Woman's Hour - Weekend Woman’s Hour: Refuges, Mary Robinson, Polar Preet, Vicky Pattison’s deep fake doc, Rumer

Episode Date: February 1, 2025

In the last year, women with disabilities experienced domestic abuse at more than twice the rate of those without, according to the latest figures from the Crime Survey for England and Wales. Yet data from Women’s Aid shows less than 1% of refuge vacancies in England are suitable for wheelchair users. Where does this leave women with disabilities impacted by domestic abuse? Anita Rani hears one anonymous woman’s experience and is joined by Angie Airlie, CEO of Stay Safe East and Rebecca Goshawk, a director of Solace Women’s Aid.Mrs Robinson is a feature-length documentary about Ireland’s first female president, Mary Robinson. Telling the story of her childhood and career for the first time on screen, it was filmed over three years, and takes a deep-dive into Mary Robinson’s career as she discusses the significant controversies throughout her tenure, her own professional regrets and examines how her gift for bridging differences was instrumental in bringing about seismic change in Ireland. Mary Robinson joined Clare McDonnell to talk about it.Preet Chandi, better known as Polar Preet, broke world records in 2023 when she made the longest solo and unsupported journey across Antarctica, crossing 922 miles in 70 days. Now Preet is setting her sights on the North Pole, hoping to cross 500 miles of sea ice to reach it in under 70 days. She joined Anita to discuss why she’s making the change to the North Pole, how she plans to get there and how she plans on dealing with polar bears.Reality star turned documentary filmmaker Vicky Pattison joined Clare to discuss her latest project, Vicky Pattison: My Deepfake Sex Tape. The documentary sees her exploring the proliferation of videos generated by AI, whereby people’s faces are placed onto pornographic images and shared without their consent. Vicky talked about creating her own deepfake sex tape and looks at the impact the phenomenon is having on women and girls.The singer-songwriter Rumer is a MOBO award winner and double Brit Award nominee. Her new album In Session is out, celebrating the 15th anniversary of her platinum debut album Seasons Of My Soul. The success that followed that album affected Rumer's mental health. She stepped away from the industry and relocated to the US. Now back in the UK she has returned to the record that has shaped so much of her life both professionally and personally. Rumer joined Anita to talk about her life and to perform live in the studio.Presenter: Anita Rani Producer: Annette Wells Editor: Rebecca Myatt

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. Just to say that for rights reasons, the music in the original radio broadcast has been removed for this podcast. Hello and welcome. This is where we handily collate a selection of standout moments from the week on Woman's Hour. And by the way, if you want to hear more of what you missed, do subscribe to the Woman's Hour podcast on BBC Sounds. It's free. So coming up, Mary Robinson, the first female president of Ireland on a new documentary about her life, the highlights, controversies and professional regrets. Reality star turned documentary maker Vicky Patterson,

the star of Geordie Shore and I'm a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here, released a new doc this week looking at the world of deep fakes. In it, Vicky makes an explicit deep fake of herself. We ask her why. And the explorer Preet Chandi, who journeyed solo to the South Pole in 2022, is at it again with a challenge to become the first woman to travel solo and unsupported to the North Pole. And we have music from the singer and songwriter Vrooma. It's a dreamy performance. I'm excited for you to hear it. So let's begin. In the last year, women with disabilities experienced domestic abuse at

more than twice the rate than those without, according to the latest figures from the Crime Survey for England and Wales. Yet data from Women's Aid shows less than 1% of refuge vacancies in England are suitable for wheelchair users and only 1.8% of vacancies could accommodate a woman with limited mobility. So where does this leave women with disabilities impacted by domestic abuse and what can be done about it? Well earlier this week I spoke to a woman we are calling Lise. She told me about her experience of domestic abuse by a former partner and the challenges she faced in finding safe accommodation. Her words are voiced by an actor.

There were many difficulties in trying to get to a safe accommodation. I found nobody was willing to take responsibility. It was always, it's a housing matter. No, it's a police matter. No, it's a social care matter. No, it's a health matter. I mean, I was fortunate that I was able to get to safety to my family. It's always the same thing. Agencies, professional bodies do not work together and it's

always someone else's responsibility or problem. The challenges I faced, one of them really, really affected my mental well-being was I was trying to get into a refuge. Now, as a disabled person, that was one of the biggest challenges I faced for multiple reasons. One of them was accessibility of a refuge that would meet my needs. We looked for a very long time. There was no refuges around the whole of the UK at that time. It wasn't just a particular city, but the whole of the UK when they weren't able to find me a refuge that was able to meet my needs. What are your needs, Lise? Can you tell us about the disability?

My disability is a physical impairment. It would have been a level access property certain types of doors that was one of the issues the second issue was I was under a hospital treatment and I would be taken and brought back from hospital via hospital transport service however that was one of the things what was the reasons why refuges would not even accept me. So one of them was accessibility. So they couldn't find an accessible property. But the second one was most of the transport drivers were male. And despite my constant pleas that they are DBS checked, it was a policy that refuges would not allow male transport staff

into the property to take me in and out. And you needed the extra support? I needed that. There wasn't a way that I could meet them outside. My mobility was extremely limited. Please tell me about how that felt. Sometimes they would tell me there may be a refuge space available. Please have your belongings ready. And I would gather the very few things I had. And then I'd wait, thinking today's probably the time I'm going to be able to get away somewhere safe because he knew where I was living because it was a family home so he wasn't leaving me alone and then to get that call well unfortunately because of the transport issue and the accessibility I mean they already knew my needs. Who was telling you that your needs

couldn't be met and that there were no spaces? It was external agencies and also another local authority agency who was trying to help me get into a safe place. That was probably where I was made to feel like because I have a disability, I'm not a priority. My life doesn't matter because at this point, this person, this perpetrator, was continuously stalking, harassing, turning up at my family home, and the police were coming multiple times a day. And it was day and night. I mean, I was scoring on the police dash system. I was scoring the highest in terms of the risk imposed to myself because of the perpetrator.

I was extremely shocked. I thought to myself, with the scoring that I'm getting, with the level of my needs in terms of my health, the danger that I was in, if I couldn't get into a refuge space, then who is and who was? And where are these support systems? I was very, very, I very I mean emotionally I think I broke I broke down I'm so sorry to hear this lease eventually you got a restraining order out against him and he served custodial sentence for breaching orders you were then provided with local authority temporary accommodation how's that been how are you now where are you now well the temporary accommodation that I was offered originally was not suitable in terms of my health issues it

didn't meet my disabilities at all I was in a very high-rise flat often trapped in my home because of lifts that I wasn't able to access I had to go through a judicial review to now be put into another temporary accommodation, which still doesn't meet my access needs. The property is very damp. People with disabilities, and I'm sure you're aware, Lisa, we mentioned this at the start of the programme, are far more likely to be a victim of domestic abuse than anyone else.

So what changes do you think are needed to help people with disabilities feel safe and safe enough to leave their abusers. We need people to be educated, professional bodies to be educated, and also it needs to be implemented by the government where disabled people matter. People need to hear that there is help out there for people who want to leave, and it's so much harder for disabled people to leave. The words of a woman we are calling Lise. I was also joined by Angie Airlie, CEO of Stay Safe East,

which provides specialist advocacy and support services to disabled people who are experiencing a range of issues related to domestic abuse and crime, and Rebecca Goshawk, a director at Solace Women's Aid, a charity that works with women and children experiencing domestic violence. I began by asking Angie what she made of what Lise had to say. I wish I could say that her experiences were unusual, but unfortunately they are the kind of experiences

which our service users are facing on a daily basis. So, so many barriers they experience to getting to safety, particularly in relation to housing. So we have many victim survivors that can't get into refuge. Their needs are labelled as too complicated or too complex and refuges don't feel that they can support them or there just isn't the accommodation out there to meet their needs. So unfortunately, Lisa's situation is something that we encounter

on a daily basis. Rebecca, what do you think of Lisa's testimony and what she had to say? At Solace, we do have spaces that are wheelchair accessible, but it's only in some of the properties we have. Often they are not, you know, they it's only in some of the properties we have. Often they are not, you know, they are owned by landlords rather than the charities themselves. And that means we don't, we aren't always able to make the changes we want to, to those buildings to ensure that there is sufficient spaces that have that wheelchair access. We think it's really important that there are more spaces across the UK to ensure that survivors can get that support when they need it. Yeah, you provide refuge accommodation to survivors in London. How many do you have

and what percentage of those spaces can accommodate people with disabilities? We have 178 spaces and six of those are fully wheelchair accessible, but we do make adaptations to other rooms. For example, we do have a lot that are ground floor accessible, or when people come in, we can make adaptations to rooms. For example, those things like vibrating fire alarms or flashing lights to ensure that we can meet people's needs. But we know it's not as many as we need. Have you had to turn women away? We have, yes, because often those spaces are already full when people come to us. So yeah, unfortunately we have. We will often work to look for housing, whether that's through temporary accommodation with local authorities. We're often advocating for women with housing departments. But yeah, we absolutely have had to say that we don't have those rooms available for women when they need them. And that's not good enough. Across England, we need to ensure there's sufficient spaces. Yeah, absolutely. And then Angie, obviously, they come to you because you advocate on their behalf. I think we need to understand one of the stats that we said at the beginning,

that women with disabilities are more than twice as likely to experience domestic abuse than women without. Can you explain a bit more? Why is that? Why is the abuse different? I think there's quite a multitude of reasons. So it starts right back in the education system. So very often disabled young people are not considered sort of people who need to be educated about relationships, for example. So they might not have the same level of sexual relationships relationships education that people who aren't disabled would have i think also sadly some abusers as we know that abusers thrive on power and they do see disabled women as almost being like the ideal victim because it's somebody that they can control um with a greater level of control. And there are very specific ways in which disabled women do experience abuse. So, for example, we often see that perpetrators label themselves as carers and they will sort of represent themselves in that position to external agencies.

They may control medication, so that might be taking away medication or giving too much medication as a form of control. There are also high levels of coerced sex within domestic abuse situations for disabled women. And women just feel that they can't say no, because again, it comes back to that whole self-esteem issue, that feeling of being less than and not deserving to have a safe and happy relationship. So what happens then when we heard from Lise, if you finally got the courage to get out, there's nowhere for you to go, there's no safe accommodation that can accommodate you and then they come to you Angie, what happens then? What's the conversation that takes place?

Well often sadly Anita, we can only see our clients as safe as possible so it's interesting because the Domestic Abuse Act back in 2021 defined safe accommodation but the definition of safe accommodation doesn't really work for disabled victim survivors just because there isn't the accommodation out there. So our caseworkers, our IDFAs, work really hard to do very intense safety planning for that person. And it has to be very creative. I'm going back to what Lise was saying about agencies not working together. We have to work collaboratively with housing, with police, with adult social care, children's services, to try and make that person a little bit safer if possible.

Ideally, everybody would be completely safe, but sometimes that just isn't the lived reality for the victim-survivors that we're working with. Rebecca, one of the things that Lise said was that she's just passed from pillar to post and nobody wants to say that it's their responsibility. Whose responsibility is it? I think it's everyone's. As L as Lisa said and I think as Angie said there's a number of services that

should be supporting survivors that is the police that is housing departments that is adult social care and charities who who have that expertise around safety planning that Angie mentioned and we similarly see that those organisations are not working together. It can be very slow for particularly adult social care to if someone needs to move areas, they're very slow to move with the survivor to kind of create that support in a are suitable for women using wheelchairs. We attempted to gather stats for the rest of the UK, but we've only received data from Northern Ireland. I mean, obviously, given it's a much smaller population, but Northern Ireland has the smallest network of refuges in the UK. They're all operated by Women's Aid. I know you two know this, but they reported that 42% of their refuge accommodations are fully wheelchair accessible. It's just one set of figures but if they can do it why can't we do it in England Angie? I think there's several sort of barriers in the way to having further accessible accommodation. So for starters as Rebecca referenced when some an organization has a refuge contract generally

the property comes along with the contract so often kind of rolls over for years and years that the same property is used for that refuge and often the properties just aren't suitable for adaptation so for example in London it's very common to have buildings which are townhouses with multiple flights of stairs that could never be made accessible with the best will in the world. So I think that what we need is capital funding to invest in further refuge provision that is suitable for disabled victims. That unfortunately didn't come with the Domestic Abuse Act. There was pots of funding that went to local authorities called New Burdens Funding, but that didn't come with capital funding. That was only for supporting people. So that needs to change, I think, as part of the government's ambition to halve violence against women and girls.

I would really like them to totally look again at the way that refuges are funded yeah well we asked the local government association as you say fund many of the women's refuge centres across the uk for a statement councillor heather kid chair of their safer and stronger committees board said any instance of domestic abuse needs to be taken seriously and councils work hard to provide the required support and refuge for victims and survivors as soon as possible this support takes into account cases where individuals have extra vulnerabilities and are at greater risk. Councils continue to face severe financial challenges and increased demand for services.

Rehousing victims and survivors is also impacted by the housing crisis. To provide the support and refuge that people need, councils need to be sufficiently resourced and access to appropriate housing. We did ask the government for a statement on that funding, but they have yet to respond. Rebecca, what do you make of that? Yeah, we understand that there are challenges with local government finance, but I think there is an opportunity to have a kind of bespoke funding pot that is accessible to make those changes to buildings. I think we need to look at, you know, adapting some of those buildings that are suitable

for wheelchair accessible with some small changes, but also looking at creating kind of bespoke and specialist refuges that actually can be built for the purpose of supporting survivors with wheelchair access. And I think, you know, we need to see funding attached to that. Angie Airlie and Rebecca Goshawk there.

And if you've been affected by anything you've heard in our conversation there are links to support and resources online just head to the BBC Actionline website. Now Mary Robinson was the first female president of Ireland and now her journey to that epoch-changing moment is documented in the new film Mrs Robinson, a feature-length documentary all about her life. Filmed over three years using home archive footage, Mary Robinson tells the story of her childhood and takes a deep dive into her career.

The film also examines how she bridge divides to help bring about social and political change in Ireland. Well, Mary Robinson joined Claire Macdonald this week and Claire asked what it was like to watch her life back. Well, I didn't actually want to make the film, but I had a very dear friend and an advisor when I was president for the seven years who always told me the things I needed to hear.

And she said, Mary, this isn't really about you. Yes, it's about you, but people need inspiration, especially women. And you've had a good life and I think you should do it and she made it possible and sadly died almost immediately after the film was completed so it's dedicated to her but I now understand it does as you say tell a story a social history of how Ireland struggled and many of us you know had to fight for women's rights that are taken for granted now by younger people in Ireland. Yeah, I mean, it feels like the audience gets a very honest view of you personally, your background, your work, the things that matter most to you.

And you just said it, the things that are at the top of that list, the interests of women and gender equality. Why was that always so key for you? I think I blame my parents, if you like. They were medical doctors. I was the only girl wedged between four brothers. And they kept saying to me, Mary, you have all the opportunities your brothers have. And I knew this wasn't the case. Even at the very beginning, they were altar boys.

There was no such thing as an altar girl. I had to wear this awful scarf in church. And we were a very religious family, weekly mass. And I knew from everything I perceived in wider society that women were not equal. So I think I had this sense of injustice that drove me into making it so. I was going to do everything I could to make it the way my parents told me it was. And you say in the documentary you felt you didn't have the right kind of look. So you had to try even harder to be academically brilliant. That struck me as quite sad. How do you reflect on that now? I think it was just a reflection I had that I had very handsome brothers. And somehow, although I was the only girl, I wasn't a beauty. And therefore, I had to just try a bit harder

to be clever and achieve things and make a difference. You certainly did that. People will remember you're the first female president of Ireland from 1990 to 97. And the odds of you winning that, 100 to 1 outsider, first of all. And you go in the documentary, you weren't entirely sure that this is something you should do.

What changed your mind? I think it was reading the oath of office, which is in our constitution, and seeing we have a direct election by all the people. So it's outside politics. It's a choice of the people. And yet the six men who had been presidents before me had been kind of elder statesmen or elder judges who hadn't really done much other than be the president, do state visits abroad, use the red carpet and abound if they went anywhere. And they weren't relevant. But I could

see from the oath that a president could be relevant at local level, at national level, and hopefully even at international level. And I wanted to make the case for that when I started. I didn't start when I was nominated by the Labour Party and running as an independent. I didn't expect to win by any standards, but I wanted to make the case for whoever became president. We thought it was going to be the deputy prime minister, who was a popular guy and who was going to be the nominee of the party that had owned the presidency, if you like. And looking back at that footage, you were clearly a singular woman in a sea of men. And when the odds started to shorten and it looked like you might actually win you were the receiving end for a fair bit of sexism weren't you from from your opponents yes there was a particular radio

program when a minister at the time said you know and about mary robinson who's reinvented herself and her newfound interest in family very very wounding stuff and initially i was very hurt by it and then i saw the response and that people were outraged, particularly women. And I think it helped in the end to secure the victory. And Bride, of course, my great friend, had a good sense of humor. And she sent 24 red roses to this minister on behalf of the women of Ireland after the election. So she's right about the impact. And I'm now really aware that it can be used, for example, for one of the projects I'm involved in at the moment, which is shown in the film at its very beginning, called Project

Dandelion, which is women leaders stepping up on a broad climate justice movement, which will be women-led but not women only. And look at what's happening on climate now with President Trump taking the United States out again out of the climate agreement, but even more than that, having an energy emergency in the United States to drill baby drill. I mean, it's shocking and it's very worrying and we need women to really step up. So I'm glad the film can have a life of impact, I hope. Yes, I mean, I want to dig deeper into that in a moment, just while we're on it and that time in your life. Just to go back ever so slightly, when you got married

and you met your husband when you were at Trinity College, went away to Harvard, came back and then you got married, it was very difficult for you, and you document this in the film, that your family didn't attend the wedding because of his religion. That must have been very painful. It wasn't as narrow as that, actually. I was already, at the age of 25, a senator professor. I was the only daughter of my parents. And they thought no one

was good enough for me. And they knew that Nick had had lots of girlfriends in college. And when he decided to become a cartoonist, instead of staying with the law, and this wasn't the profile that they wanted. And he was a Protestant, it was a cumulative sense of something that, you know, is quite dangerous, actually. It's called over love when you over love a child. I think nobody is good enough for them. And that was the problem. And I mean, once we were married, of course, my parents were very religious Catholics. They came around immediately, you know, and Nick always understood the over love problem. And this is a man who is still still with you, still by your side.

And you talk about that relationship very movingly. And how he was very happy to kind of take three steps back and always be three steps behind you. That's how he describes it in the documentary. Do you think you could have done it without a man like that by your side? Well, we're in our 55th year of marriage. So I certainly made the right decision. And it has been enormously important in my life to have a partner who was happy that I was earning more when I was working as a lawyer and happy that I was in public domain from the beginning of our marriage because I was a senator before we married.

And that when I became president, that he would, as you say, be a couple of steps behind me. Just to go back a bit, you were an incredible advocate for women having power over their lives, over their bodies, and that started with advocating for family planning. How did you get involved? Well, it was very clear to me, particularly when I'd done my master's in law in Harvard, that the law was out of touch with reality. Married women couldn't get the contraceptive pill unless they had the written permission of their doctor that they had cycle regulation problems. We used to joke that must be the weather or something that so many Irish women had cycle regulation problems. and it was a criminal

offence to buy or sell a condom. It was ridiculous and so I thought all I have to do is put a you know have a simple criminal law amendment bill amending the bit about condoms and talking about the need for access of married women to contraceptives and indeed all women who need it and I underestimated the incredibly um you know reaction of that I was a witch from hell trying to undermine morality in Ireland and nobody wanted to talk about sex nobody wanted to talk about reproductive health nobody and uh newspapers um but also individual letters hate mail there was no social media obviously in those days but I got a lot of letters cut off garden gloves and hate mail and telling me how terrible I was and I was destabilized I was young I was 26 going on up to 27. The bill was introduced in 1971. And Nick recognized that it was affecting

me. And so he burned the letters. And of course, almost immediately afterwards, we regretted because it took away a whole picture of social history of the time. But it did steady me. And I decided very early that if you really believe in something, be prepared to pay the price, be prepared to be unpopular for a while. It was a very valuable lesson for the rest of my life. And in fact, I never felt a car in Washington where you talk about how far reproductive rights for women have come in Ireland and how far backwards reproductive rights for women have gone in America with the reigning back of Roe v. Wade. How do you reflect on that? Now we are into a second Trump presidency. I'm really concerned about the situation in the United States. And I think it's a lesson to all of us. Human rights are never to be taken for granted, never totally secure. They can be undermined, even in a country that I thought when I did my master's in Harvard was the, you know, the strongest democratic country you could have. And now we see the real danger.

And the danger is incredibly real now because you not only have a president who tells lie after lie, but you have social media amplifying those lies. And our democratic space is very worrying at the moment. And we need independent media that will investigate. And media is being undermined because all the money

is going to social media. And, you know, it's harder now for democratic countries to fight back, to be honest. And we need to be strong and to fight back. And we need a free media, independent media to do that.

We just have to point out at this point, there'll be many people listening to this who and there's strong feelings on both sides of the abortion argument and many people were pleased to see these changes brought back in and did in fact vote for President Trump. I want to talk to you because I know climate change is something incredibly important to you. You mentioned Operation Dandelion. Tell us why Dandelion first of all. Why did you call it that?

I'm a believer in storytelling to get the climate message across. It's the best way. And we need a symbol to help us with our stories. And the dandelion is part of nature. It's very often a weed. I always thought of it as a weed when I was growing up. But actually, it's a beautiful flower. It's very resilient. Yes, it's true. You can't get rid of it if you want to. But it's got roots that are very deep for the soil. So it's regenerative. And so this is how we're going to have a sort of ecosystem. We've begun with women leaders and it's made a huge difference in the climate space. Now, women leaders amplify each other. We're not competing with each other for funding.

That's not the mentality. We're talking about what others are doing, especially women on the ground, and getting more money to the women who are making their communities resilient. It's part of the whole story, but it's not being funded. You say climate change in the documentary is a man-made problem that requires a feminist solution but you go on to qualify that to say it's just not wholly women you are talking to explain that a little bit more for us yes a feminist solution but a man-made includes all of us and we need men who accept the way of leading that comes from the women's movement. It's not the masculine authoritarian

way of doing it, which is becoming too popular in our populist world. The feminist way of leading is enabling problem solving, not hierarchical, and reaches out to people and listens. And I think we need much more of this leadership because we need to address the problems. And we need to address in particular the climate and nature crisis. And we only have about five years to turn around, according to the climate scientists. We have to be in a different place in 2030. The powerhouse Mary Robinson and Mrs. Robinson will be screened in Glasgow, London and Birmingham until the end of today in celebration of St. Bridget's Day, a day in the Irish calendar committed to showcasing women's achievements. And

the film will be available to view across all major platforms from March the 17th, St. Patrick's Day. Still to come on the programme, music from singer-songwriter Rumour. And remember, you can enjoy Woman's Hour any hour of the day. If you can't join us live at 10am during the week, just subscribe to the podcast. It's daily and it's free via BBC Sounds. Now, Preet Chandi, MBE, better known as Polar Preet, has achieved three world records,

including when she made the longest solo and unsupported journey across Antarctica in 2023. And she's at it again. This time, though, trading the freezing cold and slippery terrain of Antarctica for the just as cold and even slipperier terrain of the Arctic Circle. She'll be walking over sea ice, swimming through cold waters and may even have to battle a polar bear or two in an attempt to make it to the North Pole.

Only two people have done this unsupported in history. And Preet joined me this week to tell us why she wants to be the third person and the first woman to do it. It's funny, when I started, you know, going to the South Pole, I thought, oh, it'd be cool to, you know, go to the North Pole too, knowing absolutely nothing about it. But, you know, don't let that stop you I started to learn so in Antarctica when I've done my expeditions I'm traveling on land so you know I put the tent up I wake up in the same position in the morning I'm traveling in 24 hours of daylight in the Antarctic summer and then you flip to the Arctic the other side of the world I'll be traveling on sea ice which means I could pop my tent up

one evening and then wake up in a slightly different position in the morning because it's floating. And I will start with some hours of darkness, it will then become 24 hours of daylight. It is also wet in the Arctic. So Antarctica is dry, cold and windy. In the Arctic, it can be get it can get wet. And that moisture management is really important. And one of the first things I learned when I started this journey was Arctic comes from the Greek word Arctus which means bear so Antarctica the word itself means no bears. This is good fact. Yeah it sounds freezing. Yes I think it's going to be a level of cold that I haven't experienced. Okay why? For me it's always been about pushing

boundaries. Like this is a world, a community I knew nothing about at all in 2019. I started on Google, how do you get to Antarctica? And I think it's really important to look back. So I'm like, wow, I've actually managed to get here. And, you know, yes, it's adventure for me, but it can be anything and saying to people, go and try, go and do anything. Like my comfort zone has gotten bigger. And I'm not saying this isn't it. This is, you know, and it's scary and it's hard. But that's, you know, it is hard to push our boundaries. It is hard to step out.

But that growth and the reward you can get from it is just incredible. But polar bears. How are you going to deal with no polar bears in the Antarctic? This is a serious concern. So how are you going to deal with one if you come across one?ctic what what this is a serious concern so how are you going to deal with one if you come across one so i think it's really important to be vigilant so at the end of the day i'm in their terrain um i will have a fence i'll have around my tent and also i will be carrying uh things with me so i'll have a weapon with me and so you know if something does get

close to me to fire non-lethal shots um and I think it's just trying to keep them away from me is the idea. But it is, you know, it is a dangerous terrain to be in. And I think it's just really important to remember that and making sure that you've got, you know, the right preparation to go in there. And you do have the right preparation in terms of firearms because you were in the army. Yes, I was, yeah, for 16 years. I left in October because I wanted to do more outdoor adventures and I was taking unpaid leave to do expeditions

and it was just really hard to do both. When are you planning on doing this? It's very soon. Yes, I'm planning to leave in a couple of weeks and it all depends on funding, of course. But, you know, it's so easy. I get told to stop and to give up or wait a few years all the time. But I think the reason I've

managed to do so much is because I'm persistent. Yeah. And it's not because I'm the best. It really isn't. You don't need to be the best to succeed. I think it's my persistence. So I will try till the very last minute. And if I do not get enough funding in time, I've got another year to train. And what about all the equipment that you're going to need? Have you got it all? Or again, is it all done? You're all ready? Yeah, yeah. yeah so i've got the equipment my sled is on its way to antarctica my dry suit will be coming in the next week uh because the sections will have to swim as well there's over water yeah no i i read about this i was reading about how the the how dangerous this is going to be because you're on ice so it's very slippery just to walk on it is dangerous then pitching your tent yes you might

crack the ice so i think that is really important for experience to see where's good ice to pitch your tent um so you know how many years has that ice been in there and checking with your pole the color of the ice as well so and because at the start of the trip I'll actually be going over what I can only describe as like a maze but like a really rough maze that you have to like climb over these blocks of ice so finding like suitable places to camp I think will probably be quite hard at the beginning and then when when you don't have those anymore that's when you start to get sections of open water um so it's yeah it's really important

to find good places totally unsupported carrying everything yourself yes what happens if you get into trouble yes so that's where the money comes in so the reason it's so expensive is because trying to get search and rescue in this area is really, really difficult. And why I wouldn't be able to go unless I've got the, you know, the amount of money that I need, which is a lot. Do you have an emergency way of communicating? Yes, yeah. So I carry a satellite phone on all of my expeditions, I've in reach, I have GPS, but you're on sea ice. This isn't, you know, in Antarctica, and I'm, you know, I'm talking about the summer seasons when I've been to Antarctica and working with the logistics company. I know that in, you know, one to three days, depending on whether somebody can come and get me.

And, you know, I can be in a relatively safe space and an area while I'm waiting, whereas this is a little bit different. And this all going to plan, how long will this expedition take to trek to the North Pole? I'll be taking 70 days of food and fuel with me. 70 days. What's the percentage of chance of this? I think less than 5% that I'll actually make it to the North Pole. But that's the beauty of it. And it's not, you know, yes, amazing if I can make it.

But even if I don't, and even if I was 100% sure I wouldn't make it, I would still try because I think there's beauty in that journey itself. And, you know, it is okay to fail. I I encourage people to fail I think there's so much you can learn from and it's not all about you know I have to like get the victory at the end um at all I think this journey will be really incredible to do when you uh did your um first initial trek to the south at South Pole across Antarctica, you had podcasts and music and messages from your family and all of it to keep you motivated. You even named your skis after both your nephews. This time very different.

Yes. I won't be listening to things because I have to remain vigilant. I will probably have the voice notes from my family and friends that, you know, I listen to inside the tent, but not during the day. I just, I wouldn't want to take that risk. So how, I mean, you're going to be on your own in this incredibly bleak landscape with all the worries and fear of what could potentially happen. What on earth is going on in your mind to keep you steady? I think there's a few. So sometimes I think about the bigger picture. And I remind myself that this is just so much bigger than me as a person. You know, I'm a Punjabi girl from Derby. Yes, you are. Yes. Get in there. And it's just so much more important than I am for somebody

from, you know, who didn't know anything about this at all to go and do something. And it's bigger than adventure for me um and then the other side of it is when I'm finding things hard I don't think about anything big picture and I just literally I will sometimes count I'll put my left foot in front of me my right front in front of me and that's it and you know I really hope people can relate to that just in in any sense at all you know at home if you're finding things difficult you're getting out of bed you're then brushing your teeth uh you know going down the stairs or whatever it is you're doing and that's all i do just one step at a time great life advice there one step at a time from preet chandhi and we

wish her well on her epic journey now this week claire was joined by the reality star turned documentary maker vicky patterson you may know her her best from Geordie Shore or being voted Queen of the Jungle on I'm a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here. Vicky last joined us on Woman's Hour to discuss her moving documentary Alcohol, Dad and Me. While her latest project is looking at the world of deep fakes. Deep fakes are where photos, videos or audio is combined with artificial intelligence to make it seem like someone is doing or saying something they haven't often used to create content of a sexual nature people's faces are placed onto pornographic images and shared without their consent the spread of these videos

has increased considerably causing huge harm to victims who are often women and girls. Well, Claire began by asking Vicky why she decided to make this film. I think, you know, the answer to that is not very straightforward. Like, over the last few years, in particular, I've endeavoured to use my platform to do good, in particularly for issues that affect women, you know, whether that's taking myself to Parliament to discuss the lack of awareness and resources surrounding female reproductive health, whether that was trek myself to Parliament to discuss the lack of awareness and resources surrounding female reproductive health,

whether that was trekking through the Arctic to raise awareness about poverty in women. And that was a real goal for me, you know, to use the platform to do something good. We first started talking to Channel 4 and Potato around 18 months ago about this project. And I just think it's really worth mentioning that over the last 18 months, we've watched this technology evolve, get more hyper-realistic, become more of a danger to women. And when they were first talking to me about it, you know, the latest iteration in abuse of women, it was brought to my attention that there was a video trying to encourage people to share less of their children online and showing people just how easy it was to, for some, to manipulate pictures taken from social media of your children. And as a woman who, you know, has faced not only misogynistic abuse online, I thought it was important to highlight this, but also as a woman who is potentially going to start a family soon, I have to have courage in my convictions that I'm doing as much as I can to bring my kids up into a world that, you know, is safe.

And at the minute, it does feel quite scary. We will cover this shortly. And you see it in the documentary. There has been some backlash to what you did. But throughout it, we see how emotional you were making this, how angry and emotional. What kind of a toll does it take on you? I think I'm quite an emotional person. I mean, you've had me on here crying before. I'm sure everybody's seen us cry. I'm very sensitive, very empathetic. And you can't do something like this

and, you know, invest yourself without feeling consumed to a certain extent and feeling you know real empathy and for the for the women who survive this type of abuse so I um yeah I did I did struggle with certain elements of it none more so than meeting the meeting the victims and saying how they'd how they were using their platforms to sort of like spread this awareness but also like how they were putting their lives back together I found it really inspirational but it did leave its mark definitely yeah and with your husband as well because we'll get into you actually made a deep fake uh with your face it must have been very hard for him he says so in the documentary to see you do that go through that well um I mean we we got married less than six months ago and I've been working

on this project pretty much ever since a month after and it has been difficult. I have been frustrated, I have been upset and I have been overwhelmed quite a lot so even without you know thinking about the the deepfake itself I haven't been a joy to live with quite frankly and I do feel for my husband but he's very supportive he's a very nice man and he understands why I did feel like it was important to shed light on this issue and also you know nothing I could feel and nothing Irk could ever feel comes close to what the victims have had to go through so I think we've just been really mindful of that as well. Why did you decide to go to that length to actually make a deepfake that looked like you and you make a graphic pornographic

video why do that and release it onto the internet? I'm definitely not under the illusion that this wasn't a divisive decision you know know, and I do understand that. I acknowledge that. And I just wanted to say, like, with regards to victims feeling any type of way about it, I understand. Like, this is divisive. And we, everybody deals with, like, trauma and distress in different ways. And I'm in no way trivialising their feelings.

But what I will say is I worked closely with four victims, women from all different walks of life, politician, newsreader, mother, who, a young girl, you know, who had all been victims of this. And they reassured me that they believed this was a bold and impactful way to get our message out there. And just to make it absolutely clear to people listening,

talk us through what you actually did. You hired actors, you hired an intimacy coordinator. Just explain to people what they can see if they watch the documentary. You're absolutely right. So normally how this works in the case of deep fake abuse is people take existing pornography and they put their victim's face on it, which, you know, I think really sets a case for arguing that there's two victims in this crime because the person in the pornography did not give their consent to be used in this way either that is a whole nother conversation for a whole other day what we did in to guarantee consent was we at every level of this process we brought in

a intimacy coordinator a lovely woman called Elle who was fantastic we brought in an intimacy coordinator, a lovely woman called Elle, who was fantastic. We brought in a guy who specialised in AI technology, Ben. And then we also brought in an adult content creator and an actor. So everybody involved in this was consenting adults, a luxury, I might add, that is not afforded to people who are actual victims of deepfake. OK, let's just pick up on the pushback that you've had from, you mentioned it yourself, from real victims who say it's in poor taste and that despite warnings from charities, Channel 4 decided to go ahead with it regardless. And you speak to victims in the piece and you've heard about the trauma this experience has caused them and still decided to go ahead with it why i mean i can only reiterate what i've initially said and that is i completely understand this is a not only a divisive but a deeply distressing thing that can happen and everybody is going to process that different differently i i hear what the victims have said and understand but we did speak to and you know have four victims

involved who thought that this was this was a powerful way to get our message out there that it was brave that it was bold and it was going to do what ultimately we wanted which was to advocate for ironclad legislation around this issue we want to encourage people to foster empathy for the victims we want better education we want tech giants to stand up and take notice. I have made me peace with how we've chosen to do these things we set out to do. But I will say I completely understand any sort of pushback. Because the peace, obviously, it's important that you have, but also that the people who claim that it was an insensitive way to go about it just to sort of reiterate that it was your choice and as you said that the victims

of this often don't have a choice whether it goes out in the world you chose to put it out in the world as well they aren't giving that uh given that choice uh one said to the guardian the essence of these deepfakes is that they're not consensual. You don't get to choose when you publish it and then trace it around the internet. So again, they highlight the insensitivity of that. What do you say? I mean, for me, I completely understand. I don't think throughout this documentary, there's not a single moment where I claim to understand what a victim has gone through. And that's certainly not what this experiment set out to do. What it set out to do was highlight this issue, bring much sunlight, much needed conversation, honest discourse to something that is largely going not only unnoticed, but untalked about.

And I'm proud of what we've created. There is an awful lot of discussion about this deepfake sex tape, which I understand. I would implore anybody who is feeling curious, who is feeling nervous, who actually feels unsure of the documentary, if they can bring it within themselves to watch it, to give it a go,

because there's so much more than just a deepfake sex tape. It's a documentary that encourages, would foster empathy for the victims, shows them how to get these type of things removed. Vicky Patterson there, and her documentary, Vicky Patterson, My Deepfake Sex Tape, is available on the Channel 4 website.

And just to say that, as we covered earlier this month on Woman's Hour, the government will introduce a new offence, meaning perpetrators could be charged for both creating and sharing these images. And we asked Google for a response, and whilst they didn't respond directly to our request for a statement, on their website they state, our approach to information quality and webpage removals aims to strike a balance between ensuring that people have access to the information they need, while also doing our best to protect against And a spokesperson for Channel 4 said, of how accessible this content is and how it can proliferate online. She also wanted to experience as closely as possible the feelings,

vulnerabilities and concerns that arise when one becomes a victim of deepfake porn. The documentary recreates this in a controlled environment to exemplify the ease with which this kind of content can spread online and to raise awareness by demonstrating actions people can take should they find themselves a victim of this crime. The choice to make original footage ensures that everyone involved was able to fully consent from the outset. And now, the singer-songwriter Rumour is a Mobo Award winner and double Brit Award nominee. Her new album, In Session, is out now, celebrating the 15th anniversary of her multi-platinum selling debut

Seasons of My Soul, which sold more than a million copies. The success that followed that album affected her mental health to the point where she decided to step away from the industry and relocate to the United States. While Rumour is now back in the UK and has returned to the record that shaped so much of her life. Selected tracks have been given a fresh and soulful take. Well, she joined me in the studio on Friday, the new album In Session. Why did you want to make it? Well, I've been playing these songs for quite a long time and I started working with this group called Redenbacher's Funkestra, which is a group led by an Austrian music director called Stefan Redenbacher.

And we had so much fun sort of revisiting some of my older material that we decided to record the sessions. And I thought it would be a nice time with the 15th anniversary coming up of Seasons of My Soul to just, yeah, just a fresh take and a bit more of a soulful take on some of the songs that people love.

And it's nine songs, and it's not just Seasons of My Soul. There's one from Nashville Tears, one from Boys Don't Cry. And I think, yeah, there's a few other ones in there. So it's like a sort of best of, but it's a re-record. And is it a statement of saying I'm back? Yeah, I think it's nice to sort of get back out there. You know, I'm doing a tour in October and also just, yeah, show my appreciation to the fans in the UK

that, you know, I'm here and I want to make more music and I'm working on my next record as well. So yeah, I think it is a sense of, yeah, just coming back into the marketplace. We are very happy about it because we've missed you. We've missed that voice.

We want to go back a bit now, 15 years, because your original album, your debut season, it was multi-platinum debut album selling more than a million copies huge success applaud it's from the likes of Elton John and Burt Bacharach no less but how did that success affect you well it was a bit of a shock at the time because I thought I was making quite a niche record I thought I was making a jazzy kind of a record that um you know might get a few reviews in a couple of jazz magazines or something um so I wasn't expecting it to be in the pop world or to be received as well as it was so um I think at the time I just wasn't um I didn't have much support. You know, you know, I would come like say for like like today, for example, I would go home and, you know, to nobody there to make me a cup of tea and say hello kind of thing. So I had like very little foundations under me.

And it was very lonely. It was a very lonely time because I was doing a lot of traveling and I felt isolated. So I felt like I needed to kind of regroup and um well what happened how did that affect you the loneliness and having all the success and the yeah fame and all the rest of it and then going home to nobody yeah it was it was it's it's it's the extremes you know so for example um you know you get up you go to say a morning show not not dissimilar to this one or a tv show and there's you're getting dressed and your makeup and the hair and everything and then you're you know you're back in a taxi at 9 30 and fully made up sitting alone in a flat you know and it just the contrast of it's not

normal you know what i mean it's just not your adrenaline's quite high i imagine and yeah or like you're in you're doing a show and then you're in a hotel room by yourself so it's it's it's the extremes um what it does to your body so when did you realize that it was affecting your mental health and you needed to do something about it oh you know I was somebody who was quite well you know quite a well person and suddenly I was sort of wading through medication you know I had medication for my ears, medication from, you know, for this, that and the third. You know, it was like I was getting physically unwell, actually, to the point where, you know, I was realizing that, yeah, just just just not not well physically. So you decided to leave. I have to do something, you know, to reconnect with my soul, you know, and my spirit, you know, because it had been at risk of kind of getting seriously ill. So I went to America.

I started off in Los Angeles just on my own. I rented an Airbnb, you know, and then I spent a bit more time with my now husband, Rob, who was out there. And then we ended up moving to Arkansas. And then that kind of, that was the beginning of my sort of healing journey. What a story, what a voice, Rumour. And her album In Session is out now. On Woman's Hour on Monday,

Claire MacDonald is joined by newly Oscar-nominated actress Mikey Madison, who stars in the film Onora, which follows the story of a sex worker. Plus, what it's really like to be a woman in the RAF. We'll hear from a female wing commander who's recently returned from deployment overseas. That's all from me. Enjoy the rest of your weekend. I'm Sarah Treleaven, 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.