it's a very different feeling, of course, to the one that you get inside you when you're listening to the original. What did that teach you about what you can do with mood and music? I think mood has a lot to do with tempo. It's, like I said before, it's echoing the motion of feelings and the momentum you get in your own body, you know, fast to slow and strong sounds and weak sounds.

And for this particular project, it was making everything really still. So it was almost like interrupting the momentum and the excitement, the tension and release that was from the original part of how I did that was slow the whole thing down so it's a totally different tempo from the original and apparently it echoes a resting heart rate according to an amazing sleep expert I met whilst working on this project um and it was about um amazing what the professor was talking about how the predictions so it was about repeating things over and over again. So it became hypnotic. What I love about our original version is there is this hypnotic element to the way things build and build and build before you get the actual drop

in the music. And this way we did away with it. Yes, exactly. But I was going to say, you're like a doctor to me. So what do you prescribe to yourself? We're going back to Powering Through. Sister Bliss, what powers you through? Is there a particular track? Well, in terms of Powering Through, I think Leftfield's Open Up is a big one because it was a real anarchic record.

It's exciting. It's dangerous. It's punky. It was a collaboration with John Lydon, which feels like a really unlikely marriage. But I actually prefer to listen to more mellow music because I listen to banging music all day long. So, you know, give me some Joni Mitchell any day. I love that. I love that. The contrast. Sister Bliss, what a pleasure to talk to you. Thank you so much. I will go back to my ritual

tomorrow and know that we've had this conversation. It'll feel a little like a dream and perhaps I'll even think about the sleeping side of this with music as well Professor Lauren Stewart just final word from you is there a song for you that powers you on or a particular tempo that you're drawn to well at the moment I'm liking getting out into nature and I'm listening to spell songs which is a lovely album of a collaboration involving the kora which I particularly am drawn to and it's an album all about nature and the natural world. So I get out into the marshes and appreciate the natural world. I am making a list here.

I'm writing everything down. This is good news you can use. And we'll add to the various playlists I've got going on. Thank you both to you for your expertise. Professor Lauren Stewart from Goldsmiths and of course, Sister Bliss. And again, memories. That's a lot of what you're also getting in touch with, what music provides with regards to memories.

Saoirse says, I totally love Faithless. They've given me some of the best memories with my mum throughout my childhood. I've had insomnia as my ringtone for eight years as a way of bringing light and beauty into my everyday. It never gets old. Now, the second and final report in what's being called, and I mentioned this right at the start of the programme, you will have heard it throughout the day in news bulletins,, has examined nearly 9,000 maternity cases in which mothers and babies may have been harmed or died over almost 20 years. Speaking in the last hour, let's have a listen to what she had to say.

We now know that this is a trust that failed to investigate, failed to learn and failed to improve. This resulted in tragedies and life-changing incidents for so many of our families. a phedmaethu i wella. Mae hyn wedi canfod tragediaid a chynnyddion byw-eang i'n holl teuluoedd. Mae ein tîm wedi adolygu pob cas clinigol. Yn lle mae gennym ddiddordeb da, rydym wedi dweud hynny yn y adroddiad. Ond mae fy nghymorth adolygu yn ymwneud

â nifer o achosion sy'n cael eu cyrraedd i gadegau 2 a 3. Mae'r achosion hyn yn cael eu cyrraedd fel gadegau sylweddol, gadeg 2, neu angenion mawr, gadeg 3, yn y gofal maternol. Mae llawer o blant wedi'u ddweud wrthym eu bod yn ceisio cyhoeddi angenau, ond nid oedd yn cael eu gwrando. Yn ystod y tro, drwy'r hynod o gyflawniadau o Rhiannon Davies a Richard Stanton, a Caley a Colin Griffiths, ar ôl y diwydiannau eu gilydd, Kate a Pippa, Kate yn 2009 ac yna Pippa yn 2016, mae'r ysgrifennu cymharol wedi cymryd lle. Mae'r gwylltau o'r teuluoedd yn cael eu clywed. Mae'r tîm adolygu yn benodol o ran y llai o'r trwstynol yn ymlaen yn y trws,

yn ogystal â'r llai o'r onestiaeth a'r trwstynol wedi'i dangos i'r teuluoedd. Mae hyn yn fwy o bwysig pan fydd yn glir bod materion mawr o ran diogelu yn amlwg yn unedau ar gy yn ystod y cyfnod oedd Fortunately, these cases were not isolated incidents. And through the time span of our review, we have found repeated errors in care, which led to injury to either mothers or their babies. Listening to that, the BBC East Midlands health correspondent, Rob Sissons. Rob, could you just very briefly, before we reflect on that, remind our listeners of the history of what happened to spark this review the history goes back a long way it goes back a long way Emma nice to talk to you and awful to have to relay some of this terrible information but it goes back 20 years this review to a period when caesarean sections were trying to be brought down, the numbers of them. And this trust managed to do that and was lauded for it.

But with some catastrophic results in some cases. There were children brain damaged, babies brain damaged that otherwise might not have been if they'd have had a caesarean, it's reasonably thought. And over 20 years, these cases kept on coming. Babies kept dying. Babies kept being injured. Ac ar ôl 20 mlynedd, fe ddaeth y cân yma. Roedd y bobl yn parhau i ddwyddo, roedd y bobl yn parhau i gael ei anafu, ond nid oedd y Trws yn cael ei herio o fewn, neu os oedd, nid oedd hynny'n llwyr. Roedd yna gymysg o gofnod ymlaen y staff. Roedd yna hefyd anafu i ymchwil yn iawn pan ddechreuodd ymchwil. Roedd y Trws yn ymchwil ei hun mewn ffyrdd sy'n wahanol i rai o'r rhain o'r NHS, Emma.

Ac mae'n sydynol y ffaith bod yna ddwy teuluoedd, wedi cael trawmat o'u rhain yn ysgol, i gyd-degedu a gwneud y ddegu eu hunain, pan oedd ganddyn nhw'r holl ddychmygu emosiynol o ddelio â'u llwyr mawr, themselves when they got all the emotional upheaval of dealing with their huge loss, they set about trying to get this inquiry going. And finally, in 2017, the then Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt got the ball going. So it's a long history, lots of strands to this, lots for your programme to talk about. And the conclusions today with the final unveiling, what are the key ones and how have the Trust responded? The Trust have apologised, but for many of the families,

that apology, which was given a while ago now, is a long time coming. For a long time, they didn't investigate some of the deaths. And the scale of this, you 201 babies who died who would probably have lived have they had more appropriate care on top of that 65 incidents of babies born with cerebral palsy 29 with severe brain injury and nine women died as well who might reasonably have been expected to have survived if they'd have had the right care i mean no wonder this is ac mae'n debyg bod gan bobl ddwy wlad yn cael eu gorfod, os oedd ganddynt y gofal cywir. Nid ydy'n fwriadol bod hyn yn cael ei ddisgrifio fel'r peiriant gorau mewn hanes maternol. Mae'ch rhaglen chi wedi cynnwys eraill ar gyfer ystod y blynyddoedd,

ar y sgail mwyaf, ond mae'n siocen yn eu hunain, shocking in their own right at other places, Morecambe Bay and a trust in London as well, there was, Northwich Park, I think it is, or Northwick Park. Northwick Park. And I was just going to say, responding to the publication of the final report, Louise Barnett, the Chief Executive at the Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust,

has said, today's report is deeply distressing. We offer our wholehearted apologies for the pain and distress caused by failings, our failings as a trust. We have a duty to ensure that the care we provide is safe, effective, high quality and delivered always with the needs

and choices of women and families at its heart. Thanks to the hard work and commitment of my colleagues, we have delivered all of the actions we were asked to lead on following the first, because this was the final report today, first Ockenden report. And we owe it to those families we failed and those we care for today

and in the future to continue to make improvements so we are delivering the best possible care for the communities that we serve. That's a key part in here. You know, people, of course, right now in the area, in that area, preparing to have families, women who are pregnant. And the faith that, right now in the area, in that area, preparing to have families, women who are pregnant. And the faith that they have is in some ways must be very difficult at the moment with this final report coming out, Rob, as the East Midlands Health Correspondent.

And I don't think Donna Ockenden was able to totally reassure people. She said they were still getting, up until very recently, new reports of more recent cases which echoed the themes of some of the problems they've uncovered earlier. And she also said that the concerns over safety in maternity units extend way beyond here. And that there is a need for women to be listened to more. There is a need for much more oversight when things go wrong and meaningful investigations. More money is being put in by the government into maternity across England, but Donna Ockenden says it's not enough. Much more is needed.

Very sorry to interrupt, but we're going to have to leave it there. And on that point, the chief executive of the Royal College of Midwives has also mentioned that it is worrying in light of a shortage of 2,000 midwives at the moment. Much more to discuss. 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. Hi. Yeah, you. Hello you hello hi don't go away i've got a quick couple of

questions for you if you don't mind so how much do you think you really know about the menstrual cycle beyond the period bit did you know par exemplar that the hormone oestrogen makes you smell better or that your hormones change the way your brain works hour by hour. And that you could even biohack them to maybe, I don't know, bag a job or run a PB. No, that's not surprising, you're not alone there. The mysterious workings of the womb have been a dark secret for centuries. The ancient Greeks thought the womb was the mischievous moving creature that wreaked havoc on the body. And the Victorians, well, they thought that if you examined a woman's vagina, she would devour you in a mad fit of sexual rage.

As you can see, we are really on the back foot here. All of us. I'm India Rackson. And when I found out about the amazing things that happen in our wombs and brains through the cycle, my mind was so blown that we got to work making this podcast. 28-ish Days Later for BBC Radio 4. 28 episodes, each charting every day of the very approximate 28-day cycle.

It looks at the science of our bodies and the way that we've been treated through history and discovers how understanding our cycle can change our lives. Fancy striding back into your powerful menstruating self? Me too. And you can listen to 28-ish Days Later now on BBC Sounds. 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. Available now.