Woman's Hour - Weekend Woman's Hour: Dr Koshka Duff, Tareena Shakil, 'Corona Lisa', Midwife Shortage, Six The Musical

Episode Date: January 29, 2022

Dr Koshka Duff, an assistant professor of politics at Nottingham University has received an apology and compensation from the Met Police after officers were caught on CCTV using sexist, derogatory and unacceptable language during a 2013 strip search. In her first broadcast interview since the apology, she speaks to Emma about that experience and why it has taken so long to get an apology. Chloe Slevin, a 3rd year nursing student at University College Dublin has been painting well-known masterpieces - with a Covid-19 twist. Her latest creation? The 'Corona Lisa' which sees the famous Mona Lisa in full PPE, which she plans to auction off for charity. She joins Emma to talk about all about her paintings.Tareena Shakil is the first British woman to be found guilty of joining the so-called Islamic State. She was jailed for travelling to Syria with her son - who was a one year old baby at the time, in 2014. She speaks to Anita about why she left the UK to join a terrorist organisation - and why she's speaking out. Midwives are being ‘dangerously overworked’ according to a former NHS midwife. Piroska Cavell, who worked for years across the UK as a midwife and Dr Mary Ross-Davie from the Royal College of Midwives speak to Emma about the challenges facing midwives working on the frontline:Plus do you remember the rhyme for Henry VIII's six wives? Well a musical about them has just opened on Broadway following rave reviews on the West End. Six the Musical follows all six wives, as they take the microphone in a ‘Britain’s Got Talent’ style sing-off. Co-director Lucy Moss, co-director and co-writer of the show, and Tsemaye Bob-Egbe, who plays Henry VIII’s fifth wife Katherine Howard, join Emma to discuss its success.

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

BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, I'm Anita Rani and welcome to Woman's Hour from BBC Radio 4. Hello and welcome to Weekend Woman's Hour, where I bring you up to speed with the best bits of the week just gone and I have some fascinating interviews to bring you. Coming up, we hear from the first British woman to be found guilty of joining the so-called Islamic State, plus the Irish trainee nurse putting a Covid-19 spin on art masterpieces. But first, Dr. Koshka Duff, an assistant professor of politics at Nottingham University, has won an apology and compensation from the Metropolitan Police for sexist, derogatory and unacceptable language used by officers when she was strip-searched in 2013. She was arrested in May of that year

on suspicion of obstructing and assaulting police after trying to hand a legal advice card to a 15-year-old caught in a stop-and-search, allegations she was later cleared of in court. She spoke to the programme in her first broadcast interview since receiving that apology and footage became public. Emma started by asking when she first heard and saw the tapes of what those police officers had to say about her.

I didn't hear that footage until last year because for seven years of the complaints process, the police had refused to disclose the CCTV that they had. So it was only then that I heard those comments. But really, those were absolutely in keeping with what I experienced. The strip search itself is not on CCTV, but what they were saying was no surprise at all. Well, we will come to that and also how you found yourself in that position.

But this, of course, came to public light only in the last 24 hours for people being able to to see and hear how police officers, men and women, talk about somebody who's in their charge. And in your situation, particularly, I suppose, as a woman, much was made of your body and of your smell. And I wondered what your reaction was when you first heard that. So it was really clear that they were trying to humiliate me. They called me childish. When I was being arrested, I was called a very silly girl. The sexism of the way that they were treating me was really obvious at the time. It's just really dehumanising language. And how gender plays a role. I mean, it was men who made that very specific comment about your knickers smelling. And any woman, actually, a lot of people got in touch with the programme yesterday, can relate to that sort of insult. And I just wondered what you made of that particular

comment and how that made you feel. It does give a kind of peephole into a culture of misogyny and, I suppose, immaturity. the footage that's been public is actually only really the tip of the iceberg. Let's go back then. You were handing out a legal advice card, I believe, produced by the Green and Black Cross organisation to a youth who was being stopped, stopped and searched. You saw them. And I just wondered how that interaction in the first place came about. Police ran into onto the estate and started engaging in what looked very like a racist stop and search operation. They'd ignored me initially. I went over when I heard shouts of distress coming from behind this community garden centre.

And the young person was calling for his mum. And did you just, you happen to have these cards on you or is this something that you've done before? It was very much by chance that I had, so these kind of know your rights or legal advice cards are quite widely produced by organisations that are, you know, concerned with people's rights on stop and search and on arrest. I know people who work with Green and Black Cross. I attend protests and I had this card tucked in my phone case. I must have got it from one of them. I asked him if he knew his rights on stop and search

and if he wanted the numbers of some trusted solicitors. And he said, yes, he did. So I had the card in my hand and I was reaching out to give it to him. And it was at that point that the police got up in my face, get back, get back. You're obstructing the search. You can't be here.

And why did it not end there, if you like? Why were you then taken yourself? So it all escalated in just a few minutes. They were kind of pushing me to get back. They were grabbing this young person. I was at this point trying to just watch what was going on, but they were kind of trying to get me really out of the area. So within just a few minutes, they were like,

right, we're arresting you for obstruction, and they grabbed me. And did you resist that, or what happened next? Because I suppose people listening to this who don't know very much about how the police operate might think, how do you go from that to being strip searched? When I was arrested, I went limp as a form of passive resistance, non-compliance, because I was in shock. And what they were doing doing was unjust and I didn't want to comply with it and was carried into the police van and then sometime later carried into Stoke Newington Police Station and they strip searched me pretty immediately upon arrival. And the reason for that is what?

The only thing they said is we need to find out who you are. Because you weren't giving them that information until you had a lawyer. Yeah, exactly. They hadn't read me my rights. That's on the custody record that they hadn't read my rights. I don't see how stripping me would reveal my identity in any way apart from, you know, they wanted to soften me up to kind of intimidate me into telling them my details and to punish me as well for standing up for a young person's rights. You know, you're very well versed in and were attempting to give some advice to that individual that you talked about. And because my understanding, I suppose, and again, you better tell me, but this being strip searched is usually with regards to if they are concerned that there's a weapon concealed as well. It wasn't, as far as you know, in an attempt to do that, it was about your identity. That's what they said at the time. In the misconduct proceedings in 2018,

suddenly a brand new justification was found, which was that they were concerned about my mental health. Was that the first time that's ever happened to you, being strip searched? Yeah, I hadn't experienced this before. And what was that like, if you don't mind me asking? off my clothes with scissors and while they were doing that they were cracking jokes with each other for example about the benefits of strapless bras when they were cut off my top and they were talking about whether to cut off my underwear and then is it quite a physical experience as well I imagine yeah the overwhelming feeling of it was was physical pain and I was terrified and they had my hands in cuffs and they were kind of jerking them around behind my back. My wrists and arms were completely cut up from this. I had

quite extensive injuries, which my legal representative, who I eventually saw hours later, had the presence of mind to take photographs of, which were shown at my trial because they falsely accused me of obstructing and assaulting them. And I was very lucky to have these photographs. None of them could explain where all these injuries had come from. You were cleared in that trial of everything that you were accused. When was the trial? November of 2013. I think the other thing when reading your story is how long ago this was. And we know things can take an awfully long time,

especially when individuals or organisations seek redress from the police themselves. But you've continued this fight. Why has it taken so long? Well, what I've experienced over the past eight years is a legal system which is absolutely set up to protect the police from accountability and to prevent complaints from getting anywhere, to just disappear them into a bureaucratic abyss. And then they investigate themselves and they find that what they did was absolutely fine. And, you know, in a sense, I'm saying, you know, they're right that this is normal. The problem is that it's normalised.

What's been the impact of this hanging over you since 2013? It's really difficult to know where to begin on that. The incident itself was really traumatic. And for years after, I experienced flashbacks and panic attacks and kind of fear whenever I saw a police officer. The process of going through this complaints procedure, I've just felt like I've been on trial for eight years. Like the gross misconduct proceeding for the custody sergeant who ordered my strip search, I was questioned, kind of grilled for hours. And he was not asked a single question. sergeant who ordered my strip search, I was questioned, kind of grilled for hours, and he

was not asked a single question. I've just experienced a kind of a barrage of victim blaming and gaslighting. You just mentioned, you mentioned it a couple of times, that disciplinary panel in 2018, the sergeant in charge of the nightly research, Sergeant Curtis Howard, he was cleared of gross misconduct. How do you feel about that? I think it just shows like the way that they've closed ranks around him shows that this isn't about individuals. It's their kind of standard mode of operation. Although a lot of police officers who will listen to this programme will say, you know, there are good people. We are also trying.

We had some police officers get in touch yesterday. I have to say, though, a gentleman and a woman got in touch, both of whom could attest to what you were saying and what this footage showed was also a part of it, but also trying to do a good job and a better job. Yeah, absolutely. I think that, you know, there are well-meaning individuals in the police, and that's why I say it's not about individuals. The issue is the job that they're being tasked with doing

encourages and even requires this kind of dehumanising attitude because of the violence that they are tasked with inflicting. Well, some would also argue with the violence they're tasked with policing as well. Of course, not in your case, but I meant in other scenarios. The force, of course, has issued an apology. I'll come back to a bit of that in just a this quote, I would like to take this opportunity to sincerely and unreservedly apologise for the sexist, derogatory and unacceptable language used about yourself and for any upset and distress this may have caused. And then there's a hope that this settlement

and the recognition of the impact of what happened will enable you to put this incident behind you. What do you make of that as a statement and as a sort of sentiment? I think it's really striking that they don't apologise for the strip search at all. They apologise because they got caught out in using some embarrassing language. They don't apologise for violently stripping me naked. It's the change in the discussion around policing coming out that have put them under pressure to apologise when, you know, for eight years, they all maintained

and they were, you know, backed up at every level of the system that supposedly ensures accountability, that this was totally normal. I the statement with the spokesperson for the Met, it said, following the conclusion of the civil claim, allegations of misconduct relating to these comments were referred to our Directorate of Professional Standards and are currently being investigated. This investigation remains ongoing. Do you have any faith in that?

Because that's with regards to professional standards? No. At every stage, you have to provide more and more and more. The process is bogged down, it goes on for years and nothing comes of it. I'm minded to mention, of course, at this point, you published a book called Abolishing the Police. You may be coming at this from the position which is the police is completely or are completely as a force unfixable. So I just wanted to give you the opportunity to say, is there anything the police can do from your perspective? Or are you firmly in the camp? And if so, is that because of what's happened to you? Did you come to that view because of that experience in 2013?

Certainly experiencing kind of the sharp edge of policing, seeing what it's like in reality has made a difference to how I see things. In general, there is a vast gulf between the people who do experience policing firsthand and the people who are, you know, really only hear about policing from the police's own press releases. So there's a serious issue about... Who tells the narrative? Who tells? Yeah, exactly. So we have a kind of quote unquote justice system and broadly a media culture that will treat the police as reliable witnesses. And what I think my case and many others that are, you know, the revelations that have been coming out show is that they can't be trusted, you know, with the powers that they've got and the weapons that they've got, let alone more of them. The policing of the police is

something that has been under greater scrutiny, but there will be a lot of people who say, we still have to have a police. It seems like you do not come from that position at all. So I think there are things that we can do kind of immediately and right now to reduce the harms of policing. So, for example, we need to reduce reliance on police in addressing social harms like mental health issues. The final thing I just wanted to ask, unless there's anything else you wanted to add,

which was, you know, this hope from the police, one of their spokesmen, that you, you know, could be feeling better after the apology, after the compensation and for any distress caused and that hopefully you'll be able to put this behind you. How does that look in real life to you? I mean, where are you with that?

Does this offer closure? I'm really happy that the conversation is happening right now about misogyny and normalised sexualised violence in policing. And after the rape and murder of Sarah Everard, the police put out statements saying women should challenge officers they think are behaving in a dodgy way, kind of, again, putting the onus on women in a victim blaming way. On the other hand, if you do stand up for your legal rights and in solidarity with those of others, I've seen the way that you get treated for that. And I think just on that point about Sarah Everard taking people's minds back, I mean, of course, the police wouldn't say they meant, you know, if you don't stand up to the police,

then these things will happen to you. Of course, I take your taking it from that and lots of other women felt that was completely the wrong focus, putting it back onto the women. You know, that must have been quite a thing to hear after your experience. It's the kind of advice that would be given by somebody who had no idea of how the police actually operate. To not comply when you're being kind of threatened is really, really difficult. One of the things that I find particularly distressing over the last eight years is that they have continually used the fact that my body tensed up during the strip search as a justification for having used more force. They said, like, you know, you clenched your fists and you were holding your arms rigid.

And I was terrified and my body was kind of seizing up and that that's used to justify more violence. It just shows the victim is going to be blamed whatever they do when it comes to police violence. Dr. Koshka Duff there, and of course, lots of you got in touch with us with your views on what happened to Dr. Duff. Emily got in touch to say, I was in floods of tears listening to the humiliation and terrifying experience she had whilst being strip searched and the inhumane way in which it was done. This is utterly horrifying. Now forget about the Mona Lisa. One student has just restyled the masterpiece for our times, creating the Corona Lisa. Very good. Mona is wearing full PPE as well as a surgical mask. 21-year-old Chloe Slevin,

a third-year nursing student at University College Dublin, has spent the last couple of years painting well-known masterpieces with a COVID-19 twist. And like her two previous pieces that were sold in aid of charity, Corona Lisa is being auctioned off from Monday in aid of Laura Lynn, Ireland's only children's hospice. Emma started by asking her where the idea for the Corona Lisa came from. I don't really have like an exact idea where it came from it's just kind of what my life's been all about the last few years. I've been quite busy I'm kind of hopping between my studies and work and also trying to look after myself and use the art to kind of get away from all that as well but of course I'm finding some way to incorporate it. Well yes of course you're life influencing what you then put on the page. Tell us about your role during the pandemic what has it meant for you because you talked about going between your

studies and work. Yeah so when Covid kind of began here in Ireland and the HSE our health service they called out for the students to come in and become health care assistants in our hospital so our hospitals our nursing homes and wherever else so i went into one of our large general hospitals my one of my teaching hospitals and i was working there for a while during covid so i would have been on uh the infectious disease unit and we were kind of like a step down from icu it was it was tough being thrown in the deep end but yeah but look I can't there's no there's not enough words to describe home a's and staff where they were so supportive it was I was really I was really cared for there

so I'm just happy I got to help and this is another way of of helping for me yes well I know it means a lot to you to be able to try and support services that are directed towards children. Yeah, yeah. And that's what this will go towards, the proceeds of this. I did a bit of a description of Corona, Lisa. And, you know, it's very striking to see something you're so familiar with cast in our times in, you know outfits or if I could put

it like that we we just were not that familiar with until nearly two years ago yeah PPE has kind of become I don't want to say the normal for us now in healthcare but it's it's pretty much expected that you you're wearing your your full PPE and it was just kind of seeing it every day day in day out I was actually on a placement a college placement when I started piecing it all together so it was just you're seeing the gowns all the time the the visors you're just surrounded by it so I wanted to kind of make it a bit a bit different yeah well there's a comedy almost to it as well you know in the fact of how she looks covered in PPE yeah a lighter kind of more light-hearted sense of what what it's all about yes and and I suppose the other side of that though is as healthcare professionals you know you want to be able to feel trusted by those you're looking

after and yet you've had this you've had this division between you yeah it's been tough and that's kind of what my last painting was about. So my last charity piece, that was called The Separation of Adam, taken from The Creation of Adam. Nice. So the iconic two hands touching, except I put gloves on them. And I came up with that one while I was working on The Covid Ward, and that was just seeing how distanced everyone was I kind of separated the hands a bit further than the original and you're not you kind of lose that sense of a relationship with

your patient sometimes and you could have a patient for a few weeks and they they've never seen your face they've never held your hand they've only met you through plastic and that was kind of the point of the last painting it was just we were so we were everyone was so separated and it was very tough you have I I was the last person some people got to see I was the last hand to hold rather than their loved ones and it just it wasn't fair on them it really wasn't but that that's why I use my art for charity. And that's why I really try to support others with something I love. Yes. Well, it's very obvious that not only are they clever ideas, but you're also the execution is very good indeed. How do you actually do it? Are you are you painting? What's your what's your tool? What are your tools?

I use paint. Yeah. So I'd use acrylic paint on canvas. But look, I've ever since i could hold a pencil i was drawing on anything and everything like i i couldn't put it down and it's just it's just been something i've kept myself busy with my whole life that's i'm having another look again as we speak and they are you know really good really really good and i'm sure i hope that the auction goes well it just a word from you about, I suppose, how important it has been for you to have that kind of interest as well, that escapism in the year that you've had, because a lot of people have tried to actually take things up as well because they need to kind of escape.

Yeah, and I'd absolutely encourage it. It's been so helpful for me. As I said, I started putting this together when I was on a placement in an emergency department and that was a very tough placement for me like as I said I kind of I started putting this together when I was on a placement in an emergency department and that was very tough placement for me and I experienced my first pediatric cardiac arrest and as you can imagine that is just a horrific thing for anyone to go through and it was just I kind of put it on hold because I was so overwhelmed with it. It had such an impact on me. But in saying that, it comforted me as well. It was kind of something I could, you stick your headphones on,

you stick on a little podcast or a bit of music and you just get stuck into it and you can forget about everything else for a while. So as you said, people picking things up during this lockdown and during COVID, I would absolutely encourage it. Painter and trainee nurse Chloe Slevin there. And if you have any ideas of famous works of art that could be COVID-19, then please feel free to get in touch. Our Twitter is at BBC Woman's Hour. How about The Venus de Milo hasn't washed her hands? I'm sure you can come up with better. Still to come on the programme, we hear from one midwife and the head of professional midwifery at the Royal College of Midwives about staff shortages and a musical about Henry VIII's wives.

And remember that you can catch up with any of our programmes on BBC Sounds and it's absolutely free. Now, Tarina Shaquille, the first British woman to be found guilty of joining the so-called Islamic State, has been out of prison for nearly four years trying to build a new life. She was jailed for travelling to Syria with her son, who was a one-year-old baby at the time. That was in 2014 when she was 24. She didn't last long and soon fled, being detained as soon as she touched down in Heathrow. Well, Tarina spoke to me on the programme on Friday, and I began by asking her why she decided to go to Syria

to join a terrorist organisation. The life that I was living before I decided to run away, it was, you know, a life that was really unhappy. There was a lot of domestic violence. I'd always lived a life of unhappiness, and then I had started talking to people online who were in Syria fighting, who had basically said things like, you need to come and live over here because if you die in a country that's not ruled by Sharia, you're going to go to

hell and loads of things to that effect. But plenty of women sadly are in abusive relationships and suffer domestic violence, but they definitely don't decide to join a terrorist organisation. How did they get into your head to convince you to get on a plane and not just you, to take your one-year-old son to a war zone? You know, I was in a very vulnerable place. And the things that people would say to me online and refer to certain verses in the Quran, they were all linked to hijrah. Hijrah is migration for the purpose of Islam. And they were things to the effect of, you know, the people who didn't go forward are not equal.

For them in their next life is a painful punishment. But they were all surrounding hijrah. You need to come and live here. And did you know what was going on in Syria? Did you know who ISIS were and that they were responsible for beheading and killing and torturing not just Westerners but Muslims as well? Yes.

I knew who ISIS were and I had seen a lot of things on the news before I had travelled out there. I do understand that, you know, seeing, being aware of what they're capable of should deter you. And I accept that, I really do. But when I would speak to the people that were my constant links there, and I would mention these things to them, you know, there'd always be a way for them to like play it down. For example, oh, the the media they just hate islam it's not really like that you know your attention's kind of diverted from it because

the end goal is to get you to go and live there obviously and what did you think was waiting for you at the other end what kind of life were you going to live i hadn't really thought about it in detail i just wanted to be there i had thought maybe that I could just carry on with a normal life. And I know that sounds really crazy considering that it is a war-torn country. But when I think back now, the only life I was expecting to live was a normal life, not one to be fighting, one where I was just so concerned about running away there and just to be there that I didn't think about a lot of things that should have been thought about. And you said that you were talking to people online and it was on Facebook.

So over what period of time were you communicating with people from ISIS? So it will have been for about six or seven weeks. It was near about the end of July and I flew out I think October 20th so it's just just over three months just under three months something like that so I booked a ticket to Turkey because I was informed that that's obviously where you go to travel on to Syria and even when I had booked my ticket it was not a hundred percent that I would run away to Syria. I always said, let me see how far I get. It had been planned, hadn't it?

Because you had a contact who was going to get you into Syria. But when you came back from Syria, and I'm jumping ahead a bit, and you were arrested as you got off your flight at Heathrow, you lied to the police about going out there, hadn't you? Yes, I did lie about how I got out there. Why did you do that? Because, you know, just a few hours before they had taken my child off me and I just wanted him back.

I didn't know, you know, I've never been in trouble with the police before. I've never been involved with social services before. I thought that if I said I had taken him there willingly, that I would never get him back. And I wasn't even aware that there's a court system that has to be followed. I'm going to come back to trying to understand a bit more, Tarina, about that decision to actually leave. At what point and how did they manage to convince you that this is not the life you want and that what you should be doing is living over there according to their ideologies and values. So all of the things that were being said to me to make me feel like I don't want to live here anymore was to do with the afterlife.

I have a lot of knowledge now that I didn't have before. You know, I've been I've worked with imams in prison. I know a lot more now. Yes, there are them verses of the Quran are there, but they were revealed at a certain time for a certain period. Yes, the rules still do apply now. But as it was explained to me, it's not a case of you just open a book and take a verse and apply it to your life now in all instances.

I wasn't even speaking to my family. The only people I would speak to like pretty much every day all day was these people in Syria. I was really isolated from everybody. Do you think you were radicalised? Do you think you were groomed? Groomed 100%. With regards to radicalised and what I understand that that word means, you know, I've never in terms of killing or wanted to kill anybody or ever wanted to be involved in that side of things ever. So I would definitely say I was groomed online, 100%. What happened when you got there? I just literally went from house to house and lived with like 50 women.

So when I first got into Syria, it's one house. We stayed there for about a week and a half, then moved on to another house in Raqqa and just lived in the house, eating, sleeping, talking with other women. So when I got to Syria, I made friends with a girl from Qatar just because she could speak English. We went on to Raqqa together. And after about three days, she started to talk about escaping. And I was supposed to escape and leave with her but she didn't have a plan it was really early on I mean what did I arrive there on the 25th of October she escaped on around the 6th of November I was supposed to leave with her so we're talking about

two weeks if that. Why did you want to escape what happened where you decided I need to get out of here? I think the main thing was I remember being there on the first night and being on the bus that took us to the first house in Jarabulus. And I remember seeing the black flag in real life. Yeah, the black flag of ISIS is what you're talking about. Yeah, the black flag, the one that they use. And I remember thinking, oh, my God, I'm actually here. This is real. Like, it was no longer online anymore,

almost as if the kind of adventure, as it were, was over. I remember thinking at that second, like, oh, my God, it's real. Like, what have you done? Yeah, Tarina, I'm listening to you, and I want to understand because, you know, you've spoken very public about this publicly and you've made a documentary because you want people to understand and also you've said that you want to try and help de-radicalize other young people who might be in a similar situation to what you were in and you say that you got there and you saw the flag flying and it became very real

but you changed your Facebook profile to have the ISIS flag flying. Yeah, but that's online. That was done when I was in England. I said when I got to Syria and I seen it in its entirety, it became real. It was heart-stopping. It was like, I'm actually here. It's a realisation. And there's some very disturbing photographs. There's one of you with an AK-47 and there's one of your son standing next to an AK-47,

which is really shocking. Did you ever use the gun? No, never. So why have photographs taken with guns if you were desperate to come home? Because that was the environment that we were living in at the time. I was in a house full of women. I really understand that them pictures are disturbing

and believe me, I hate them myself. I of women. I really understand that them pictures are disturbing. And believe me, I hate them myself. I really do. I don't, I never like to see them pictures. But when you're there and the threat is very real and you've seen other women be taken away by a group of men just because she's not listening, then you conform. Because it's not online anymore. It's real life.

So how did you escape? When I was in Durabilis I met a lady from Trinidad who she didn't want to be there for her own reasons whatever but she had kind of confided in me at that and I ended up meeting up with her again in Raqqa so towards the end of my stay in the house the woman who was in charge of the house, through whatever reasons of her own, not being allowed to marry who she wanted, she had, you know, she had started to not really do her job properly, withdraw into her bedroom, go through depression as you like, and she would stay in her room and not come out, and she would just be on the internet there. She had sent me once or twice to buy codes for her from the internet shop.

It probably took a day or two for her to say to me again, can you go and buy me a code for the internet? At which point I went and I never went back to the MACA. I never went back to the house. I went with the lady from Trinidad, stayed at her flat for about two days. And then your son was with you the whole time? Yes, he was, yes. And then you managed to cross the border into Turkey

and get a flight back to the UK and you were arrested at Heathrow on the plane? Yeah, I was in a detention centre for six weeks before. I didn't get on a flight straight away. Some experts have said Serena that your escape doesn't add up. Does it not? According to some experts. That's my escape and as true as God is and as true as I am sitting here today I've got nothing to add to it and I've got nothing to take away from it. I've never heard that before. It's how I escaped.

What else would there be? So what happened then when you arrived at Heathrow? What happened on the plane? Several officers came onto the plane, escorted me off and took my child off me and arrested me and took me to the police station. And were you expecting that to happen? I wasn't expecting them to take my child off me. I was expecting to be arrested.

You thought your parents would be there to come and see you and maybe you were going to give your child over to your mum, didn't you? My parents were there waiting to take my child and the whole way through, you know, when people asked me why I lied, the whole way through, my parents were led to believe from authorities that they would be able to take my child. It was never mentioned that he was going to be taken and put into care. So when they said to me, hand your child over, I was like, oh yeah, my mom, she's here. They were like, no, hand your child over.

Now we, as a family, had always thought that that would be avoided, that he would go to my mom direct. That didn't happen. So, you know, none of us had the correct information. And I guess, again, going back to your question that you asked me earlier that's also a big factor as to why I lied because it was just the shock of it the oh my child's with strangers now because he was placed in temporary foster care and as a mother I understand that I took him somewhere terrible I really do

understand that and I live with that every day. Hands down, I think no matter whatever else happens to me in life, that will forever be the worst thing that has ever happened to me. And I really, really would not wish that upon anybody. And why have you decided to speak about your experience publicly? Because if I can stop just one person, if I could stop just one person from making that mistake, from ruining their life, from ending up with a life sentence, from ending up dead, then that is what I would love to do.

And I would love to speak out about it particularly because you know it is an issue of grooming it really is and I don't think people particularly like to talk about that I don't think people fully understand it's something that needs to be talked about particularly when we're in a situation where there are women from so many different countries in camps in, I think it's Syria or in Iraq, that are wanting to come home and people are scared about that. So what do you think about that? Let's talk about Shamima Begum because she is trying her best to come back from the Syrian refugee camp where she is.

Do you think she should be allowed back? I can't say a straight up yes, because I don't know what people's intentions are for when they come back here. If they genuinely are like, I made a mistake, I want to come home, I want to do my prison time, if there is prison time to be served, I want to turn my back on it, then I would say yes. I can't say no, because I've been in a very similar situation. It's not the same same but it's a similar situation so if I sat here and said no don't let them come home that that's really hypocritical of me. You say that you've changed you've gone through a de-radicalization program and you want people to think better of you you're working you've got a

cleaning job. Which is why the answer that I gave you was if people genuinely want to make that change they are sorry about what they've done and people genuinely want to make that change, they are sorry about what they've done and they just want to come back home, put the past behind them, I would say yes. So whenever anything like this happens, Tarina, when there is a case like yours in the news and it's all over the press, there is always a backlash towards the Muslim community. I want your thoughts on that. I've read quite a few times in the newspaper, come across it on social media, where ordinary Muslim girls on the way to uni, college, whatever, have been attacked, had ISIS shouted at them, hijabs pulled off.

And I always feel partly responsible for that, because obviously my actions were supportive of this group. And I did run away to go and live in land controlled by them. So I always feel really sad and responsible because, yeah, like I said, it's not, again, that's something else that doesn't sit easy with me. Innocent Muslims being targeted. Tarina Shakil there. And we have a statement from the Home Office in connection with Shamima Begum, who I spoke to Tarina about, which says,

Our priority is to ensure the safety and security of the UK. Those who remain in the conflict zone include some of the most dangerous who choose to stay to fight or otherwise support Daesh. Many of these individuals represent a serious and credible threat to our national security and the direct threat they pose would be significantly higher should they return to the UK. Now, a former midwife has raised the alarm over the worrying amount of pressure being placed on midwives who are being overworked with not enough resources or staff support. It's predicted that there's a shortage of nearly 2,000 midwives across the country,

with several maternity units being forced to shut due to the lack of people. We've already highlighted on the programme the problems with the move towards compulsory Covid jabs from April for frontline NHS staff in England, with our story of a maternity unit where nearly 40 midwives are refusing to be vaccinated and face losing their jobs. You can hear that again on BBC Sounds. Well, Emma spoke to Peroska Cavill, the former midwife who has sounded the alarm, and Dr Mary Ross Davie, head of professional midwifery at the Royal College of Midwives, about whether the government's pledge to hire nearly 1,200 new midwives will be enough.

Peroska began by telling Emma what she noticed while working as an agency midwife across the UK. What I noticed is common amongst all the trusts. The midwives are doing an absolutely fantastic job. We're all, you know, for us it's about caring for the women and the families. But actually within the institution, I do refer to the NHS as the mothership. And there's very little care for us. So you're working in a really high pressure environment.

You know, you're looking after two, maybe three people's lives when you're with someone delivering. And there are all sorts of factors that can happen. Labour is normally, you know, very straightforward, but it can change very, very quickly. And you have to deal with the very sort of the other side of it. People tend to think the midwifery is very lovely and we cuddle babies and we chat to women and it's very straightforward. But when we have a bad day in the office, it's as bad as you could possibly imagine. And you have to pick yourself up and go straight on into another room with someone else. And it's very lovely and carry on. There's you know there's very little if any support you're working

extremely long hours um and you're trying to mentally deal with that because you invest in every patient a hundred percent you're in there you're invested in them you want to make sure their experience is as good as possible and after a a period of time, you can't sustain that. So, it's fine. And that's your personal choice. I know you're still working now in a private healthcare setting or your own private healthcare company. But I know you care still greatly about this.

And in terms of raising the alarm, what you actually said, you talked about being dangerously overworked. And that would then lead, of course, as well as the staff being put at riskworked and that would then lead of course as well as the staff being put at risk but those that you're caring for so is it a case of more midwives and then that being the the solution because of course that's what's being prioritized allegedly by the government undoubtedly more midwives is going to help you know because the staff shortages are huge and the impact on that is huge, but also the way they structure it. At the moment, you know, things are really

pared down to the very, very bare bones. So you have a minimum number of midwives who have got to cover, for instance, a labour ward, an antenatal ward, a postnatal ward, a triage, and you're forever mixing and pulling people from different areas to try and cover. Yeah, it would be great to have more midwives so that you could then probably address the work-life balance as well. You know, I have colleagues that have suffered heart attacks and strokes purely due to the pressure of the job. Let me bring in Dr Mary Ross-Davie at this point.

What are you hearing from people on the ground, from midwives on the ground at the moment? Yeah, unfortunately, exactly what we've just heard we've had a widespread survey with our members in the autumn last year and it really reflected what we just heard so more than half of our member midwives were saying that they were seriously thinking about leaving the profession over the last year we've also seen that evidenced in terms of lower numbers of midwives in the workforce. What we think has happened is lots of midwives who were due to retire at the beginning

of the pandemic, they thought, no, I'll hold on, I need to look after my colleagues, I need to look after women during this really difficult time, so I'll stay. But then the pandemic has rolled on and on and people are completely burnt out so those midwives who were able to retire have now made that decision to retire so I think the answer is more midwives it's more midwives coming in we don't have a problem particularly in attracting people to come into the profession though so we do have a large number of people who apply to be student midwives. Our problem is then in retaining them. So retaining them during their education is really important. So we need to look seriously at reintroducing the bursary for student midwives and student nurses

as well. So they're not dealing with financial difficulties during a really tough course. And then we need to keep the midwives that we've already got, you know, as has been talked about already, we need to look after them. They've got great experience. They know what they're doing, but they need to have the support. I expect your answer, Mary, I'll come back to you in just one moment, Proscop. I expect your answer is going to be, of course, you know, people can be reassured, but there will be people listening to this who are thinking, well, is it safe to have a baby at the moment? If I hear that there are these conditions being endured by those who are meant to be caring for me, as a woman expecting, and men who are listening to this as well, what do you say to them? Absolutely. What we don't want to do is

give people unnecessary fear and concern during their pregnancy so it's a it's a difficult balance we want to raise the alarm we want to say to the government we need more midwives we need more support we need more sustained investment in maternity services and at the same time we don't want to create anxiety for the two women the two can't be the two can't be true i'm sorry to interrupt interrupt. But, you know, how can, let me put it to you, Proscar, how can it be the case that if you explain that, and you just painted a very vivid picture, that, you know, people are working round the clock having really difficult shifts, and there aren't enough people? How can that not cause concern for those receiving

the care as much as I also want to shine the light on those giving the care. I think that women you know should be reassured that everyone who is at work is working and they give their all to make sure they're committed to you it will be us that take the impact of the stress and the worry if I'm walking into a room with a woman and my job is to calm her down to make sure it's going to be fine I'm going to look after you I'm going to make sure that nothing's going to happen apart from the best experience possible i'm not going to walk into a room and be nervous and stressed and allow her to know that i'm concerned about what's going on out there we you know and in terms of retention that's absolutely right we've had students as a midwife you are you become a mentor um but what we're finding is that more and more students

are going straight, for instance, straight onto a run of night shifts after completing their training. Night shifts are very hard to get used to. And then you're dealing with everything else as well. And then they're just breaking. Three, six months in, we'll find them crying in a cupboard somewhere. We're trying to gather them up and reassure them that they'll get through it. They'll be fine. But in terms of, you know, the safety, patient safety, we do our absolute best. I don't think, yeah, so I think that's really important to hear.

And I think, especially from someone who's been doing it, you know, thank you for saying that. But just to come back to you, Mary, as the head of professional midwifery at the Royal College of Midwives, in October, the Care Quality Commission found at times staff numbers were so low at the East Kent Hospital Trust that women had to be transferred to different hospitals during labour. It also found, as people will remember, there weren't enough staff to keep mothers and babies safe at that hospital trust at the centre of a baby death scandal. Since 2011,

15 babies died in the trust's care. Yes, the CQC mentioned how much improvement had been made and there were comments of gratitude on that side of things, that things were getting better from the trust's point of view. But there is an example, a rare one, but there is an example not about the individuals who were on shift, but about the actual numbers causing potential issues. Yes, absolutely. And there are reports and there are reviews of very concerning situations like that. But the example of where you are transferring women to another unit, that is an example of midwives, heads of midwifery, keeping women safe. They're saying, we don't have enough staff in this unit, so we're going to need to transfer you to another unit. It's not something we ever want to do because we know it's so disruptive not to know the place where you're going in to give birth. So it isn't something we want to do, but there are those things that we can do to keep people safe. I think the other thing to remember is that we will always focus on labour and birth as our priority for making sure that we have that one midwife in the room with you you

know shutting the door and making that time special and really focused is it true other areas of service that really get affected actually and postnatally yeah no no no and that's very important sorry i didn't mean to cut you off i was going to say because postnatal especially um has been a huge area of concern for for a very long time as well and there's a there's a department of uh for health and Social Care statement here, which says midwives do an incredibly important job. We know how challenging it's been working through the pandemic. There are more midwives working across the NHS now

than at any other time in history. And we are aiming to hire, as I've said, 1,200 more with this £95 million recruitment drive. Is that the case? There are more midwives now working across the NHS than at any other time in history? I think it's really interesting the different figures that can be picked here. Yes, we have welcomed the investment that the government have announced and their intention to try to recruit a thousand more midwives. It's fraught with difficulty trying

to recruit those midwives. You know, where are we going to find them at the moment? Also, what we know from guidance from NHS providers is that actually maternity services need between 200 and 350 million pounds a year that continues to really provide high quality care. And that isn't the level of investment that we've seen announced by the government yet. And that is what we're needing to really make services really safe. The issue is not so much about numbers, because we do see a falling birth rate. But what we see is increased complexity of the women that we're looking after. We see far more women giving birth after the age of 40. We see more women who are giving birth when they've got real medical complications. And that means that they need more care. They need more assessment.

And so that puts more pressure on the service as well. Peroska Cavill and Dr Mary Ross-Davie there. Well, Denise got in touch to say nursing staff are under enormous stress due to the long 12 hour shifts they now have to work. How can someone work that long, Go home, rest, start again and have a family life or take any other responsibilities. When one person is off covering a 12-hour shift takes far more stress and strain. These shifts are appalling. Now you may have heard of Six, the musical. The show is a modern retelling of the lives of the six wives of Henry VIII, originally written by two Cambridge University

students. It's been delighting London's West End audiences for several years and recently opened on Broadway, no less. Lucy Moss, co-director and co-writer of the show, and Shamaya Bob-Egby, who's part of a brand new London cast and plays Henry VIII's fifth wife, Catherine Howard, joined Emma this week. Lucy started off by telling Emma where the idea for the show came from. It came from a desire to address the kind of imbalance that we felt there was in musical theatre in terms of meaty, funny parts for women.

So basically we were kind of looking for an idea that we could take to Edinburgh with a sort of famous subject matter that would have a famous group of women. And we were like who could that be oh the six wives great and then kind of all snowboard from there and and I really want to see this and it sounds like it's also quite uplifting but of course the stories of those women are anything but yes no it is quite it's quite a tragic tale um but I think yeah the overwhelming audience response is one of joy and I think it's because I

mean the show so it's a pop concert so it is like pop music and it is a kind of tongue-in-cheek playful use of their story and because it's so much more about empowerment and like lifting each other up and sort of celebrating the amazing people that we're seeing on stage as opposed to sort of actually what what literally happened yes I feel like we've sort of managed to find a way to make it not quite as depressing and also because it's sort of fun musical you can kind of rewrite history and change the ending you know indeed well let's have a little taste of the show, to the history mix. Switching up the flow as we add the briefings. Everybody knows that we used to be six wives. But now we're ex-wives, we're six.

We're ex-wives, very much so, and however the fate took them. Shamaya, good morning. Nice to have you on the programme. Good morning. Thanks for having me. Catherine Howard. Tell us, what happened to her again? Beheaded. That's the one. OK, I was trying to remember the rhyme from school. What drew you to this role? I really love roles that are women who have unexpected stories.

They're really powerful, intelligent women, but also have vulnerability which they try and manage and the role was just she's fun if you've ever seen the show Catherine Howard is really really fun tongue-in-cheek and she's just brings all the last but also she has another lades at her that you don't expect so I really love complicated roles so and that's why I went. So I really love complicated roles. So that's why I went for her. I also like this pop element to it. Is there a particular singer that you're channeling

or that you've decided to try and think about when you're belting your songs out? Yeah, so the character, correct me if I'm wrong, Lucy, is based off Ariana and Britney in terms of the costumes and the style of the song. But actually for me, I actually wrong Lucy um is based off Ariana and Britney in terms of the costumes and the style of the song but actually for me I actually had a session with Lucy and we thought I'm the first principal Blake um first principal Black Kay Howard um and I needed to relate the character to someone that I felt was more my vibe and we actually thought actually who's really cool

but also like a pop princess and I was like Rihanna used to do that you know I mean back in the day so actually my Catherine Howard is more based on Rihanna she's quite cool she's actually effortlessly beautiful stunning but also very funny and powerful that's kind of what and powerful you know she stops a room as soon as she walks in yeah well I mean and and Rihanna's doing better than Catherine Howard in many ways. She still has her head. Absolutely. I might not have mine after this programme.

Who knows? All sorts of things happen. But I know it's also really important for you, as you mentioned there, being a black actor in this, being a black performer, to make sure that we are seeing, certainly the audiences are seeing different people, different women taking that centre stage in these sorts of productions. to make sure that we are seeing, that certainly the audiences are seeing different people, different women taking that sense of stage in these sorts of productions. Tell us about that for you.

Our cast is one of the most diverse casts. The audition process was actually mind boggling. I would walk into the room and I was so inspired by the people that we saw, the trans women, different women of color different heights sizes it was so beautiful and even at that I was like I don't care if I get it everyone here is wonderful but then you were like I really want the role of course I mean you always kind of do where you kind of have to yeah of course and uh then we saw our cast and it's the same thing it's just a beautiful mix of women from different backgrounds. And whenever we see children, especially in the audience, young girls, it's like someone out there. Everyone can see a variation of who they are on stage. And it's really beautiful to be a part of that.

And I bet you've had some lovely moments with audience members and sort of meeting them and seeing them. I just, yes, I almost cry every night. Children are just as soon as I see young women in the audience, young girls in the audience, I just get very emotional because that was me. Yes. Well, and also I think, you know, just to come back to you, Lucy, I loved reading of your personal achievement, apart from this, of course, making you the youngest with this opening, six musical opening on Broadway in October at the end of last year. I mean, what a time for theatre as well during the pandemic. So well done on that as well. But making you the youngest female director of a musical in Broadway history. Brilliant.

Yeah, no, it's pretty wild. I mean, I suppose, how old are you? Let's try and understand if there's been lots of young men until this point. Well, here's the thing. So I'm 28 now, but I was 26 at the time when we when I you know got that crown as it were um and it was sort of the first sort of reaction is like oh my gosh I'm so fancy I'm so important youngest female director then you go wait hang on why is that and you look at how many men there were between the ages of 22

and 26 that had directed shows on Broadway and it was like oh yeah patriarchy right that's why it was just like so it's like a first quite like makes me feel kind of like I'm so fancy and then after that I'm like actually it's depressing yeah well there'll be many people who smash my record very well there you go she's laid down the gauntlet to all you young budding female theatre directors out there that was Lucy Moss and Shamaya Bob-Edby speaking with Emma about the brilliant Six, the musical. That's all for today's Woman's Hour. Join us again next time. My name's Jonathan Myerson, and I wrote and directed Nuremberg, the new scripted podcast from BBC Radio 4. My father was a lawyer, and he worked with several of the British prosecutors

who'd been at Nuremberg. So I grew up taking this huge trial for granted, the trial of the major Nazi war criminals. With six million murdered and ten million enslaved, how could these men not have faced justice? But it wasn't until I started researching that I discovered it very nearly didn't happen. In the end, verdicts were delivered and sentences were carried out. But was it justice

or was it vengeance? Subscribe to Nuremberg on BBC Sounds and you can make up your own mind. 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.