Woman's Hour - Weekend Woman's Hour: Landmark policy change in the Family Court, Essex Witches, Women rowing across the Pacific

Episode Date: October 25, 2025

The Essex witch trials represent one of the darkest chapters in British history. A new Sky History series, Witches of Essex, revisits the real lives of women accused of witchcraft in the 16th and 17th centuries, drawing on newly examined court records and the latest historical research. Historian Dr Eleanor Janega joins Nuala McGovern to discuss.A landmark change to the Family Courts has been announced this week - the court will no longer work on the presumption that having contact with both parents is in the best interest of the child. Domestic abuse campaigners have said the move will save children's lives. Nuala talks to Claire Throssel MBE, one of the campaigners who has driven this change. In October 2014, her two sons, Jack, who was 12, and Paul, who was nine, were deliberately killed by their father. He had been awarded five hours weekly access to the boys despite Claire's warnings that he was a danger to them.After 165 days at sea, two British women have just made history becoming the first pair to row non-stop and unsupported across the Pacific Ocean, from South America to Australia. Jess Rowe, 28, and Miriam Payne, 25, set off from Lima in May and arrived in Cairns in Australia on Saturday, completing more than 8,000 miles in their nine-metre boat, Velocity. Along the way they faced storms, broken equipment, and even navigated by the stars when their systems failed - they join Anita Rani to talk about the highs and lows of their Pacific adventure.Presenter: Anita Rani Producer: Simon Richardson

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. A new season of Love Me is here. Real stories of real, complicated relationships. It's not even like a gender. I mean, it's wrapped up in gender, but it's just a really deep self-hate. I think I cried almost every day. I just stole myself on the floor. It's coming on really straight.

It's like he's trying to date you all of a sudden. Yeah. And I do look like. my mother. Love me. Available now wherever you get your podcasts. Hello and welcome to the program, bringing you the highlights from the Woman's Hour Week. In today's show, what do you do when you're paddling across the Pacific and your water maker stops working? Sometimes we had to use a hand pumping water maker and it's actually harder work than rowing. And then on the first day we used that, the filter broke off.

Oh my gosh. So we have to fix that with a pair of pants. As you do. More from Jess Row and Miriam Payne, who just made history becoming the first pair to row non-stop and unsupported from South America to Australia. That's coming up. We're also going to hear a remarkable interview with Claire Thrussell, whose two sons were killed by their father. She's been campaigning for a change in family court policy, so the court will no longer work on the presumption that having contact with both parents

is in the best interest of the child, a change which has just been announced. But first, with Halloween approaching, let's start with the story of the Essex Witch Trials. A new Sky History series, Witches of Essex, revisits the real lives of the women accused of witchcraft in the 16th and 17th centuries, drawing on newly examined court records and the latest historical research. Historian Dr. Eleanor Janager, who is a contributor to the new series, joined Nula on Monday to explore what these trials can tell us about fear, power and gender in early modern England, and why the legacy of those witch hunts still resonates today.

I think that when we tend to say witch trials in England, everyone thinks Pendle right away. And absolutely no shade. Pendle is a very, very important centre for witch persecutions. But Essex is actually where we have the first recorded execution for witch hunts in the early modern period. So in many ways, this is kind of the spark that ignites the entire witch panics here. And what do you think we're learning now that we didn't know previously? One of the things that I think we are doing a really great job of understanding at this point in time is these social things that need to happen in order for a witch panic to take off. A witch panic.

Yeah. That's a good term. So that's the thing is that you can believe in witches, right, that they might exist for one reason or another. And that's one thing. It's another thing entirely to go around accusing women of being witches and go out of your way to execute them. So it really is a social contagion. It's something that makes people act in a way that they hadn't done before. And that's what's really crucial about understanding the witch panics is this is very much a feature of early modern society.

You're not going to get things like this in the medieval period. This is a specific modern problem. This is the Tudor period of what we're talking about, particularly under Elizabeth I first. And I was fascinated by certain things that gave rise to the witch panic that you look at. For example, the equivalent of a gossip rag at the. time. But gossip can get you killed. Absolutely. So gossip is a real problem in the early modern world because the way people comport themselves and the way that you make contacts with each other is through your reputation. And so if people take against you, they can just completely decide that

you are outside of the normal protections of society. And we have these chat books, which are essentially gossip rags at the time. And they do a couple of things. One, they spread this contigent, this idea that women might be doing, you know, terrible magic and harming their neighbors. But also there is this thing in it for the people who are publishing it, because this is a way for the men that are running these witch trials to make a name for themselves. So say you're posted out in Essex and you want a plum job in London, a way to get a name for yourself is by publishing a chat book, saying, look at all these witches I found, and then suddenly you're no longer in the provinces. You can be in the heart of everything. Let's talk about sex as well,

because we kind of have the Virgin Queen on one way. You enlighten me to something that I was watching about the image of a witch flying on a broomstick and what that's all about. Yeah, the broomstick is a kind of double entendre and it's a phallic syndrome. So, you know, it's not something that we would twig now, but in the early modern period,

everyone goes, ha ha, I understand what that is. She's kind of getting it on with Satan. Exactly. And this is one of the big beliefs about witchcraft at the time is that the way that you become a witch is by attending Ortees with Satan. And it sounds incredibly laughable now, but this is a really, really serious idea

that they have at the time. So it's kind of like a sexual contogen is what makes you a witch. So by the time that you are willing to have sex with Satan, who knows who else you might be having sex with. So this is a way of controlling women's sexual behavior, whether this is queer women who are having sex

with each other, women who are having sex outside of the bounds of marriage or people who, for example, are having sex for commercial reasons. And the promiscuity, of course, coming into with cunning women as they were also called. What is it that you would love to know that hasn't been discovered yet?

You know, one of the things that I don't think there's never going to be a possibility of discovering this. And I guess this is our job as historians. This is why we make programs like this. This is why we do the research. But I am quite interested in when women admit to witchcraft. Oh, yeah. That was so interesting. Why would you admit?

Yeah. And I mean, I think that one of the things that we look at with some of these accusations and the people who admit it, probably a lot of it is I want to save my daughter, who has also been accused. And someone has to go down for this. They're not going to take no for an answer. So I'm going to throw myself on that particularized grenade. I think that others, it's just a result of torture. You know, if you were kept awake for two days straight and walking the entire time when you only have one leg, you might to admit to all sorts of things. But we certainly see in particularized trials, people who just really do become convinced that they are witches, you know, for example, in the Pendle trials, someone curses someone because he doesn't give her pins. And then she says, oh, I hope that you, the devil takes you and he falls down. And then she goes, oh, my God. Yeah, my power. I am a witch, you know. But it's difficult to get ourselves in that same headspace. But I think it's really important to recognize that different parts of time, people have beliefs for particular reasons, and we kind of have to respect it. I don't like it, obviously. But, you know, we have to understand that, you know, the past is a

foreign country, as historians love to say. The past is a foreign country, but you have said before that history can act like a mirror for the present. Oh, absolutely. And I think that this is why this program is so important. Because one of the things that you see with which panics is we have something that is essentially built out of whole cloth that begins to oppress women. You don't see oppression like this or accusations of witchcraft like this over the medieval period. It's an intensely modern thing. And it coincides with a rolling back of women's ability to participate in public life. You have big figureheads like Elizabeth I, so incredibly powerful women can continue to participate in society. But poor women or annoying women or women who just kind of

rub people the wrong way are increasingly violently patrolled. And this is a lot of. And this is something that I think is incredibly important to look at now. Because women's rights aren't something that just sort of happens. People tend to look at history as just a means of everything becoming better over time. And that's not how these things work. Sometimes things get intensely worse suddenly. And this is what's happening during the witch panics. Historian Dr. Eleanor Yanaga, the Witches of Essex, is available to watch on Sky History. Still to come on the program, what's it like rowing across the Pacific Ocean, while your equipment is falling apart around you.

And remember, you can enjoy a woman's hour any hour of the day if you can't join us live at 10 a.m. during the week. All you need to do is subscribe to the podcast. It's free every day from BBC Sounds. But now it's time to hear an extraordinary conversation with a tireless campaigner touched by tragedy. A landmark change to the family courts was announced on Wednesday. The court will no longer work on the presumption

that having contact with both parents is in the best interest of the child. Domestic abuse campaigners have said that the change will save children's lives. On Wednesday morning, Nula spoke to Claire Thrustle MBE alongside her MP, Marie Tidball. In October 2014,

Claire's two sons, Jack, who was 12, and Paul, who was nine, were deliberately killed by their father. He'd been awarded five hours weekly access to the boys, despite Claire's warnings that he was a danger.

to them. And I need to warn you, you may find the following details distressing. He'd lured the boys to the attic of his home to play with trains he'd bought them before setting fire around the house. Claire has been one of the campaigners who's driven this change to the court's policy, and she began by describing to Nula a memento of her boys which she'd brought into the studio. So this is one of my favourite photographs, and it's a photograph of when Jack did a solo in his concert. So he's in the school uniform. He's in his band uniform and he's posing at the side, just stood and then Paul perched on the stage at the side of him and just put his hand on his

shoulder, as if you say, this is my big brother. Took the photograph and immortalised it and then just a couple of moments later, Jack says, okay, take your hand off my shoulder now. Properly brotherly affection. And the fact it's on a music stand at the side of me is just perfect because Jack loved music. That was his life and I was so proud to be his mum. You know, it's been 11 years. This has been announced today on the anniversary of the death of Paul when that horrendous tragedy occurred. And I'm just wondering how you're feeling today in the sense of all that you have achieved, but on the back of such heartache. It doesn't feel like a win. No, I'm sure. What had you said?

to the family courts and really the system around it before this tragedy occurred? I had to apply to court for an emergency residency order and I said in that application that he was capable of killing the boys I'd lived with him, they'd lived with him, I'd ended up being punched on my arm and thrown down the stairs with the force of it, the boys had seen that. I had to protect the boys and many times,

I got in the way between the boys and him there was a red mist in his eyes and he was just pure evil there was the very first case that had been reported the year before the father had taken his two children to the woods in Wales and killed them and then shot himself he was sat on the sofa and it didn't affect him at all

and he just turned around and he said well I understand it fathers aren't treated the same as mothers and I just went cold the fact that he couldn't process that children had been killed and he thought that that man had a right to do that because he was their father, it just said it all and I knew that he was capable of killing them because I got in the way and took all the injuries for the boys

I'd live with him and I saw the evil and the fact that there was no filter And so you voiced to anybody who would listen or wouldn't listen, as the case was, of your concerns for their safety. Did the court give you any reason on why they thought it was still in the best interests of your children to spend unsupervised time with their father, despite what you had told them? It's because of practice direction 12J underneath the Children's Act. and underneath there it says judges will automatically presume it's in the child's best interest to see both parents and I say says who because judges are strangers to children and to us

they get snapshots of children's lives then they make a decision and those decisions are ending children's lives they minimised the danger they minimised everything I said it was either parental alienation or I was I was exaggerating or I was being vindictive. But I tried to protect both Kafka and social services. I said to both, do not see him on your own

because there were ladies. I said because he will turn, he will become nasty and aggressive and unsafe. They both ignored me and saw him on their own and the Kafka officer was barricaded in her office by him two days before the fire. And still that didn't change the parental supervision. unsupervised should I also say

Yeah and when we went to court outside the courtroom He had a go at me as well outside the courtroom We were late going into court And still contact was granted They knew domestic abuse was prevalent They ordered a section 7 report And said that KFCAS needed to complete that report But still unsupervised contact

For five hours a week the Kafka officer had said, oh, he's dangerous. I want people that's higher up than me in future meetings. Well, if she couldn't handle him and didn't feel safe, how did she think a 12-a-9-year-old felt? And it is Paul, as we were talking about today, and also talking, of course, about Jack. and it's important to say their names, I know, because they were referred to as child A and B for so long. I do see you have tattooed their names on your chest as well, of course, as another reminder.

I want to read a little of the statement that we have from Kafka, which advises the family courts about the welfare of children and what is in the best interests of the child. They say, we welcome the government's decision announced today. The safety and welfare of every child is always and must continue to be paramount. This is the first principle of the Children Act of 1989 that holds firm today. Children's experiences of parental separation, conflict,

and in the worst cases, further abuse and harm can be obscured by a legal presumption of contact. Putting children's safety at the heart of the family court proceedings that are about them is what we must and will continue to prioritise at Kafka. How does that feel hearing that now, Claire? It's a complete 360 for what they were saying 10 years ago. They're forced to do it now because we've removed presumption of contact out of law and now they're going to have to change their practice

the way that they think, the way that they treat people. Let me bring in the MP, Marie Titball. You are her constituent as well. You've also been campaigning for changes to the family court. What type of cases will repealing the current law effect? Morning, I just want to say I'm so hugely proud of Claire, my constituent. She's done a phenomenal job to get us to where we are today. And the change that we will be taking about will repeal an amendment that was brought by the 2014 Children's

Act, which always, which says that having both parents involved in a child's life is always prioritised over the child's safety, including where there is a known history of domestic violence. that means in practice that the burden has been on the victims to rebut the presumption of child involvement. So in Claire's case, for example, she talks about the horrendous moment when she took the fist that was aimed at one of her sons and herself fell down the stairs and had to lay that out before the court and tell them, and the burden was on her to tell them that this was not in the interest for her husband to. have contact with her children and the courts ignored her, Kalkas ignored her, social services ignored her. So the groups of people

that will be affected by this are just those that are at risk of being murdered and homicide. It's a whole swathe of children up and down this country living in a household where there is a known domestic abuser and where the parents separate and they go to the family courts

and it will mean that there's no longer that legal presumption that it's always in a child's best interest for them to have involvement with both parents. And this is really important. Not just 67 children have died. That's 67 children that we know of in the last 30 years. But we also know that around 60% of cases in the family courts involve domestic abuse. And in the nine months from April 2024, and then estimated 49% to 62% of private law. Children that cases that Casca received involved over

40,000 children who will have experienced domestic abuse and that includes physical and sexual abuse as well. So this scoops up and captures and protects those children that are at risk of that kind of abuse as well. And those numbers are staggering. I want to read a little from the Ministry of Justice. Their statement says the repeal is a landmark moment for the family justice system and child protections,

which is dedicated to Jack and Paul Thrussel killed at the hands of their abusive father in 2014. We will legislate to repeal the presumption of parental involvement when parliamentary time allows. Now that gave me pause. When will parliamentary time allow, Marie? As soon as we possibly can, I know that Claire knows that she has a group of us in Parliament,

me as her constituency MP, some phenomenal ministers at the MOJ and the Home Office, and now the Prime Minister, who will deliver this. We went to meet him in Downing Street yesterday. When I was first standing as a candidate, I said to Claire, I will help you keep your promise to your voice, for their voices to be heard, for us to repeal this law. And we went to see the Prime Minister yesterday,

and he said to us that he will deliver on that promise. So this will happen as soon as parliamentary time allows. And that just means we have to wait to make sure that there's a bill that this can be put into and to draft an amendment which enables us to repeal what was done through the 2014 Children's Act. So that just means we've got to get the text of this amendment right to repeal the law. And that will happen as soon as parliamentary time allows for a bill to bring us forward. In a number of months? As soon as possible, as soon as this is in scope of a relevant bill, I know colleagues will work extremely hard to make this happen as soon as possible.

And what's really key here is that under our reforms, if parents are going through the family courts, and those parents can't guarantee a safe environment for their children, they should expect their involvement in that child's life to be restricted. And that's hugely significant. Let me go back to Claire. You've waited 11 years. How's your patience threshold? I've waited 11 years. I don't want to wait 11 more. But let's be honest.

For 30 years, the family courts have let down children, have failed to protect them, have failed to see, here, believe and support them. They mustn't be allowed to fail them for 30 more. And I hope it goes through as quickly as possible next year. Today is the 11th anniversary of Paul. And I held him in my arms as he died. I made him a promise.

That promise Maria has taken up and has given to the Prime Minister. And the Prime Minister has promised he's going to deliver on this legislation. and I have to keep that hope alive. I have to keep that belief alive and I believe in this government. Marie and Sarkir and Alex and Sarah they have fought tirelessly to get this through. As I say, this is the sixth government

and the only government that's actually done something. So I'd like to say to everybody out there there's still hope if you believe in something and keep going and keep believing. And sometimes good things do happen. That was Claire Thrustle, MBE, alongside MP Marie Tidball. And if you've been affected by anything you've heard in the programme so far, then please do visit the BBC Action Line website.

And remember if there's a story you'd like us to cover on Woman's Hour, then please feel free to get in touch with us by emailing the program via our web. A new season of Love Me is here. real stories of real, complicated relationships. It's not even like a gender. I mean, it's wrapped up in gender, but it's just a really deep self-hate. I think I cried almost every day. I just stole myself on the floor.

It's coming on really straight. It's like he's trying to date you all of the sudden. Yeah, and I do look like my mother. Love Me, Available Now, wherever you get your podcasts. website. Let's finish with the inspirational story of two remarkable and, as we're about to hear, extremely resourceful women. After 165 days at sea, they've made history, becoming the first pair to row non-stop and unsupported across the Pacific Ocean, from South America to Australia. Jess Row 28 and Miriam Payne 25 set off from Lima in Peru in May and arrived in Cairns in Australia

on Saturday, completing more than 8,000 miles in their 9-meter boat velocity. Along the way, they face storms, broken equipment, and even navigated by the stars when their systems failed. When they joined me on Thursday, I began by asking them what it feels like to be back on dry land. Oh, it's really strange. It's quite overwhelming. We're finding at the moment, because our life has been so regimented for six months, just even being in a supermarket and making a choice of what sandwich to buy is quite hard. eating actual food and not rehydrated food. I've got to ask you, why?

What made you want to do? Well, we both, so we met when we were rowing across the Atlantic Ocean back in 2022 in the Talasco Whiskey Atlantic Challenge, which is now called the World's Toughest Row. It's a 3,000-mile rowing race from Lagamara in the Canary Islands to Antigua in the Caribbean. And we both just absolutely loved our time out there and decided why not, you know, try and row across the biggest ocean. And we thought it would be a perfect opportunity.

to raise money for the Outward Bound Trust, of which I think we're over £100,000 now. But you both work full-time. So how did you juggle working, training, and also getting the time off? With great difficulty. I think we almost maybe got more sleep when we got on the ocean. So we were, yeah, working full-time, it was a huge juggle because it's an independent expedition. And we organised the whole thing ourselves. So there was a lot of late nights and a lot of early mornings. We were up to all time. two in the morning, especially the last couple months before we flew to Peru, just sorting all the admin out and bits and pieces. So, yeah, with great difficulty. What was it like being stuck on a boat? You were there for five months, just the two of you.

I mean, that is, you're taking a, I mean, it doesn't matter how much you like somebody. That is still a risk. Yeah, it was definitely a risk, but we were so lucky if didn't have a single argument. We got on so well throughout and, yeah, just had a laugh every day. And, yeah, it could have gone pretty badly wrong. if we weren't getting on. But yeah, we're already excited to, you know, do some things together in the future.

Okay, well, that's good. Okay, so that's one tick that you got on for five months. But particularly hairy moments. I had to look at, in my mind, when I was reading about the two of you, I thought, were they just in a tiny little canoe? I mean, it's not a huge boat that you're in, but you're so exposed. I mean, weather, what, tell us about some of the scariest moments

that you had to encounter. Yeah, so we actually, everybody's surprised, but we actually didn't have a time that we were scared at all. We got frustrated and, you know, we got really grumpy at times, but we were never scared. But we just felt like everything that could have gone wrong just about did go wrong. Like what? Well, on our first attempt, our rudder totally delaminated,

and we found out that was due to manufacturing error. Then the same, it's looked like the same issue was starting with a spare rudder, so we couldn't fit that into the housing. We then tried to change our daggerboard into a rudder, snapped all our drill bits and blunted all those. So then we had to get rescued back to Peru by our good friend, Alec Hughes, that we've met there. Then on the second attempt... How frustrating was that?

Yeah. I mean, so incredibly frustrating, but we're just so lucky that our friend, Alec, could come and rescue us and save the expedition, and our parents and everybody back home were so busy behind the scenes trying to organise spare rudders to get sent out to Peru. And then on the second attempt, we were, I think, six days in, and our, well, we started having major power issues and slowly had to start switching off all of our equipment. A lot of, most of the way really struggled to run essentials.

We were hand-steering a lot of the time. It got a little bit better once we got closer to Australia with the thinner ozone layer. But on that same week, our water maker pipe started bursting and we found out that they'd be fit with, some sections would be fit with pipes at warm rated for the pressure, meaning that they would continue bursting. and I think we made nine repairs in the end

before somebody managed to figure out a bypass system for us and that took 100 days of just sort of like constantly waiting for it to go and in that time sometimes we had to use a hand pumping water maker which is really not ideal that only makes three litres an hour compared to the electric one which makes 10 and it's actually harder work than rowing

and then on the first day we used that the filter broke off so we had to fix that with a pair of pants Yeah, it just felt like everything was just going wrong all the time. That's the level of detail we want here on women's hour. You had to fix it with a pair of pants. My kind of women. So let's talk a bit more about the practicalities.

When did you sleep? What did you eat? And what did you do about, you know, just your periods? So we were doing two hours on, two hours off. So we'd row for two hours. And then we'd rest or sort of fix bits on the boat, wash ourselves, make food in the two hours off. But as we got closer to the middle of the crossing, we were just rowing more and more every day.

It's so hot in the cabins. It's like a sauna. It's absolutely horrible. And yeah, towards the end, we were actually just rowing all day together. And then we do two hours on, two hours off just at night time. Food, we were eating, well, we are supposed to try and eat about 5,000 calories a day. But we didn't quite manage it because we really struggled with the food. So we were eating dehydrated and freeze-dried food.

So you just add water to it. And it's got no texture to it. whatsoever it just tastes like mush. And then also we had snack packs. So we had 1,500 calories of snacks every day. So that was built on nuts, dried fruit, chocolate, biscuits, flapjacks. We actually finished all of our snacks quite a few weeks before finishing. Oh no. Yeah, ran out of chocolate quite early on. And then periods on the crossing, very much the same as at home. We had sustainable tampons that we used and our bucket is a loo. So it's a bucket and chucket situation. Yeah.

So what will you do next, the two of you? Are you already planning it? Oh, I think catch up on five and a half months of sleep deprivation. Quite right. Yeah, there's always going to be more adventures for us. There'll always be something, but not too sure what's next yet. Rowe's Jess Row and Miriam Payne got to know each other very well. That's it from me today.

On Monday, Nula will be talking to the singer and actor Petula Clark, whose career has spanned eight decades. 92, she's finally written her autobiography, and she recounts her journey from child star to music, film and theater legend. Do join her at 10 a.m. Enjoy the rest of your weekend. A new season of Love Me is here. Real stories of real, complicated relationships. It's not even like a gender. I mean, it's wrapped up in gender, but it's just a really deep self-hate. I think I cried almost every day. I just stood myself on the floor. He's coming on really straight.

It's like he's trying to date you all of the sudden. Yeah, and I do look like my mother. Love Me. Available now wherever you get your podcasts.