Woman's Hour - Takeover 2019 - Dany Cotton, Commissioner of the London Fire Brigade

Episode Date: July 26, 2019

Dany Cotton says, 'I was thrilled to take part in this year’s Takeover and talk about topics I’m passionate about - I have managed to include something tasty, something fluffy and something serious! I will be explaining to the listeners the benefits of therapy dogs and why I will be getting one for London Fire Brigade. I also wanted to talk about an issue I have seen throughout my 32 year career – mental health and how it can affect first responders. I love cooking and I’m sure I was a mouse in a previous life, so I will also be talking about the looming Halloumi shortage.'

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. Hi, this is Jane Garvey and this is the Woman's Hour podcast from Friday the 26th of July 2019. It's day five of the Woman's Hour takeover. We've had some fabulous guest editors during the course of the week. Nadia Hussain on Monday, the campaigning lawyer, Harriet Wistrich on Tuesday, Amica George, the teenage campaigner on Wednesday.

Yesterday it was the turn of Cressida Cowell, the new Children's Laureate. All those programmes, if you missed any of them, are available in podcast form via BBC Sounds. So there's additional content provided for you every day. Today, it's the turn of the Commissioner of the London Fire Brigade, Danny Cotton. The first woman, of course, to get that job. I asked her what things were like when she joined the fire service back in 1988. So in London, there were 30 women out of 9,000 firefighters in London, so very few and far between.

And the welcome to you, was it warm? Mixed. Some people definitely didn't want to work with a woman because they thought we weren't up to the job and were generally quite suspicious. And other guys were ready to kind of give it a go and see how we got on. And your family, you're not from... Well, I imagined, I don't know where I got this from, that maybe your parents were in the forces or something like that? No, not at all. So my grandfather was a police officer but my father worked as a sort of computer professional

and my mother taught English as a foreign language, so nothing at all in the family. And actually, because of your mum's connections to people from overseas we're going to talk later in this in this programme about your love of cheese and I wonder people will think well what we are getting here well what we're getting here is a real idea of who you are as a person and your mum taught English so the people she taught used to come around to your house. Yeah so at the end of she taught used to come around to your house. Yeah so at the end of every year they'd come around and bring their national dish be that from wherever they were from so we had the most amazing food when we were growing up

literally tried anything from the most fantastic pistachios from Iran to dried sheets of apricot and just so my school lunchbox was the most interesting lunchbox anywhere in the school just people would look in amazement as I opened it every day and see what was in there. And are people going to be surprised by the things you're interested in in this programme, do you think? I think people that know me will know that food had to feature somewhere because I'm definitely very fond of my food and cheese is one of my favourite things. I was a mouse in a previous life, I'm pretty sure. And I love all animals.

So there's, you know, the aspect of talking about dogs won't come as much of a surprise. And to those who know me at work, you know, mental health is something that's so very dear to my heart. Well, we'll move on to talk about mental health. I'm also going to be in the company of Crumble, who is a therapy dog. And I'm told we'll be on her very best behaviour. She was certainly perky when I met her about half an hour ago, so very much looking forward to having her in the studio. And yes, we are going to cook with halloumi cheese

towards the end of Women's Hour today. But that was quite an insight, actually, just that nugget that when Danny Cotton joined the fire service in 1988, there were 9,000 men, 30 women. Things have changed. Now, of course, Danny Cotton will be forever linked to the Grenfell Tower fire two years ago, in which 72 people died.

The public inquiry is ongoing, of course. The Fire Brigades Union has criticised the shameful rate at which potentially lethal cladding is being removed from Britain's tower blocks. And last week, an all-party parliamentary committee called on the government to recognise the need for urgency in this particular area. Well, we'll hear much more about Danny Cotton's experience at Grenfell in a moment. First, here she is on why she was attracted to this really tough job in the first place. So I was 18 when I applied to join and it was based on the fact I knew I wanted

to do a job that was practical, I liked teamwork and I really liked challenge and variety and the fire service just seemed the ideal opportunity for me. I suppose I was quite a naive 18 year old, I didn't consider that people wouldn't think of women as firefighters, I just thought it looked like a great job. I learned quite quickly that it was going to be a challenge in a lot of ways. But I think because I attended the large scale Clapham train crash really early on in my career and just got on with it and did my job, then the view of my watch changed. And I think they thought, well, she did all right there, so she must be OK. Yeah. Tell me about that day. I can't, to my shame, I can't remember what time of day. Was it first thing in the morning? Yeah, first thing in the morning. So it was commuter trains coming into London full of people just before Christmas.

And, you know, I think the shocking thing was the reality of seeing things like loads of Christmas cards strewn everywhere because people were writing them on the train. And I think the impact for just seeing the shock of so many people involved, because, you know, tragedy, you know, 35 people lost their lives, but so many more people injured and so many more people were just wandering around in complete shock not knowing what to do with themselves you saw things that day that you had never seen before obviously how could how could you have dreamt that you'd be at something like that what was the impact of seeing

because without i mean there were bodies strewn all over all over the tracks weren't there yes and I suppose I'd never really considered how I'd feel about it and the first moment I realised I was going to see them I did have a slight pause and think gosh how am I going to feel about this but because you're in uniform and because people are looking at you and they want you to help them you just get on with it and it's like wearing a kind of suit of armour for me and my training kicked in I was there with my watch and I just got on and did it all and I suppose it's something that I've been lucky hasn't really impacted on me but I will never forget the details of that day and it did make me I think a stronger person because having that so early in my career

it made me realize I could pretty much face most challenges. Now, if something of that terrible nature happens, it is, I'm sure it's mandatory for there to be counselling at least offered to everyone who was there. What happened to you then? So we didn't have a counselling team at the time, the concept hadn't really been thought of. So all we did was we went back to work and we sat around the mess table and we had a chat about what had happened and sort of debriefed each other and that was as far as it went so very very different to the situation we face now where we offer counselling to everybody and we follow up on that support. And do you see any differences at all in the way women and men approach these situations? I think that we are very different in the way we solve challenges, we're quite different in the way we communicate, which is why when we have mixed teams of people, they are just able to solve the greatest problems, deal with people and process situations in a very different way.

Let's get on to Grenfell. It was the single, obviously the single worst incident involving fire of any of our lifetimes. Yeah, I mean, absolutely. It's the, you know, it's the most shocking, the most horrific thing that any of us have ever faced in the UK Fire Service. And, you know, not a day will go by where I don't think of the loss of life and the terrible situation that the people who live in that tower have been put in. Obviously, the public inquiry is happening. The first phase is now over. And you gave evidence. What was that experience like for you? I think for me, the main part of it was I wanted to contribute fully to it because what I want is for us all to learn lessons. I don't ever want any community to be faced with the tragedy that Grenfell community were faced with and I don't want any fire service to ever have to deal with a situation like that again.

So it was an extremely draining process. It was very intense because you just want to focus on giving the best answers you can to help the process and to ensure that we find out exactly what happened and identify what lessons there are to learn. And there is a possibility, of course, that many of the authorities involved in the events of that night, including the fire service, will find themselves uh well in the wrong um there will be perhaps questions more questions to be faced in the future about what went on that night and particularly about the education that the fire service has had in terms of the way the fire might have spread or could have spread in a block of flats with that kind of cladding

i think you know there isn't a single person who's been involved in that building where there won't be lessons to be learnt fundamentally that cladding should never have been on that building the fire should never have been allowed to spread in that way because the design of that building should have made that each person was safe in their compartment for up to 60 minutes which gives the fire service time to go in and rescue them that's what should happen in any building. So for a building to behave like that should not have occurred. And for us, you know, we will always look at what happened that night.

There'll always be new technologies. For instance, since then, we've developed the smoke evacuation hoods, which mean that when there's a fire situation, we can go up and we can give members of the public a hood to allow them to pass through the smoke and breathe safely. So there's always new things that we can go up and we can give members of the public a hood to allow them to pass through the smoke and breathe safely. So there's always new things that we can adapt to. But I think the main lessons to be learned are the fact that the buildings should be safe for people to live in

and should never be put in that kind of situation. Because the other thing is Grenfell had a very narrow staircase. And if people start mass evacuating down those staircases, A, there's a very likelihood of congestion, someone tripping and falling. B, it means we can't get in with our firefighting equipment to put the fire out. So the building is designed that people should be able to stay safe in their buildings and a fire should never be able to spread up the outside of the building and into those compartments in that manner.

Can you tell us a bit about how, just tell me actually about the hours and days after that. How the hell did you come home and what did you do when you came home? I suppose the natural reaction would just be stick the kettle on. I can't think of anything else. No, so the first day I was there for over 15 hours and the second day I was there for 12 hours. I think you come home, spend a very short time, have something to eat, try and get some rest and go back because you're dealing with the immediate aftermath and that was very complicated but the time after that, the days and weeks that proceeded after that our main concern was about then trying to identify whether this could happen again

and the horror of finding out all those high-rise buildings had that cladding on and I think the thing that I find shocking is that so many of them still have and that people have not acted quick enough to remove that. And so many families are still living in potential death traps in London. And of course, we were promised by the government that this would not be allowed to happen. So are you, well, you are disappointed by the speed of the government response? I'm more than disappointed. I'm horrified. I'm horrified that the government have not reacted quicker. I'm horrified there has not been more pressure put on

for this cladding to be removed, not more support given to the people who own the buildings. And fundamentally, I'm really deeply upset by the fact that all the advice that we've given in the past on campaigning about things like sprinklers in buildings has fundamentally been ignored. Because we know that things like, fire detection and automatic fire suppression like sprinklers definitely save lives and make a difference and yet we recommend it time and time again and people who build buildings choose to ignore us. The developers ignore it? Yes. Because it's expensive? Well it's not expensive at the cost of a new build in something like a school it's the same as the price of carp new build in something like a school. It's

the same as the price of carpets. It's about 5% of the cost. And yet the rebuild cost, if you have a fire and the devastation to people and communities, you know, is priceless. Danny Cotton. Well, Danny wanted us to talk on the programme today about supporting the mental health of first responders, the people who go in and see things that the rest of us will never see and would never want to see. And of course, we need to emphasise that Danny, at just 18, was at the Clapham rail crash

in which 35 people lost their lives, hundreds of people were hurt. I asked her genuinely, what impact did that have on her? Clapham, I had no after effect from Clapham. I had no lasting effects whatsoever. I just got on and carried on doing my job, which I think probably now in hindsight might just have been luck or it might just have been because I was so young and inexperienced

that it didn't have the same impact. Grenfell was different. Grenfell was massively different. And I think part of the reason that I felt so deeply after Grenfell was the level of responsibility, you know, being there, being over-responsible on the scene, being responsible for my firefighters who were risking their lives. And, you know, I was without a shadow of a doubt convinced that one of my firefighters could possibly die in their extreme efforts to go and rescue people. And then knowing all those people were in there,

the feeling that builds up inside you, I've never experienced that level of responsibility feeling before. Were you diagnosed with PTSD? So I've never been to a proper clinical diagnosis, but my counsellor says I exhibit all of the symptoms of PTSD. And were you signed off sick or did you spend time at home? No, not at all. There was too much to do. I think that, you know, in my job, there is so much to carry on with,

there's so much to get on with, that I didn't allow myself the time to, you know, sit and think about myself. It was far more about concentrating on my crews, my firefighters and our response to the situation. And then the learning we've taken from that. So you are really keen to acknowledge that back in the day, it was probably almost impossible for male firefighters to say you know what I had to carry a child's body out of a house and I'm shattered and I need help. Did you ever hear anything like that back in the 80s or 90s? No not at all I think that there was a very much more of a kind of macho stiff upper lip environment where people were just not ever encouraged to you know talk about that um i

think they'd go back to the watch and talk about things people go home and internalize it for definite especially if you know it was a young child people with children you know they'd think about that situation for themselves but very rarely would there ever been a conversation about how that made you feel and what do you think has changed now is it that the men have changed or is it that we have changed as a society? I think there's a mixture. But I know from my own experience with London Fire Brigade that had I not been as open and honest in talking to my firefighters

about my own experience, about my own counselling, I directly had a number of my officers come and talk to me and say, if you hadn't been open, we would never have gone for counselling. We would never have admitted to ourselves. And I had one guy who was literally broken. He came in and he said, I can't do this, I need help. And I said, you need to go and talk to somebody. But they genuinely just wouldn't have done it

if I, as the leader of the organisation, hadn't been as open and honest. For some people like me, when you suffer a major shock like that, what I had was lapses in my memory, huge lapses. Your brain just fires pieces of information to different areas. So it's like going to look for your socks, which should be in your sock drawer, but you filed them in the fridge. So you're never going to find them because you're never going to look in the fridge for your socks. Since Grenfell, we've seen a thousand members of staff through our counselling services that have had some sort of impact to do with Grenfell.

And for some people, it has been about a cumulative number of events they've attended and Grenfell was just the sort of final straw for them. In terms of mental health provision then in the fire service, what would your ideal be? I think it's a range of options. So people respond in different ways. So some people want to talk to somebody who's got nothing to do with the fire service. Some people want to speak to somebody who understands, who's in the fire service. Other people like peer-to-peer support. So what we're trying to set up is a range of options so that people can choose what suits them. Danny Cotton, who's the guest editor of this edition of Woman's Hour. Dr John Green is head of the Grenfell Tower Mental Health Response Team.

Good morning to you, John. Good morning. And also here, Jill Scott-Moore, who's CEO of Police Care UK, which is a charity for serving and former police officers. So much to unpick there. But can we just go back, John, first of all, to the idea that an 18-year-old Danny Cotton could get through the horrific events of the Clapham rail disaster, but not be able to cope entirely, and I'm not in any way criticising her, with what happened at Grenfell. Is it simply that younger people process these things better? I don't think so.

There may be, it may in her case, perhaps so, but it's not a general rule. I think she picks out two things. One is cumulative, there's a cumulative impact. And the other is, so that's very much the case in many of the blue light services. It's not just the incident that they're at, it's the ones before and the ones after. So that is one element. The other thing is the relationship that you have with the incident. So she spoke about the responsibility that she felt. And that put her in a different position from the position she was in

with the rail crash. What about the way things have changed? In 1988, she says there was no help beyond the help that firefighters could offer each other. That was the way things were done, or not done, wasn't it? Yes, I mean, I had a long relationship with major incidents. I co-coordinated the response to the Labrador Grove rail crash in 1999. And so I've also followed a lot of the other incidents. And it's been a gradually changing programme, gradually improving programme, the way that we respond to these incidents. And I think there's a greater recognition of what needs to be done and the best way to do that.

I don't think we're all the way there yet, but we are certainly going in the right direction. How many people are you still helping around what happened at Grenfell? Are we talking about Blue Light specifically? I think we're over, we've certainly seen over 200 people from various first responder services. We're particularly closely working with the Metropolitan Police. We've got a big programme with them. And we've got a commitment. We're underway at the moment with a commitment

to increase those numbers. And we also take people from the firefighters and from the ambulance services. But we take a range of other people, including, of course, local community survivors and so on as well and there are a lot of organisations impacted so we've got a very big programme but we are very intent, have been from the outset, working with the emergency services to make sure their staff get the services they need

and as I say we're midway through quite a big programme with EMET and talking to firefighters and the other services. Jill, Dani is passionate about the mental health of first responders and, of course, of her team, the firefighters. In your experience, is it harder for men to admit to a feeling of inadequacy around events like this? Good morning, Jane. I think that it's difficult to say, in all honesty. I mean, certainly we see as a charity just as many women coming forward as men. I think that perhaps how they're affected by those incidents

varies slightly between men and women. Certainly we see more complex post-traumatic stress within women, which is the type of PTSD that develops with that cumulative impact that we talked about. In relation to Dani, Dani says that she has been told she has all the symptoms of PTSD. She hasn't had an official diagnosis. What would you say about that? I think that's very common. I think that many people, certainly that we see within the police service and research that we've done with the University of Cambridge, would suggest that there is a reluctance for people to come forward for a diagnosis or to recognise the symptoms in themselves. Well,

what impact would a diagnosis of PTSD have on you? Well, within policing, you need to declare that diagnosis. So let's be honest, it might hold you back? Potentially. And certainly that's the perception that exists within the service. Whether in reality that would impact, difficult to tell, but certainly that's what people tell us. But if you do have PTSD, and whether or not you have an official diagnosis,

does that actually have any implications for the way you might handle a challenge of this nature in the future or don't we know? I don't think we know I mean I think that people that display the symptoms of PTSD you know many of them will avoid situations that act as triggers to them so that can impact on their sort of operational activity, potentially. John, what would you say about that? I'd say that, first of all, on the diagnosis, the actual words of the diagnosis

matter much less than the symptoms that someone's got and how you treat them. That's the critical issue. And so the first point. I think the second point is that many people function very, very well with post-traumatic stress disorder. They just struggle. It's very unpleasant. And post-traumatic stress disorder is just one point on a continuum.

There are lots of people who don't meet the full diagnostic criteria who've still got lots of problems and who we are going to treat in exactly the same way as if they got PTSD. It's a rather artificial point on a line. So I'm much less concerned with that than I am concerned with helping people who've developed problems as a result of... What would your assessment be of someone who said, for example, they had been involved with Grenfell and they were fine? They really were fine? Yeah, I mean, it's perfectly true that we do get people... You can't predict in advance

who's going to develop post-traumatic stress disorder. Trauma spectrum disorders is a better way of putting it, a response, a negative mental health response. You can't predict. We've no way of predicting. We don't know why some people do and some people don't. We know that past experience is important. It can be part of a long chain of trauma. We know that your relationship to the event and what you think about it matter.

But there's so much that we don't know. And some people develop a problem and others don't. Or actually, it's not quite that. Most people have a very bad response initially. That's very common. Some people, it recovers spontaneously or maybe just with a little chat with friends or whatever it might be. I don't mean to be dismissive in that.

I think it's very important. But we don't know. But there is that interaction going on. We're not sure why some people it sticks and other people it does pass off, at least partly. Yes. And with Grenfell, it was a community incident involving a settled bunch of folk in that part of West London.

Something like a rail accident can involve people from any number of different places all happen by pure fluke to be in that incident. Is that more challenging in a way? Yes. So rail crashes and terrorist incidents are often dispersed because people don't know each other and they go back to their home widely dispersed. But this sort of centred event, it's important because you get ripples out. Everybody knows someone in the tower who lived in the tower. And so it's got a big impact on the community. I think we've seen that in the reaction of the local community, how distressed they are by what's happened.

Of course. And people like me go past the tower on the tube most days of the week i mean it's there it's a constant reminder so what it's like to have a personal connection to it i honestly cannot imagine let very briefly from you both actually we are making progress here aren't we because as danny said in that interview in 1988 they just went back and put a brew on after what they'd seen at Clapham. Nobody would expect anyone, Jill, to put up with that now. No, absolutely not. I mean, I think that there's a huge amount of work that's been going on around stigma to get people to start to talk about it, to come forward.

But there's still a huge amount of work to do around actually providing the treatment that people need and the support they need when they need it. And, John, speak up if you can. If you've been through something like this, even if it was 40, 50, 60 years ago, you can still get help. You can still get help, and you'll be very welcome to come forward to help. And remember that you can also be traumatised by everyday events. You can develop PTSD from everyday events. It's not just major incidents.

It's car crashes, deaths in the family, accidents, all sorts of things. So it is something you should seek treatment for. Thank you both very much. Really appreciate you giving up the time to be with us this morning. Thank you, John. And thank you, Jill, as well.

And if you'd like to see a video of Danny Cotton, there is one up now on the Woman's Hour website, bbc.co.uk slash Woman's Hour. And you can take part, of course. Give us your comments on social media, Twitter and Instagram. We're at BBC Woman's Hour and we love to hear from you, as you know.

Oh, and we should say, of course, Nadia Hussain is also up on the website with tips for how to switch off. And there's also an article on our website now from the author Cresta Cowell, who was in charge yesterday. She's rounding up her 10 children's books to read over this summer now you may if you've got very acute hearing have heard the noise of the therapy dog crumble who was waiting very relatively patiently outside to come in the studio because Danny Cotton has a real thing for

dogs and as she'll tell us later she's hoping to get one when she retires finally. But here is Danny on why she's so keen on therapy dogs. So when I was in America last year, I met a therapy dog that works on a fire station. There's someone trained on each shift to look after the dog. But its pure sort of purpose in being there is to bring joy and pleasure to people. So it's literally for petting and cuddling. Yeah. So when they've come back from a stressful call or things going on, the dog just bounds around because the dog has no idea.

And he's just lovely the whole time. And he's very well trained. So he never goes anywhere near the fire engines. He doesn't go in the kitchen. And when their call bell goes off, he goes and puts himself in his cage to be shut in. And I was so impressed with the idea. And, you know, having that link to animals myself and seeing how much difference they make,

I want to explore it, not only for my firefighters, but for loads of the community engagement work we do. So we do a lot of work with young people, with troubled people, with older people, with people with mental health issues. And, you know, we had a really great example. So one of my fire dogs um is called simba and he is a very excitable spaniel and he was at the scene of a fire doing some investigation and the

person who had the fire in the house was a pregnant woman who was completely devastated and was almost hysterical simba this very excitable spaniel went running up to her sat down just put his head in her lap and just sat there while she stroked him and she calmed down. And the handler could not have been more surprised. He said it brought him to tears. See, there we go. That's the power of dogs like Crumble. Is Crumble likely to make a noise? Would she bark toward her? Yeah, but we probably won't be able to shut her up.

We won't be able to get a word in any way afterwards. The heavy breathing, by the way, is not me. That is Crumble. Or me. That is Crumble. Or me. Or you. That is the voice of Liesel de la Fontaine, who is the proud owner of the Cocker Spaniel Crumble therapy dog in Liverpool, the co-founder of Therapy Dogs Nationwide,

Eileen Slattery. Hi, Eileen. Hello, good morning. Now, you're with Spartacus. I am, who's fast asleep. Because I was told that Spartacus the golden retriever could bark to order. He will. I will try and wake him up later on. Yeah, it's the least Spartacus could do.

Spartacus has been billed as the dog who can bark to order, so for Spartacus to have gone for a kip is completely unacceptable. Right, can any dog be a therapy dog, Liesl? Yes, so basically we are looking for the temperament of the dog over and above anything else. So we have big, small, furry, short-haired, anything. We're just looking for the temperament of the dog. Yeah, but not every dog is anything like the right temperament, surely, to be a decent therapy animal. No, completely. So it's really important.

I mean, we got into it because everybody believes that they have the best dog in the world. And probably everybody wants to share the best dog in the world with people. And maybe, you know, they are great around the kids at home, or they are great when they go and visit granny. But our therapy dogs get put into an awful lot of different situations. So they need to be able to be able to sort of like be cope, not just cope with, but to be happy and confident in these different situations um so it's really important while we do the temperament assessing eileen when did you start therapy dogs nationwide well therapy dogs nationwide's been going three and a half years um april fools day next year will be four years old it originally started with four of us there was eileen hodge and jJones and Mary Oliver MBE.

We all knew each other through various therapy work with dogs and we decided that we could do a charity which volunteers could be so much included because they're the integral part of what we're doing. And between the four of us us we started off the charity mountains of paperwork and each of us had a lovely different trait and was brilliant at the admin mary started and helped run the kennel club bark and read pause and, as we call it, programme, where we go into schools. And Eileen Hodge, she does everything just like me. We're the front of the charity.

So would you go into all sorts of different environments? What about prisons? I think you go into those, don't you? Yes, we have a trustee, Ruth Boyes, and she is head of our prison programme. Actually, we've just been asked to go into Dartmoor Prison in Dartmoor. Yeah, Devon. Yeah. So we're quite excited about that.

But we also go into police stations, would you believe? And I was contacted recently to go into some ambulance stations by the Northwest Ambulance Authority. So these front of people that are out there in these critical, dangerous situations, everyday panic, they also need help. And as Danny was saying about PTSD, people are suffering. Yeah, well they clearly are, we know that. What about the impact potentially on older people? Well, a lot of dementia people that we visit in nursing homes, they can recall stories and they actually will chat and tell you

that years ago they had a dog. I remember one lady telling me that she had a dog and it got lost and her father had to cycle 40 miles to pick the dog up from the local police station and she still remembers her father paying sixpence to get the dog back. You see isn't that? The fact that there was a dog there made her revisit that happy memory and happy place in her life. That's so important. We hear it so often.

Every volunteer that we have can recount half a dozen stories. Yeah. Have you ever felt that perhaps, and Crumble, by the way, is now darting around. Well, she can't actually leave your grasp, can she? No, she's on the lead, Liesl. But has she ever misbehaved on duty? Oh, yeah, frequently. Well, she can't actually leave your grasp, can she? No, she can't. Because she's on the lead, Liesl. But has she ever misbehaved on duty?

Oh, yeah, frequently. What does she do? No. So all joking aside, I mean, we're looking for dogs with good temperament, but we're also looking for dogs with good character as well. So quite often when we go into the hospital, they will take Crumble's working coat off in front of the children, and then they'll take a child's T-shirt off,

and then they'll listen to Crumble's chest off and then they'll listen to Crumble's chest and then they'll listen to the child's chest and it sort of starts to become a game. But yeah, she's then decided at some point she wants to become the doctor so she's trying to steal stethoscopes and various other things. Right. Dr. Crumble. I wouldn't be that reassured if I knew I was going to be treated by Dr. Crumble

although who doesn't like Crumble? She has a lovely bedside manner. Does she? Yeah, no, I can well believe it. Her Dr. Crumble, although who doesn't like Crumble? She has a lovely bedside manner. Does she? Yeah, no, I can well believe it. Her breath's a bit, can I say, maybe it's just the heat. It is the heat, yeah. Okay, right. Your previous dog was Muppet.

Yes. How did Muppet differ? So Muppet was a therapy dog more or less from day one. She was about a year old when she passed her assessment. Muppet was one of those dogs in her lifetime who was completely bomb-proof. So although we have lots of therapy dogs and many of them multitask,

so they will go into schools to help children with their reading or they will go into corporates to help with wellbeing and staff mental health days. Some of them will only just do a specific job, so they'll only go into residential homes or they'll only go into a prison.

Muppet was very versatile. She could turn her hand at anything. And she was very, very clued on as well. So even if we were busy visiting somebody else and she saw... If we were visiting a child and she saw a parent in the corner, she would make her way over to the... Because it's not just always about the children that we visit. The parents are stressed as well.

Of course. Oh, gosh, who wouldn't be in that situation? Well, thank you both very much. Love you to talk to you, Eileen. Take care of yourself. Eileen and Spartacus, who never did wake up, in our studio in Liverpool. Perhaps we'll get Spartacus on the podcast. We'll see if he's perked up by the time that rolls round. And thank you very much, Liesl.

Now, Crumble is going slightly more bonkers, possibly because there is halloumi being cooked in the other side of the studio. that rolls around and thank you very much Liesl. Now Crumble is going slightly more bonkers possibly because there is halloumi being cooked in the other side of the studio so we'll talk about halloumi cheese in a moment or two but Dani Cotton of course has worked very hard to challenge all the stereotypes about the fire service and in 2017 she ran a campaign called firefighting sexism to try and stop people using the word fireman. Why is that so important? For me, it is about the next generation. So people say, oh, people don't notice, but they absolutely do. We had a young girl called Esme whose mum contacted us recently.

She came home from nursery in floods of tears. And when her mum said, what's the matter? She said, well, I want to be a boy. And what's up? And she said, well, I want to be a firefighter and you have to be a boy. So the stereotype stuff does impact on people. So challenging some of that macho stereotype stuff is really important to me. Well, playing devil's advocate slightly, I'm five foot one and a half. Could I, and I'm fairly inadequate and puny,

could I, I'm not suggesting now, Danny, because I'm substantially older than you, could I have been a firefighter? Absolutely. No, I couldn't. I have been a firefighter? Absolutely. No, I couldn't. I have members of my staff who are five foot. Really? And I've had perfectly fantastic team members and great firefighters.

But what use would I be? So if everyone was six foot four and built like a brick wall, who'd crawl through the small gap? Who would be able to have a conversation with a small child trapped in a car? It's about teamwork and it's about us all bringing different skills. So absolutely, five-foot people are very welcome. We all pass the same fitness tests, we all pass the same entrance tests and we all train together as firefighters. So the best teams are made up from a wide variety of people. And actually, you make it, obviously it's a very compelling case

and I'm bound to go for it, but when people laugh at you getting angry about Fireman Sam, there are serious points at the heart of your objection to Fireman Sam. It matters. Yeah, and so just to clarify, the little chap himself, he's never done me any harm. I have nothing against him. I'd just like him to change his name. Or better still, he's served 32 years like me.

He can retire and he can let Penny or Ellie take over. Yeah, come on, Sam, do the decent thing. Now, Danny is passionate about halloumi cheese. Go on, I said to her. Sell it to me. What I like about halloumi, not least of all the fact it's squeaky cheese, it's the fact that, you know, you can cook it.

It stays as it is. It's great for barbecuing. But there is something about halloumi that is unique. And I think that it's one of those foods that's become really trendy. So it's like gin, isn't it? Everyone used to, there was gin, but nobody really drank gin in Mother's Ruin. those foods that's become really trendy. So it's like gin, isn't it? Everyone used to, there was gin, but nobody really drank gin.

Mother's ruin. And suddenly there's a million flavours. And halloumi has become very popular. So, you know, a supermarket suddenly starts stocking halloumi chips and there's a riot on their hands. Halloumi chips? Yeah, but the frozen ones. And people were just being restricted to three boxes, but there were people queuing outside when it opened to buy halloumi chips.

But my main concern now is there is a threat of a shortage of halloumi. So halloumi is only made in Cyprus. Is it really only made there? It's really only made in Cyprus. True halloumi is made in Cyprus. Oh, true halloumi. I'm being told they do make some in Britain. Yes, so they do.

But true halloumi comes from Cyprus. Britain imports 43% of that halloumi. But now, unfortunately, China have got in on the act. Oh, well, we've got no hope. We've got no hope. So there's likely to be a shortage because they just can't produce there aren't enough goats sheep and cows in cyprus to produce that level of milk to make halloumi so we import 12 000 tons of halloumi a year into britain that's how popular it is and you can get flavored halloumi halloumi

burgers but it is just something i'm fascinated by the fact something that was a relatively sort of not talked about food or maybe just vegetarians had is now so trendy and popular that it's running the risk of me not being able to get my halloumi for my barbecue because it's so popular. Do you remember your first halloumi, Danny? Yeah, I've eaten halloumi for years. And I think it was probably something to do with one of my mother's students coming around with it and just being fascinated by this cheese that you could put on the grill and didn't melt through was just such an amazing taste. But it's the texture and the squeak, isn't it? Yeah, there's something about the squeak. There really is.

So let's bring in Georgina Hayden, who is the author of a cookbook called Taverna. Georgina, welcome to the programme. Thank you for having me. Now, your connection to Cyprus is? Both my parents are from Cyprus. So we had a Cypriot restaurant for about 30 years. Okay so is it uniquely Cypriot? It is. I mean you get variations of it in the Middle East but in the Turkish side of Cyprus they call it Helim, in the

Greek side it's Halumi. Apparently it comes from Cyprus traditionally like from the olden days but it's a very very Cypriot product, very Cypriot. What are you making at the moment? So I've got a few things for you. I've got a goat's halloumi and a sheep's halloumi. One that's made in England, which we can't call halloumi. It's Anglum. And the Greek one I've actually bought away from Cyprus for you. I've made a halloumi cake called halloumobita, which is not sweet. It's actually savoury.

And I can bring it around to you. That's lovely. There you go. That's absolutely. I think we'll have to keep it. Perhaps crumble needs to be on our absolutely best behaviour. Yeah, apparently crumble's a lousy cheese. Oh, is she? Okay, right.

And that's my mother's recipe. And I've also made you a salad with, I've fried an entire block of halloumi. So, which I think people often think of it as slicing it, sandwiches, using it as a filling. But my favourite way, a bit like Danny was saying, it's so versatile, it's actually using the whole block, almost like a piece of meat in a way,

and frying it or grilling it whole, or even putting it on the barbecue whole, it is phenomenal. So I'm going like a piece of meat in a way and frying it or grilling it whole or even putting it on the barbecue whole it is phenomenal so I'm going to give you that to try as well and see what you think

did you say a whole block yeah look Georgina is this good for me Jane please don't eat the whole thing that's the only thing I would say but it is absolutely

phenomenal and it responds differently when you cook it whole it's less squeaky it's almost softer and it's absolutely delicious. I'm going to slice it up and you can try it.

And I've got it here with nectarines, honey, almonds. I do think halloumi, the sweet, salty combination, just works so well together. I love it with apricot jam. That's my personal favourite. Well, if you've been sweating cobs in Britain, as we all have actually over the last couple of days, you can make this because the recipe is on the Woman's Hour website

and pretend that you're in Cyprus. Oh absolutely. Maybe watching a sunset with a handsome partner of some description. No heteronormative assumptions made here. Whoever you like. Oh that looks absolutely delicious. Thank you very much. There you go. Okay lovely.

So this is a good combination. How did you discover that the nectarines and the halloumi go well together? So my family, we've always had halloumi and apricot jam sandwiches. And that was our thing growing up. And I can't, the combination, it works, doesn't it? It's so good. So I think just working in food now, I want to push that a bit further than just apricot jam and halloumi.

And I thought if we use the whole stone fruits and put them on the barbie. So I had a big barbecue the other day and it was the most popular dish. I just put loads of whole blocks of halloumi on scored them crisscross again treating it like a piece of meat in a way put on loads of stone fruit and then drizzled them with honey and and everyone just loved it you know Danny raised the well to halloumi fans that the frightening prospect that now the Chinese are into it the rest of us can forget it I mean it is a worry isn't it it is but interestingly we are making it over here. Obviously, it's not the same. You can't call it Halloween. And does it taste as though it's

British? Genuinely, it's I think it's delicious. It's really, really great. So there's two here. This one is English and that's sheep's. And then this one is from Cyprus. I bought it over my suitcase for you. Do you know what we're going to do? We're going to have a taste test in the Woman's Hour podcast.

We should. We definitely are. Right, thank you so much, Georgina. My pleasure. Thanks for having me. Recipe on the website. Let's hear a little bit more from Danny Cotton. She told me how she was going to cope when she does leave the job in the fire service next spring. The first two years is actually a longer time than most people serve, so it's a natural retirement age. It's very difficult, the prospect of leaving when this is happening. Yeah, it is. But also, I was going to ask how on earth you replace this job. natural retirement age. It's very difficult, the prospect of leaving when this is happening. Yeah, it is. But also, I was going to ask how on earth you replace this job? Yeah, well,

you're not sure how you're going to do it, are you? I'm going to get a life. So just the prospect of not getting up at half past four every morning, not having two phones with me on 24-7. You know, I'm never off duty. When I go on holiday, my phone's beside me the whole time. So just spending some time with my family, I don't get to see anywhere near enough of them. Just being able to go out and exercise when I want to and just regain my life a bit will be quite a change for me. You are easily the most famous representative of the fire service there has ever been, partly because you're simply not a man, do you get recognised a lot? Oh, constantly. I was just talking to some colleagues earlier saying that

I don't think I've ever been to an airport in the last three years where someone hasn't recognised me on public transport. And I think with that comes pressure because you think about what you're doing everywhere you go because people might be looking at you. But also there comes the great pride because I'm so proud of the job i do is there a dog in your future absolutely what are you going to get do you know um so i want something that's got spaniel in it because i love spaniels um but probably with some sort of poodle cross so it doesn't shed massively because i'm slightly allergic to fur which is like hindrance but um yeah so something like that

that's got the needs to go out on exercise a lot and, you know, is trainable and keeps me active and occupied. Danny Cotton, we wish her a very, very happy retirement when it rolls round next April. So many of you just have so much respect for her and indeed for her colleagues. Holly said, listening to Danny now with total empathy, Danny, you and all first responders are absolute heroes. Another listener says, my son lives in a tower block in Manchester. The building has dangerous cladding. The tenants have expressed their fears to the landlords and the owners.

Their answer is that if they want it changed, the tenants have to pay for it. They're refusing to do anything about it. And if tenants complain, it's simple. They're evicted. How are people being allowed to get away with this um that's appalling um i've no idea how they're getting away with it but perhaps we should try and investigate that uh langley says listening to danny cotton incredibly brave cannot believe

the government hasn't responded to recommendations by the fire service after Grenfell. What an absolute disgrace. From Jakey, for me, PTSD was like a dripping bucket over 20 years. The last drop filled the bucket and water spilt everywhere. Rescuers find it hard to admit they need to be rescued too. Thank you for that, Jakey. I hope things are getting slightly better for you. Anonymous listener says, I developed PTSD at the age of 17 after a very traumatic event where a close family friend who was in the police took their own life. We knew it was partly because of what he'd seen on the job and never talked about. I wish he had because now his PTSD has been passed on in a way. I found seeking treatment very difficult. People didn't take me seriously because I was, quotes, too young. I ended up seeking comfort in online communities where telling my story was easy and I felt accepted. From John, listening to Danny Cotton's edition of Woman's Hour this morning, there was so much plain speaking and downright common sense.

It was almost unreal, says John. From Claire, I agree with needing to get rid of the term fireman. It can sound quite a small thing, but Danny is right. Children do notice. My eight-year-old son turned around to me the other day and said, men are more important than women. It does matter because it does get noticed. From Vanessa, I've never emailed a radio programme

before whilst listening, but I had to express my appreciation of Danny Cotton's interview. What a tower of humanity, reason, combined with passion, strength and devotion to duty, she shows. Vanessa, how wonderful that that conversation with Danny inspired you to make contact with us. We do appreciate it. Thank you. And from Helen, a really inspiring woman, Danny. Her calmness is infectious. Her ability to describe her feelings during the horrific tragedy of Grenfell moved me to tears. She is a true leader.

I know it sounds ridiculous in the face of it to move on to discussing her loomy cheese. But as Danny said, she thought she might have been a mouse in another life because she was so keen on cheese um and georgina our cypriot cook expert cooking expert has provided me with the ultimate taste test which is what have i got in front of me here you have got a goat's halloumi from cyprus that i brought over from in my suitcase and probably shouldn't encourage that but yes i should yeah i should stop saying that. Actually, if I'm really honest, it was my grandmother that brought it over.

So we'll blame her. It's fine. The other one is an English halloumi maker. Now, I am going to just have them and I'm going to tell you which one I think is English. An English what? Go on. It's called Anglin. We can't call it halloumi. And that one is sheeps.

Very pronounced squeak on the cheese I've just had. Okay. Okay. I mean, in theory, they shouldn't be as squeaky as the ones that you buy in the supermarkets. I think that's the... Oh, I hadn't realised. You're going for minimum squeak, are we? Less squeak.

The ones that are mass produced and tend to be machine made and have cow's milk in them, I think you're less likely to be able to eat them uncooked, should I say. We eat them with watermelon just straight up. Okay, I think the first one was the sheep's cheese. Which one's the first one? This one?

This one. Oh, this one was your first one? Yeah. You think that one's sheep's? Okay. That one's goat's. Oh, this one was your first one? Yeah. You think that one's sheep? Okay. That one's goats. Brilliant. Sorry.

Which one did you prefer? I could make a case for both. Oh. Yeah. I'm not going to fall out with anyone. It's a hot Friday in July. What's the point? And I'm on holiday next week,

so I have no interest in falling out with anyone. No, absolutely fair enough. It is funny. So I thought a maximum squeak is what you went for. You're telling me, actually, purists So I thought a maximum squeak is what you went for. You're telling me, actually, purists would go for a minimal squeak. 100%, because it's the way they're handled

is what produces the squeak, in inverted commas. If it's overhandled and machine-made, you'll get more of a squeak, and it should be handled quite carefully. Now, let's bring in Spartacus in Liverpool, who's been asleep and has now woken up, Eileen, apparently. Can Spartacus bark at us? Get it?

I love that. I'm glad you appreciated it. Apparently not, though, is the answer. Eileen, are you there? Would you believe it? I know it's hot in Liverpool because my mum and dad have spared me no detail of this last week.

I'm not sure they got it next door. I know their faces. I was like, that was great. That was brilliant. They didn't, you know. Really? That was great. I think what we've established is

if my mum and dad's suffering is anything to go by, Liverpool has melted and is no longer in contact with the rest of Britain. So that's fine. Yeah, that was Crumble, who is, I think, just as good as Spartacus, actually, if not better. Can you give us an example, Liesl, of just an encounter with someone

where you really felt that somebody like Crumble or Muppet made a connection that no human could have made with someone? Yes, we visited a residential home and there was a lady who'd been in there for several weeks and had severe dementia, was very, very quiet, hardly interacted with staff, home and there was a lady who'd been in there for sort of like several weeks and um had a severe dementia was very very quiet hardly interacted with staff came across as quite grumpy and quite offish um and and really we didn't have any interaction went in with uh with crumble and asked her if you know she'd like to interact with the dog and her face just completely lit up and she was so animated and she was telling us stories about, you know, the farm that she used to grow up on and her uncle's sheepdogs and what they were called and what they used to do and how they used to herd.

And all of the staff were there as well. And they were frantically taking notes so that they then had something that they could interact with her later after we left. So they had a discussion tool. And it was very simple and it was only sort of like a probably a two or three minute conversation but it was it was it was amazing it was a complete transformation and then all of a sudden she'd obviously said her piece and that was it and she went straight back into herself again but for those three minutes she came completely and utterly alive it's such a cruel condition though isn't it because you have these wonderful moments where people do open up are able to and then for whatever reason as you say it it goes again yeah but just allowing them to retreat to somewhere safe and happy in their

experience it's got to be a positive surely yeah absolutely and i mean with it with any of the sort of like the therapy work that any of our volunteers do um we are all led by the you know sort of like the clients and the patients that we go and see so if all they want to do is interact and stroke a dog, that's absolutely fine. If they then want to dress them up or read to them or do anything else, it's all led by them. And if that makes them, whatever makes them feel better, then that's what we're there for.

And actually, you were saying earlier, Georgina, that you work for a charity. It's Contact the Elderly, isn't it? Which I'm aware of. It's a good charity. Yeah, it's wonderful. And they offer afternoon tea. Yeah, so you can be a host or a volunteer and once a month someone will host an afternoon tea

and it's for elderly people on their own and other volunteers will pick them up and bring them to your house and it's just a lovely tea party and it's a way of just combating that loneliness that you can have, that's sort of around really. So it's amazing. I love it, I love being a a host i love cooking for people and i love hearing people's stories so for me it's just a complete win-win and then i get to have all these wonderful people

my home and and you know hear what they have to say really and you've got a little little girl who's got a little yeah i've got a toddler she's very much a part of it she's very much part of it um her name is persephone and she throws a wobbler while the tea's on do you know what she well she hasn't let's touch wood but she so far she's uh she loves it i think she just likes having people around we've got quite a big greek family so she's quite used to it and they love her as well so it's really sweet and they take they take photos and it's nice to see like you know they're you know evolving the people and the baby and stuff so yeah and you try out your recipes do do you? I do, yes. I always do some classic things,

like I'll do egg mayonnaise sandwiches and cheese sandwiches, and then I'll throw a curveball, and I'll do something Greek like spanakopita or the halomobita, like a spinach feta pie. So nothing too crazy, but they'll be very vocal and tell you if they're not into it, which I quite like. I like honest opinions.

Growing up in the 70s, the kid with the egg sandwiches was the one you wanted to avoid i mean do you know what i mean the kid on the bus the school bus the smell everybody of my vintage will recognize the smell of a 70s egg body but you're more sophisticated egg mayonnaise sandwiches i'm sure they're delighted you love an egg mayonnaise is that bad well what's the secret to a good egg mayonnaise soft boiled eggs soft boiled eggs bit of salad cream

would do why I mean yeah my dad's salad cream I'm mayo sorry so many controversial

issues in the world Georgina thank you for being part of this thank you very much really appreciate it lovely to see you and crumble bye crumble

you gonna say goodbye oh is that it by the way thanks to the. You going to say goodbye? Oh. Is that it? By the way, thanks to the people who tweeted to say, cats can be comfort animals too. Yes, they can. Only I would just say, yeah, and crumble agrees, that dogs

are essentially better equipped. Tina Dehealy is in charge of Women's Hour on Monday. Have a very good weekend. I'm Sarah Trelevan, and for over a year, I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there who was faking pregnancies.

I started, like, warning everybody. Every doula that I know. It was fake. No pregnancy. And the deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth. How long has she been doing this? What does she have to gain from this? From CBC and the BBC World Service, The Con, Caitlin's Baby.

It's a long story, settle in. Available now.