Woman's Hour - Weekend Woman's Hour - Camila Batmanghelidjh, Surrogacy, Women in Jazz

Episode Date: February 27, 2021

In her first in-depth broadcast interview since winning the High Court disqualification case regarding the disbanded children's charity Kids Company, its founder, Camila Batmanghelidjh, explains why she fought so long and hard to be cleared.David Watkins is one of the first single men in the UK to have a surrogate baby after a law change in January 2019. David talks about becoming a father to baby Miles in July 2020. Faye Spreadbury, a married mother of two, explains what it was like to take on the role of surrogate.How important is empathy in leadership? Chef Angela Hartnett, and Belinda Parmar, CEO of the Empathy Business, discuss empathy and how business leaders can use it as a tool to manage staff emotions in the workplace.Charlotte Sibtain talks about her collection of more than 400 vintage wedding photos from charity shops, markets and the internet and her quest to track their owners.Novelist Julie Ma talks about her first book Happy Families which is centred around a Chinese takeaway, the Yau Sum in West Wales, and closely resembles the one she grew up in and now runs with her brother.BBC correspondent Mariko Oi explains Japan's Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) announcement that women will be invited to its all-male meetings: as long as they don't speak. Are women in the UK jazz scene facing discrimination and sexual harassment? Sarah Raine, an academic and anthropologist and Jas Kayser, who's a jazz drummer and musician, discuss gender equality in the music industry.Presenter: Anita Rani Producer: Paula McFarlane Editor: Siobhann Tighe

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Hello and welcome to the weekend edition of Woman's Hour. Oh, we've quite a show for you today. Standout moments from the week just gone. But if you'd like to catch up with every programme, you are more than welcome to listen to our podcast on BBC Sounds, like all the others. Come on, join the gang. It's a jazz thing today.

Academic and anthropologist Sarah Raine and jazz drummer Jazz Kayser discuss what it's like to be a female jazz drummer in a scene that's male-dominated. David Watkins talks about being one of the first single men in the UK to have a surrogate baby. Faye Spreadbury is a married mother of two. She joins him to describe what it was like to take on the role of surrogate. And we hear from chef Angela Hartnett and Belinda Palmer, CEO of the Empathy Business, on the importance of empathy in the workplace. Empathy is not a luxury. We have a mental health pandemic going on. You know, you've got to manage people's emotions.

People feel incredibly disconnected at work. We're seeing fear and anxiety with younger people who are living on their own, working on calls all day on their own. And Mariko Oi is Japanese and a BBC reporter in Singapore. She talks about the country's governing party's decision to invite women to attend key meetings as long as they don't speak. I'm not sure how that would work. Two weeks ago, Camilla Batmangelich, the founder and director of the disbanded charity Kids' Company, won a high court disqualification case.

Claims by the official receiver that Camilla Batmangelich and seven former trustees of the charity Kids' Company had failed to properly manage the charity in the final months of its existence were thrown out. Mrs Justice Falk said, if it had not been for the unfounded allegations, it is more likely than not that the restructure would have succeeded and the charity would have survived. The judge praised Batmanghelic for the enormous dedication she showed to vulnerable young people over many years and her achievements in building a charity that, until 2014,

was widely regarded as a highly successful one. Founded in 1996 a charity that, until 2014, was widely regarded as a highly successful one. Founded in 1996 in South London, Kids' Company provided practical, emotional and educational support to up to 36,000 deprived and vulnerable inner-city children and young people. Over 15 years, the charity received more than £40 million of public money. However, facing cash flow difficulties, a plan to restructure the organisation's finances had been agreed with David Cameron's government. But the charity closed its doors in 2015

after the Metropolitan Police launched an investigation into sexual assault allegations following the broadcast of a BBC Newsnight report. The police investigation concluded in 2016 after finding no evidence of criminality. In her first in-depth broadcast interview since that recent verdict, Camilla talks to Woman's Hour about her battle and about some of the powerful figures she alleges

led to her own personal vilification and the closure of her organisation. I personally think it was a smear campaign. And I think there were two targets. One is, I believe, David Cameron, because he was seen to have chosen us as a big society. And I think the Brexit team wanted to discredit him because I don't understand why Dominic Cummings, whom we've never met, was briefing

against us in 2015. And I think another bit is that we were campaigning for child protection issues. And I think the country has no capacity to address its child protection problems. So I believe there's a propensity to slightly silence charities when they campaign forcefully on an issue that the government doesn't have capacity to address. And I think we got sandwiched between these two concerns. And that's why there was such a ferocious attack on us. And I hope that we will be able to carry out sufficient investigations to reveal the sources of those attacks and what happened. There's a lot that you've just said there. And having done my research before coming to talk to you today, I am quite familiar with some of what you're saying there. Just to unpack the

first part of that, Dominic Cummings was working at the time as an advisor to Michael Gove, who was the education secretary. He, of course, is now a household name as he rose to become the most senior advisor to the current prime minister before he left in December. He, of course, working for the Vote Leave side, David Cameron working for the Remain side of things to remember those days, which in some ways seem a long time ago, but won't to you. You did become the poster woman in many ways for David Cameron's big society, again, to remind people. I just wonder, now we are all these years on and you have just had this verdict very recently. Has David Cameron been in touch with you? No. And by the way, I never chose to be part of a big society. I didn't actually agree with it because I don't think volunteers can work with highly troubled individuals.

It needs professionals. Would you like to hear from David Cameron after this verdict? Well, first of all, Samantha Cameron is phenomenal and completely genuine. And she visited Kids' Company. And I don't have anything but goodwill for them. My focus has been on trying to clear the name of Kids' Company for its staff and its children. I totally recognise that.

David Cameron is not someone that I've had to worry too much about. I ask because I just wonder if you felt, because you did get caught up politically, if you were owed an apology by anybody who's been running the country? I think Michael Gove was really disingenuous because I have a letter from him to someone saying that kids' company is an inspiration and the country should be proud of it. And this is 2014.

And Michael Gove was the person who gave me my CB in the Department of Education. And I took lots of children there to receive it because I felt it belonged to them. By 2015, he was saying he never wanted kids company funded, you know, and I find it very difficult when people change colors. So there were a number of politicians when the children were being chased by journalists and all their lives were being exposed in the media. single professional politician, not a single governing body, stood up and said, what is happening to these children is completely out of order. We have to stop it. And these are, I think, the problems that we need to consider moving forward. Who protects children in care when their own parents aren't there to protect them? And it should be the state. And no one from the state stepped up. Do you think Michael Gove,

who is now one of the most senior members of this government, with what you have just alleged, of course, he's not here to talk, but let's go with what you've just said. Do you think he owes those children an apology? Absolutely. And the staff. And you. Michael Gove.

And that includes you. Look. You were the head of it. I'm not trying to drag that out of you, but it's a fair conclusion. I can live without Michael Gove's apology. But the staff and the children are owed an apology from Michael Gove, Oliver Letwin, all these people who promised that they were going to help us resolve the fact that children were pouring in through our doors. And the reason I clashed with the Cabinet Office was because when I realised they're not taking responsibility in 2015, I asked them to bring in KPMG to review our database of children and families and to identify the cases that are the responsibility of the state. And they didn't want to do that.

Well, we will get a statement from the Cabinet Office with regards to that. Now you've brought it to our attention. Was Boris Johnson involved in any of this? Boris Johnson was very interesting, actually. When they tried to get him to say anything against us, he wouldn't. Because I think City Hall knew that we were well run because they'd been in and seen our programmes. So Boris did not trash Kids' Company. How much of your position, and I ask you this, especially because we're on Woman's Hour, how much do you think the fact that you are a woman,

that you are a woman who is big and looks different? Well, no, I was going to say, I wonder how much you thought that could have played a role in the way that you have been portrayed. I think it did play a role. Because if you look at the insults that were levelled at me during that period, you know, it was a foreigner go back to your country. It was I'm running Brussels. It was I'm an explosion in a Nigerian fabric factory. Then my size became a problem. You know, so all of there was incredible misogyny. And, you know, this attribution that because I dress colourfully, then I can't organise anything.

I mean, you have to think, you know, the organisation was vast and we kept the children safe. We had 500 trainees coming from social work courses, psychotherapy, NHS. They were all doing their placements with us. It was a proper organisation. They just didn't look like it could be run by someone who wore the kind of clothes I wear. The prejudice is incredible. And I think there is something about negating

intellect in women often. So I ended up being described as not qualified. You know, I've got lots of qualifications, but constantly they said, she doesn't have any qualifications, she doesn't have any qualification, you know. So there is a sort of minimising of intellect that went along with it. You can listen to the full 30-minute interview with Camilla Batmanghelic on BBC Sounds. Now, David Watkins is a 42-year-old teacher from Southampton and is one of the first single men

in the UK to have a surrogate baby after a law change in January 2019. Previously, only couples were able to apply for a parental order, which transfers parentage from the surrogate to the intended parents after the baby is born. With the help of surrogacy and egg donation, David became a father to baby Miles in July 2020. Faye Spreadbury is a married mother of two. She took on the role of surrogate. She explains why. A couple of years ago, I'd been a social worker for 10 years and I'd gone in people and I certainly wasn't fulfilled from that.

So I spoke to my husband and we discussed doing something a bit bigger to help someone. And we'd finished our family. I've got two boys. We didn't want to have any more and it was something that was quite uncomplicated for us so we joined an agency and became members of a surrogacy organization that help you meet people that want to be parents. I mean it's an incredible thing to to want to do and then to go through with doing. How have you found the process? Luckily, really smooth. You work out your

expenses first so that you're not out of pocket in any way. And I did that before meeting David. Then we got to view people's profiles within the agency. And I spotted David because he's a teacher and I'm a social worker and I thought you know he'd have same values as me but it turned out that he's also an artist he's a writer and my husband's a musician so we met at a surrogacy social and they clicked and my boys met him and then we asked my boys if they're happy for me to do it you know we um see them as our equals and we asked their permission and they were quite excited so we through the agency we made an offer to help David it's a it's an incredible moment for you David I imagine why did you want to to do this why did you want to become a solo dad as it were well I had the desire to be a father for pretty

much as far as back as I can remember And I certainly wanted to have a biological connection with my son, well, at that point, with my child. So, you know, I was never someone who really needed to be in a relationship to feel content or fulfilled. And I always knew this was kind of my desire and my desire alone. And it was just something that I knew I could go forward with on my own. But of course, at the time when I was researching it, I realised that single people couldn't sign parental orders and engage in a surrogacy that way. And so it was just a waiting game, really, until that law changed in 2019.

And then at that point, I joined Surrogacy UK and away I went. We should say you've got Miles, baby Miles, next to you, haven't you? Yeah, he's sitting next to me. Hello. If he can hear us, hello. It's nice to know he's there. I mean, everyone's with their kids a lot more now at home anyway, aren't they? But it's certainly a big commitment regardless, but to do on your own. I know you do have some support, don't you, from your parents.

Is that right? Yeah, my parents are there to help me out when I need it and to give me some respite. So I'm eternally grateful that they're in our lives. But it's tough. It's really tough to do it as a single parent and as a first-time parent as well, when you're just learning the ropes and learning as you go.

And I think, you know, 2020 was an incredibly difficult year to have a child and to bring up a baby during lockdown has been really hard. But we've got a lot of support from friends and family and we're doing well and he's thriving. And, you know, it's all because of Faye and her family. We just wouldn't be here. He's an absolute dream come true. What has it been like in terms of the response?

Because you have made headlines in terms of, you know, being one of the first to do this. And I wonder, has there been support? What sort of reactions have you had? I think there are men who have done it before me, but I think I'm probably more high profile just because, you know, I was the first single man in Surrogacy UK to do it. And in general, the support is fantastic. I've had lots of positivity. I've had no real criticism. I did a couple of articles in the press, and it was only through those that I started to see some negativity

and some of the comments, you know, a lot of toxicity out there around my what they term selfish needs to become a father and really to do it without a mother role as well. Did you engage with those people? Did you reply to, I presume there were comments? No, I mean, you always get told never to read these comments, but it's really difficult not to, of course. But no, I don't engage with that kind of criticism.

I think it's, you know, those people would never say that kind of thing to my face. It's not something that you would, you know, say in a meaningful one-to-one dialogue with somebody. I think they're just saying it because there's no consequences to those kind of comments online. But I think it does does i think solo men having children do scare people i think because it's we don't know how to reap that we're not familiar with the idea that a man can have a paternal desire so fierce that they would want to raise

a child without a woman so we don't really know how to deal with those kind of families at the moment you're right he just wants to make himself heard that's all i appreciate that from From a young age, we welcome that here on Woman's Hour. Let me go back to Faye at this point and you can have a little chat with Miles. Faye, in terms of your attachment to the baby, to Miles, were you nervous about that, being a surrogate for the first time? I had no doubt, really, that I was just looking after a friend's baby and I certainly had no doubt that I didn't want any more children and that I would feel maternal towards David's baby. But people did say things to me like, you know how do you feel giving your baby away and you that is what you're doing and unfortunately they just don't understand that you can carry someone else's child you know

for their happiness and it's momentary you know it's nine months it's for someone else's lifetime of happiness i think it's totally worth it. We should say it worked first time. Is that right? In terms of the embryo transfer? It was quite simple. It was quite straightforward because that side of it can also be complicated. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it's IVF, so the percentages of success aren't high. So we have been really lucky and the pregnancy wasn't complicated and Miles was born at my home and straight David was in the birthing pool with me and the midwife caught the baby and put him straight on David's chest and we relaxed there for a little bit while the cord emptied and then David was able to go home then, well, within six hours or so.

Wow. That was wonderful. David, what was that like for you? What are your memories of that? It was an incredible moment. I mean, I was sort of waiting for the indication from the midwife to get into the pool. And when she said, I think, you know, about time now.

So I popped in and sat there and supported Faye and you know what do I do and like being really nervous and then uh and then I gradually saw him coming out and his head crowning and here he came and my long sought after son that I've wanted for so many years and he just torpedoed out torpedoed out into the water and then it you know it then it just all went blank for me. I went into some deeper part of myself, and I was just away. When I held him, it was an indescribable feeling. I just never thought, as a single gay man,

I never thought this would be my future. I'd written it off a long time ago. So to actually be here with my son and have that and have him in my arms, it was, it's life changing and our lives have been totally turned around by it. After hearing that interview, Rob emailed the programme to say, a very uplifting article, and with a homosexual man, I may be an active church leader so homosexuality is not condoned in any form by my fellow believers,

but that's their problem I've decided these days. What a challenge that teacher has taken on. Somehow I can't help speculating he'll do a good job of being raised by his son. Dad always said the kids rear their parents. A wonderful take on an inspiring life for life on life's terms. Particularly like David's take on critical responses to any posts or articles. Now, how important is empathy in the workplace? And is it now an essential leadership tool?

A prominent member of the City of London's governing body and the former chairman of KPMG UK both faced a backlash recently when they, in effect, told their staff to stop moaning and feeling sorry for themselves during the pandemic. Here's a clip of what former chairman of KPMG UK Bill Michael said to his staff. Take as much influence of your own diary, of your own life, of whatever, because I have spoken to a lot of partners and people at all sorts of levels where it almost feels like this is being done to them. Well, you can't play the role of victim unless you're sick. So I hope you're not sick and you're not ill. Well, you can't play the role of victim unless you're sick.

So I hope you're not sick and you're not ill. And if you're not, take control of your life. Don't sit there and moan about it. Oh, he sounds a bit like my dad. Maybe my dad needs to take empathy lessons. He has since resigned. Michael, that is, not my dad. Is being a tough, plain-speaking leader no longer acceptable,

especially in the light of the pandemic? Should small business leaders make time to listen to staff and to offer empathy? Is the role of bosses to offer empathy? Angela Hartnett, MBE, chef patron of Murano and Cafe Murano restaurants, and Belinda Palmer, CEO of Empathy Business, spoke to Emma.

Angela explained how she defines empathy. It's being there for your staff or your teams really because one thing I've thought through this pandemic and listening to people, listening to your teams, listening to your friends, your family, I think people are going to be judged about how they treated their employees, their friends, their family, their neighbours in this pandemic and I think we've seen some fantastic examples about brilliant leadership, brilliant people, and then we've seen some very poor ones as well. But I think you've got to be able to, it's interesting when people have said to me, why don't you just open up? Why don't you just rebel against the government and open your

restaurant and break the law? And I sort of said, how do I look a member of my team in the eye and say, I want you to break the law, take the risk and then go and see your mum? You know, you can't. So I think, you know, you really have to look at yourself and look yourself in the mirror and say, have I done the right thing by my team? And I think that's critical in these times. Gordon Ramsay springs to mind when people think about leadership in kitchens. Of course, he's now not the only chef that will spring to mind, but he is on television rather a lot. Would you say his style fits into this? No, I wouldn't say so. And I think Gordon's way past that style. And I think most kitchens are. I think there's definitely an area for direct talking. I don't think you have to be necessarily softly, softly, if that's the right expression.

I think you have to be direct. You have to be honest and clear, but you don't have to be necessarily softly softly if that's the right expression I think you have to be direct you have to be honest and clear but you don't have to be aggressive you don't have to be harsh you don't have to be rude and swear but you know sometimes there's an energy in kitchens that you need to get a point across so you can sound rushed or hasty but it's a live environment isn't it live environment and I think when there's a deadline as I think there is in the news world in the tv world in you know I think that's when everyone you know you hear it in your voice you feel it in your body don't you like come on come on let's go you know we've got 50 customers come on come on but you don't have to put every expletive behind it to make that point and get that across to your team. Do you feel any of the way you were trained now when you were coming up has made you a better leader? Or do you

think you've had to unlearn some of the things that perhaps were in fashion then? I don't know about unlearn. I think it's more about you make your choices of how you want to be as a person. I don't particularly like getting overly stressed. I mean, I can do and I can have be energised and be direct and come on a driver team but i don't want to be on edge the whole time and also i'm very philosophical in the sense that you know and i may get shot down by a lot of chefs it is food let's be honest you know it's a carrot it's a piece of beef it's you know a donut you know we are giving people enjoyment and pleasure but we are not in the critical line of the nh or other jobs that I think are far more serious in that respect.

Belinda, to bring you into this, you go into businesses and you conduct an empathy audit. How do you measure that? So it's like a company doctor where we go into big companies and we look at their empathy deficits and empathy strengths. So things like their leadership style, how they communicate, even down to how they write emails and run meetings. And we tie that to business profits, because I think what Angela said is spot on. You know, empathy is not about being nice. It's not about bringing a dog to the Zoom call. It really is about understanding that more empathic companies make more money. And we know that? How do we know that? Well, I've done studies on it. There is data. It's correlation. It's not causation. But in an index that I ran, the top 10 companies outperformed the bottom that we determined is more empathic.

But when we look at things like sickness, so if you take a business and you look at the number of days people are sick, if you look at loyalty, how loyal people feel loyal to their boss and also trust. When you look at those measures and you correlate that, what we determine is more empathic. You find that more empathic companies have less stress, more happier and productive employees, but also less sickness days. And a sickness day, for example, it costs a business a lot of money. So these are really important things for business. What about those businesses listening who are thinking, I'm just trying to get by at the moment? You know, they would never hire somebody like you, no disrespect, because they just wouldn't have it in their budget or they would want to.

They think they're doing all right, but their back's against the wall, you know, at the moment. They can't even think about tomorrow, let alone if they've got enough empathy. I think they're not mutually exclusive. I think you have to think about tomorrow. I think empathy is not a luxury. We have a mental health pandemic going on. You know, you've got to manage people's emotions. People feel incredibly disconnected at work. We're seeing fear and anxiety with younger people who are living on their own, working on calls all day on their own. So I don't think you can make a choice. You have to think about it. And you also have to think about, you know, a hybrid model where people are coming back into the office and at home. What does that

look like? So I don't think it's a luxury. It's not about being nice. so I don't think it's a luxury it's not about being nice and I don't think there's an option you have to think about it but what about when it tips over into and I'm just going to paraphrase some of the KPMG clip we heard there when you know some people are moaners they are aren't they and you know just as empathy isn't being nice which you and Angela have both stressed some people come to work and want to have, you know, all of their gripes and moans dealt with at work. And that's not the place for them to be dealt with. So if you're as a leader trying to be direct and to get the best out of people, how do you deal with persistent moaners? Well, I think you have to distinguish. Angela is

smiling so widely, can I just say at this point? You have to distinguish between empathy and sympathy. And sympathy is what my niece calls a pity party. You know, the pity party is the moaners. And we're not saying that, but if somebody has an issue, you know, it's like a toddler. If a toddler's screaming on the floor, that is not the place to give them a lecture on, you know,

how they should behave. You have to deal with their emotions. Although you really, really want to at that particular point. You really, really want to. And the most direct bosses I know are incredibly empathetic. It's about having that conversation. You know, in the 80s at work, we were told, oh, you need to say something positive, then something negative and then something positive. You know, the sandwich. We don't need to do that. We need to create a parent toto-parent culture. And a lot of businesses, they create this parent-child culture, which is what I think where the monas fit in.

It's not about parent, they're adults. They've made a decision to come to work. You can have an incredibly direct conversation, but you have to do it in a human way. Can you? In a human way. You can fire people in a very human way that gives them their dignity absolutely let's bring angela in on that because the the other side of trying to be

this sort of boss and this sort of leader as belinda is describing could be that you now feel you can't deal with the moaners in a way that you would like do you feel that or worry about that angela it shouldn't be like that but it's how some people may feel. I think there's probably elements that you do. You know, I'll be honest. I think back in the heyday when I was starting out as a young chef, you know, there was very much the expression, you just get on with your job.

You know, you didn't have all the benefits that we give them now. You know, you were told this is when you work. You were probably told the night before. You know, you didn't this is when you work. You were probably told the night before. You know, you didn't have rotas months ahead. It wasn't all planned and stuff. So I think there's definitely a change in culture, which is for the good. But I think you have to, I think, as Belinda said, distinguish.

I think people can come in and there will always be certain people just by their very nature of life that will moan. And it's basically saying as long as you can feel that you've done everything in your power, in your your environment for their world right then it is a case of look i've delivered now you've got to deliver for me i don't think you can just accept that someone's continually moaning you have to sort of try you know get to the bottom of it and know that you've done the right thing by them and delivered your part do you think women are better at empathy? Women leaders? You really get putting me on the spot. Probably in some respects. Yeah, maybe. Yeah.

Belinda, are women better? And have we lost our backbone? Well, just picking up on the CEO, I mean, he could have said that message. I think empathy and language, he could have said that message in a much more empowering, inspiring way that built trust. So the message he could have changed his language. In terms of whether women are more empathic, women do tend to be empathic. And Professor Baron Cohen has looked at this in great detail. But we don't know whether it's nature or nurture, because we don't know when you're a young girl, you get rewarded for showing empathy. So we don't know whether it's nature or nurture. But I think what we know is in the workplace, those days of the alpha male

traditional, you know, shouting boss have gone. And that's a good thing. And your emails came flooding in. Andy says, I just wanted to say the best bosses I have ever worked for always made me feel like I wanted to do my best for them, not by issuing commands like Sergeant Major, but by treating me like an equal. They would always raise a problem as a question and would ask for my opinion for a solution. The worst bosses always issued commands and would never listen to anyone's opinion. Just because someone has responsibility of being in charge, it doesn't mean they necessarily have to know everything. Shouty bosses are usually insecure because they feel out of their depth or suffering from a God complex. Then Mary emailed in to say, why was that man made to feel he should resign? I don't blame him for what he said, though he might have said it slightly differently. But we've turned into

a nation of whingers with victim mentality. This is a worldwide pandemic and many people act like COVID is being inflicted on them and them alone. It's a childish attitude. We've lost our backbone, says Mary. And Lorna says, Persistent moaners need training. Empathy means seeing things from the other's point of view, not anything else. So as a business manager, it's having the emotional intelligence

to be aware of the effects of their behaviours on others. An empathy audit would show managers how to improve productivity. People work harder for people who do not despise or exploit them. They also manifest less stress, sickness and deliberate sabotage working slowly. Training people to gain skills and give their best shows in the bottom line. Do you secretly enjoy looking at strangers' wedding photos? Maybe not even secretly. Well, for the past nine years, Charlotte Sibtane has been collecting vintage wedding photographs from charity shops, markets and off the internet.

Charlotte has more than 400 photos in her collection and around 30 on her walls. She's been sharing her vintage wedding project on Instagram and online to display her found photographs and has also been on a mission to reunite relatives with their lost treasures. I asked Charlotte when this obsession with collecting strangers' wedding photos began. Well, it probably happened, I think, probably about nine or ten years ago, and I was in an antique shop, just perusing, having a look, and I came across this bin under a counter.

And in it was just full of these random photos, random images. And I came across these two wedding ones. And I just thought it was really sad that these photos had been sort of lost, discarded, removed from their original sort of families, really. So I wanted to take them, look after them and display them. Where did you find your first set of photographs? It was in this really great antique shop in Brighton. There's one on the lanes and it's huge and there's loads of different dealers and it's crammed full of stuff.

I'm totally with you. I bet there's lots of people listening who can relate to that experience. You go into a lovely vintage shop and then looking at old photographs and even old postcardscards it just takes you into another world but what was it about the wedding pictures that made you think oh I need to buy these? I think it was because it was somebody's special day I think you know weddings are a very special emotional time for a lot of people and you know I think having got married myself you know you really treasure those pictures and you really love to look back at them and remember the day.

And so the fact that these wedding ones had just been sort of tossed away, I think, made them even more special. And then it basically picked up at speed. You've got 400 of them now. Where? Well, I had to. So in the flat that we lived in previously, they were all in little boxes crammed in different parts of the flat. And now we've got a slightly bigger house and I've got a space for them and a proper little kind of section in an office. And, you know, they're all kind of looked after. And did you know what you were going to do with them or were you just collecting them because you like the aesthetic and you like looking at pictures and you just thought well I'd rather have them than them get gathering dust in a vintage shop yeah I think I just um I think initially it was just about collecting them and saving them really and just making sure that they were sort of kept safe

um and then I think what was it maybe about years ago, I started sharing them on social media. And that's when it starts to really sort of ramp up and it became very clear that other people love them too, which was really nice because I thought I was the only weird one out there. We're all voyeurs who like looking at other people's photographs, particularly wedding pictures. I've had a look at your account, actually, my favourite. And they're all black and white. Is that something that you've done on purpose? Yeah, I think so. I collect them from

sort of the late 1800s right up to the 1960s. And I think for me, the black and white ones are the most sort of poignant and historically interesting. I do randomly get some coloured ones in bundles that I buy. But yeah, they're mostly black and white. And now you're doing this wonderful, I don't know, terrifying thing of trying to reunite some of the photographs with the families. I say terrifying because you don't know what the story is, right? Maybe they got rid of them for a reason. Yeah, exactly. And I think I always assume that this is going to be like a very happy ending and everyone's going to be so pleased to see them.

And luckily, for the most part part that's been the case but yeah you just don't know what the story is and that's what makes it so interesting I think and how's it gone trying to find how do you even begin to track down the relatives oh well it is it is tricky um because most of the images and the albums don't come with any information. So people aren't terribly good at annotating dates and locations and names on the objects and the images. So there isn't a huge amount to go on. But fortunately, some of them do have names and dates. So it's a case of finding marriage certificate,

finding information online, the name of the church. And then you can start to sort of gather a bit more information but it is like piecing a puzzle together it's it's tricky and it must be wonderful when you actually find the relatives and match them with the lost photographs yeah it's the best feeling because I just think you know these images people just assume are just lost forever and they're never going to see them again. So when you're able to hand them back and give them to somebody and see how pleased they are, then, yeah, that's a great feeling. And now I'm going to give you a top notch book recommendation. Julie Marr's first novel, Happy Families, won the Richard and Judy WH Smith Search for a Bestseller competition in October and has just been published.

The book is centred around a Chinese takeaway, the Yaosum in West Wales, which closely resembles the one she grew up in and now runs with her brother. In the book, the Lee family is complicated and there are silences and secrets which 34-year-old Amy Lee thinks need to be sorted out before Ah Gung, her grandfather, dies. I'm delighted that Julie Ma could join me from The Takeaway, where the Wi-Fi is better than at home. But before we get into it, let's hear a reading from the beginning of the book, which gives us an idea of the place of Yau Sam in the community. Journey Guru Review, Yau Sam Takeaway, Kaus Menin. Reviewed December. A local institution, five stars. We come here every Christmas when I visit my parents and we get the set meal for four.

Always a nice change and fills the gap until New Year when you've had enough of turkey. Places like a time capsule, though. Mam and dad say it hasn't changed in 40 years. Even the woman behind the counter looks exactly the same. Could be her daughter though. Smiley face emoji. Sandy S. First of all, congratulations on winning the competition and being published for the first time as a novelist at 51 years old. I've read the book, thoroughly enjoyed it. But for everybody who hasn't, tell us about Amy Lee. Does she resemble you in any way? Amy Lee is a better looking, more intelligent, much nicer version of myself. So what more could you want from your fictional self, really? She's had to move back home to live with her grandfather.

And grandpa lives in the flat above the shop. When grandpa collapses in the street, it's up to Amy to get to the bottom of why the old man and his son-in-law, who's Amy's dad, haven't spoken for the last 30 years, even though they live and work together. It looks like time is running out

if she wants to make this family a happy family. And that's what anybody wants, really. Families can be squabbly, unhappy places, but it's up to everybody to work around that. And there's lots of family secrets in this family. There are lots of family secrets, and I think there are lots of secrets that families work around all the time. There have been two cases where we've mentioned today

where perhaps people may find in later life that they have 10 siblings that's going to be a bit of a family secret in years to come isn't it just all about family secrets but your family in the book seems they seem to deal with it in a very interesting way that they they take it on just take it on the chin don't they take it on the chin i think families have arguments. Sometimes I think about these arguments as being like boulders in a river where the water flows around the argument. So everybody pretends that this argument isn't going on between two members of the family. And also there is a bit of a rift. One of the characters in the novel is based slightly on my mum. And she was born in this country in 1933.

And I think within about three years, she had to move to China. So she basically moved back at an early age, didn't have any English, was raised in a Chinese environment, came back here in adult life. And although she's British, she's not British. Also, there's a question as to, Dad, why did you send me home, send me away for the last 15 years they forgive me well she forgives him families just work around these things aren't they that's the reality of being a family i think you know the characters are great in your novel um but the women particularly i'm

glad you brought the the mother character up amy's mum joan um and also elaine who you know the the family the chinese family they're almost, the family, the Chinese family, they're sort of the outsider family in this tiny little place in West Wales. And then her mum's friend, Elaine, is also the outsider. She's the woman who's had three children from three different fathers. And so the whole community treats them as the other, don't they? Yes. I think that's the way things were then. I hope they're not like that now

you know I've I loved reading the book and I was nodding along with so much of it because it reflects the migrant experience including my own family experience in some ways and it was so refreshing to read a book about the British Chinese experience yes um that's one of the reasons I wrote the book because I wanted to write about what I know, but also about diversity, not just of ethnicity or gender or sexual orientation, but very much. I deliberately included characters from different class. There's the regional voice from Wales and also occupation, because I think that people will think that a mortgage advisor from Rutland isn't interesting enough to be in a book. And they are. And there are people in this book, there are postmen, there's a policeman, he doesn't investigate murders. He's the sort of policeman who will knock on your door in the middle of the night if there's an emergency. So I wanted to represent everybody. I think everybody's

worthy of being in a story. You might not be worthy of being in a six part series on Sunday nights on BBC One at nine o'clock. But you can certainly have a chat. You might not be worthy of being in a six-part series on Sunday nights on BBC One at nine o'clock, but you can certainly have a chat. Maybe one day, maybe one day. Now, your first novel published at 51 years old, you won a competition. Was it a meteoric rise or is this years of hard graft, Julie? It's been years of hard graft. And I would say about this competition, which is such a mainstream competition that I never really expected to win at all is that this novel's been kicking around for a long time in various formats and it's been submitted to lots of outlets some of them

specifically to reflect diverse voices and I never heard back from any of them this is the only time it's been successful and you only need for that to happen one time but I think the thing is that the publishers well back they clearly realize it's important to select stories that represent all of us in society every day and perhaps not like other organizations just when they've been told that they have to I think we should be more well back on this we should be more diverse all the time. Hear, hear, Julie. Now, days after Japan's Olympics chief was forced to resign over sexist comments,

the country's governing party has decided to invite women to attend key meetings as long as they don't speak. The Liberal Democrat Party, LDP, proposed allowing five female lawmakers to observe its all-male board meetings. They cannot talk during the meeting, only submit opinions afterwards. Mariko Oi is Japanese and a BBC reporter in Singapore. She talked about the decision to admit some women to all-male party meetings. Well, I can't explain to you what was behind that decision.

As you know, just a couple of days before that decision was made, the head of the Tokyo Olympics organizing committee, he was practically forced to resign because of what he said about women. He said that basically women talk too much in the meetings and that he finds it rather annoying. I have to say, I grew up in Japan. I left when I was 16. So it didn't exactly surprise me. If I'm very honest, when I first heard Mr. Mori's comment about how women talk

too much, I thought, you know, maybe not exactly what my grandfather would say. But you know, he kind of reminds me. There'll be people listening to this thinking, I didn't know that the ruling party of Japan didn't have women in the room already. Well, so there are some elected members of politicians in the LDP, but these are the board members who make the most important decisions of this party. And up until now, they didn't have any female politicians attending those meetings. But now they decided that they will allow those women to at least attend, but they can't, they must not speak.

They can apparently submit opinions afterward, but that really showed how they were trying to address the issue, if you like, but at the same time, they didn't seem to know how that would appear to the public. Is that different to the cabinet, if you like, the equivalent of the people making the decision for the country? Yes, it's different. This is the different meetings. So these are the senior board members of the party who are meeting

to make what's important in the political party. When you're talking about cabinet, when you're speaking about ministers, the Prime Minister has been making an effort to at least appoint a couple of female politicians to those ministerial roles, though critics would argue that it's nowhere near enough. And are those women allowed to talk in the cabinet meeting? I believe so, yes. And we have heard, you know, a lot of those female politicians speak in those meetings or afterward as well. And, you know, the woman who has replaced Mr. Morey, the head of the Olympic Organised Committee, she's also a woman. She was an Olympic minister. So there have been a number

of female politicians who have held very senior positions in the party. I suppose taking a step back, when you talk about that's a view you could imagine your grandpa, your grandfather holding, there may also be people listening thinking, I'm sure that my grandfather may have thought women should talk a bit less. But there does seem to be a time lag, specifically here, just because we've had our attention drawn to it in Japan around how women are expected to be, can be seen, but perhaps not heard that much. Does that chime with your

experience? Yes, I have to say when I first moved to Australia at the age of 16 I felt like there's a generational gap so there's almost Japan is one generation behind where to me Australia was so my host mother who I lived with she was already working she was a career woman whereas my mother and my grandmothers have always been a stay-at-home mother whereas my generation I have finally started working so that is something that I've noticed and you know as you say many of our grandfathers may hold something of a similar thought but at the same time they didn't exactly say it you know my grandfather would never say it as the head of the Olympics organizing committee you know he said it in you know maybe family gatherings and we all kind of say grandpa you can't say that you know he said it in you know maybe family gatherings and we all kind of say grandpa

you can't say that you know that would be seen seen as very sexist in these days and and now we have this governing body the board of the the leading party in japan having women in the room but not speaking is that is that actually going to happen mean, can you imagine that being the reality? Yes, it wouldn't. It doesn't surprise me, I must say. Again, you know, the fact that these senior members of the party, they are. And, you know, I don't want to sound sexist or I don't want to sound ageist about this. But a lot of those senior politicians are Japanese men in their 70s, 80s. And their thoughts are very conservative, shall I say, I don't know whether that's the right word for it. And from their point

of view, you know, I wouldn't be surprised if they made that decision thinking, you know, we're making this very revolutionary decision, allowing women to speak, not kind of realising what age we're making this very revolutionary decision allowing women to speak not kind of realizing what age we're living in if you know what i mean um but at the same time it's a tactic that they've used many times before you know just almost increasing the number of women in the cabinet or you know as lawmakers just for the sake of it you know just for the the sake of increasing the number of women um instead of thinking about you, if we really want to increase the number of female politicians in Japan, you know, what do we need to change? The bigger thing, even if you know nothing about Japan, and any of its culture, or any of the issues that you've described that people can relate to about

this story, or there's sort of two stories, isn't there? The first started with the Olympics, and now the response here by the leading party. Is women taking up space in meetings and women being able to talk without thinking that either they're going to be interrupted or viewed differently from men? What do you have to say about that? Your experience, perhaps,

I don't know if it's in your working life or things that you've heard from women in Japan or from women elsewhere? That kind of casual sexism, it happens everywhere. You know, I've been said something similar before in, you know, work meetings. I've always worked for a foreign company, but I've still had, you know, Japanese colleagues saying something that I find a bit awkward. Like what? Or at work. You know, I think especially what struck me when I was in my 20s,

especially was, oh, you know, when are you going to get married? When are you going to have children? And once I had my children, they're like, oh, why are you still working? Shouldn't you be at home looking after your children? And that's probably, that's not just Japan, I assume. It probably happens everywhere as well. But those comments, you just sit there, you know, laugh and, you know, shrug it off, especially in Japan. I think I'm 39 now. You know, if you speak to Japanese women in their 50s, 60s, the women's job in those business meetings

was to bring a cup of tea. And that had to actually be changed those rules have to be changed so that women didn't have to bring in everyone's you know all the guests cup of tea you know they could get it themselves you know that's why when I say even though I don't want to sound ageist about it you know when those men in their 70s 80s they still have that mindset that women in their 70s, 80s, they still have that mindset that women in their views are attending their meetings to bring them, you know, something that they want to drink and maybe sit there quietly and, you know, nod and smile. At this time on a Saturday afternoon, I don't know about you, but I like a bit of jazz. And Sarah Raine, an academic and anthropologist, agrees with me. She carried out interviews with 10 anonymised female jazz musicians

of a notable level of success, who performed at the Cheltenham Jazz Festival in 2019. The women Sarah spoke to found the scene to be male-dominated and the majority had faced discrimination. Jazz Caser is a 25-year-old jazz drummer who's featured in bands with Nubia Garcia, Ashley Henry and Georgia Smith and also starred alongside Lenny Kravitz in the official video for his song Low. Jazz released her own debut EP, Unforced Rhythm of Grace, last year.

Here's a clip of a track from that EP, Fellas Words. Thank you. Sarah Raine talks about her findings following conversations with women about the jazz scene. Here's Sarah talking to Emma about what she found. So it's quite a complex thing and it was over quite a short period of time. So it was only a nine month project, but it was quite damning really for things that we found. It was a high level of gender discrimination amongst the women that I spoke to. It was an underrepresentation of women on the festival stage, although a lot of festivals are trying very hard

and getting behind Key Change, which is a great organisation and movement. But it was generally quite a depressing picture and in 2019 you'd rather have hoped that the experiences of women wouldn't be as negative. Does that chime with you, Jas? Did you feel it was a male-dominated industry when you went into it? And how's the reality been? Yeah, I mean, it's definitely been a lot of realizations now that I'm older. I'm sort of getting into it. I started when I was

nine years old, and definitely was naive to, you know, if it was a male or female oriented kind of industry, which I think has been nice, you know, being oblivious to that. But then I think growing up, you know, it's been very clear that, wow that wow you know it's so rare to see a female drummer especially drums something like that you know I've had a lot of issues with people kind of assuming that I'm a singer is it right that you once auditioned and a guy got it because well tell us more um that was during school and and actually my amazing percussion teacher she was a woman she just was very supportive but she organized a blind audition, probably for well knowing that this is the only way that could have an equal kind of result.

But turned out she met with me afterwards and said, OK, so you won the blind audition, but we're going to give it to the guy. And, you know, the reasons for that are kind of difficult. You know, it's never set in stone of why that happened, but it seems to be kind of clear now that there's, maybe because I was a female drummer that I wasn't given the same chance. People, I guess, will make you feel that it's more of a masculine instrument or you have to be stronger or bigger or more macho to be able to do something like that, definitely. Sarah, to talk about the roots of jazz, jazz you know women were at the center of it

weren't they yes and um yeah this is something that I think about a lot um how jazz histories are written and how they're mediated how they're shared amongst people and it's amazing um how many of those women's stories are removed in the sort of simplifying and the mythologizing of jazz and it's it's a huge problem and it comes down to what we imagine jazz to be but also the sort of simplifying and the mythologising of jazz. And it's a huge problem and it comes down to what we imagine jazz to be, but also the sort of the great figures that came out of jazz and also the people that write about it. And a jazz scholarship is also very male dominated. So there's sort of a combination of all these different factors coming to play.

Did you come up with any thoughts on how this might get better? Because I kind of wish you were telling us this, that this was from 15, 20 years ago, but this is a contemporaneous view. I think there are some green shoots. I think there's some amazing grassroots organisations that are doing brilliant work in the UK and elsewhere. I think that these conversations that we're having right now will have an impact. And I'm really pleased that the report has been taken up in this sense, because I've seen a lot of younger jazz musicians and more established having these conversations on social media. And these are the things that need to happen. I think it also needs to not only be musicians that are talking about it of all backgrounds and genders, but it also has to be the promoters, the festivals.

We have to start having quite hard and difficult discussions, honestly and clearly, to try and resolve these things. But I think it's beginning. Jaz, I'm really aware, though, that we're in a pandemic. That shadow is over everything, isn't it? And it's hitting live performances in a very, very hard way. We're all missing watching you and coming to those sorts of events. But when you're having those hard conversations that Sarah says need to happen, who should they be with?

For instance, should it be with the artist who has the power to perhaps pick who's on stage with them? Should it be the promoters? Should it be the agents? Can you give us an insight into kind of how you get selected for jobs? Yeah, well, I feel like feel like yeah it's a difficult one isn't it because I guess everyone has a responsibility on a different level but everyone approaches it differently because sometimes you know it's your job to if you're a promoter or

booking agent then you should be focusing on booking and finding people out there if you look deep enough it's not it's not difficult to find female musicians or whatever to represent the venues and all of that and give sort of that's why women in jazz are just incredible because they've given me so many opportunities to kind of take my band as a leader and do gigs um but also yeah I've I've with the for the past few years I've been kind of trying to step in the role as representing females and kind of speaking up a bit more about it because I realized that as a female mixed race female drummer that is my responsibility and I do have a platform that I can use to kind of, you know, speak up about these issues. So I

guess it's important for everybody to find their way that makes, you know, the comfortable way, or even not comfortable, I guess. Yes. Even if it doesn't make you feel comfortable, it should still be something that you should, you know, step into those shoes and kind of speak up. I'm going to spend the rest of my Saturday listening to jazz. Enjoy your weekend. Join Emma on Monday at 10. 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.