Woman's Hour - Weekend Woman’s Hour: Sugababes, Lockdown babies, June Sarpong, History of abortion, Women in construction

Episode Date: March 22, 2025

The Sugababes started their music career together in 1998 but, after Siobhán left the band in 2001, it wasn't until 2019 that Mutya, Keisha and Siobhán came back together as the Sugababes. All three members joined Nuala McGovern to celebrate the release of their brand new single, Jungle, and their biggest ever UK and Ireland tour.Five years on from the first Covid lockdown, what can be done to support the 200,000 ‘Lockdown babies’ born when lockdown was at its most restrictive, between 23 March and 4 July 2020? Nuala was joined by Nicola Botting, Professor of Developmental Disorders at City St George’s, University of London, Jane Harris, CEO of Speech and Language UK, and mum of three, Frankie Eshun.Broadcaster June Sarpong co-founded the Women Inspiration and Enterprise Network and in 2019 was appointed the first BBC Director of Creative Diversity. She joined Nuala to discuss her biography of Una Marson, the poet, playwright, feminist and activist who made history as the first black female broadcaster at the BBC.A new book Abortion – A History, gives the long view of ending pregnancy. From ancient Greece to Roe v Wade, Mary Fissell charts changing practices of and attitudes towards abortion. She joined Nuala in the Woman’s Hour studio to explain why she wrote the book and what she has learned.Work has started on a home extension and renovation that is being built and designed entirely by women. In an industry facing huge labour shortages, women remain a minority in construction, only making up 15% of the industry and only 1% of those in manual, skilled roles. Nuala was joined by the project's lead, Kat Parsons and builder, Yas Poole.Presenter: Nuala McGovern Producer: Annette Wells Editor: Laura Northedge

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. something as simple as listening to your favourite podcast. So come join us on What in the World, an award-winning podcast from the BBC World Service. We break down news and trending topics every weekday in less than 15 minutes. Listen wherever you get your BBC podcasts. BBC Sounds music radio podcasts. Hello I'm Nuala McGovern 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 to a selection of standout moments from the week.

Coming up today, we have the original Sugar Babes, Keisha, Mutia and Siobhan, who are back with a bang for their first ever arena tour. And they are here to tell us all about it. Also the women who set out to build a house using only tradeswomen. What's it like working in this industry that is so male dominated? Plus the presenter and author June Sarpong on her new book about the first black female broadcaster at the BBC, Una Marson. When Haile Selassie was exiled in 1935, she became his right-hand woman.

So there's a speech that's gone viral at the moment of Haile Selassie speaking at the League of Nations, which has so many parallels with everything going on right now with Ukraine. And Una was part of the team that wrote that speech. And through a new book, we delve into abortion's long political history, from ancient Rome to medieval nuns through to the modern day. So lots to discuss. Let's get started. This week, I was joined by three UK pop legends, Muti Abouena, Keisha Buchanan and Siobhan Donaghy,

better known together as the Sugar Babes. They achieved six number one singles and have been nominated for six Brit Awards, including winning for Best British Dance Act in 2003. They started their music career together almost 30 years ago now, but Siobhan left the band a few years later and it wasn't until 2019 that Mutia, Keisha and Siobhán came back together as the Sugar Babes. All three members came in to celebrate the release of their brand new single, Jungle, as they get ready for their biggest ever UK and Ireland tour.

It's kicking off in Leeds next month. I began by asking Siobhán how they are feeling ahead of the new tour. I mean it's crazy that it's our first ever arena tour. It is, that is crazy. I know, it surprises even us. But it means everything's on a bigger scale. I feel like we've done so many shows over the past three years, festivals, and I feel like it's just, we're ready.

We're ready to take that step. So it's exciting. Well, you know, Woman's Hour has been to Glastonbury over the past couple of years. And apparently it was very hard to get in to see you. Yes. Lucia. We've done it twice. Well, the first time around was the 2022.

2022. We shut that field down. And then we did it again last year and we did it again. So, I mean, it's always nice to you know see things like that because I always personally feel like there's no one out there when we perform so when we do go out and we see everyone's there. And those EF people. Those trying to get in as well. Keisha, there was mentioned in a recent NME interview that as a group you take issue with the word reunion. Why do you think

that's not the right term? Well first of all we definitely celebrate like all the nostalgia. We're huge fans of nostalgia and everyone come back together but also as well sometimes that means that you're just doing one thing and then that's it. It could be just a celebration of your legacy which is obviously amazing and we've done that but we also are back and we're releasing new music and we want to you know be among our, regarded as among our peers. I don't really think that it kind of suits us in terms of where we're at now what we're doing so yeah. A lot will remember the revolving door of Sugar Babes for a

number of years then there was a completely different lineup of performers. Some might wonder, what is a Sugar Babe Siobhan? What is a Sugar Babe? I mean, the thing is, it is a complex past. But I think that for a lot of people, they move jobs, different things happen in your life. Since 1998, quite a few. The journey is what it is and we actually got together

when we were 12 and 13 so I think the idea that we would have everything would have just been hunky-dory until now, you know, that's just not how life goes but I so I would say that we don't regret our journey actually. I'm glad it's led us here. Let's talk about that though. So what age were you when you started your career? We were 12. All of us were 12 and 13. I mean it's so young. And our babies. Yeah. I know when I hear about someone working, starting to work at that age. You do look at it as weird. Your brain hasn't fully formed.

But it was something that we wanted to do like our parents were so supportive and they were and not a lot of people know this but we actually we all sort of grew up together, basically. Michelle and I went to school together and singing in the studio was like our afterschool hobby. And so it was sort of like very, very organic. And then things just started to move, you know, for us, people would come into the studio, hear us sing, and then all of a sudden

there was a label deal in front of us, you know. So I think for us, it was always about keeping it as organic as possible. The more famous you become, the more success you have, it becomes something else to other people. So for us coming back together is about bringing it back to sort of the essence of what we were, which is just friends that grew up together

who liked music and that's it, not about the rest of the stuff. Of which there was so many. I mean, people, you were teenagers, as he says, not even teenagers, actually, when you started, even pre-teens, really. Unlike many other teenagers or pre-teens, you fell out with one another. But for you, fallouts were tabloid fodder, whether it was allegations of feuds or bullying, for example. people might be wondering how do you leave all that behind, that intense scrutiny which must be very difficult to go through at a young age

in the public eye and come back and say, you know what, we're going on tour together. I think we just rise above it. I think that you know a lot of what people have read isn't actually what went down. And life is more nuanced and there's more context to it than what people would ever have known or heard. And only we know our past and our true story. And we bring it back to the music and what we love. And it's been important for us to make it about that, because the legacy is so incredible.

And we're really proud of the new music. And it's women, it's funny we're talking about this on this show, but it's women in particular in this industry that kind of, it becomes more about the gossip and what they look like and blah, blah, blah. We want it to be about the music and our art. Well Siobhan, that's the perfect segue. I didn't set her up. So I was picking out some of the lyrics there, the hustle and the grind. What about that, Mithi? What does this single mean?

It's all about us, I'm joking. No, the hustle and the grind. I think, I mean, lyrically it is kind of what we do. You know? The nine to five of everyone's life, no matter what you do. You hustle your grind. Exactly. And you need to kind of maybe let that animal out on the, whether it be on the dance floor or whatever you do, to let your hair down. And I think we felt it was quite a universal message. Absolutely.

And with this though, you've released this single on your own label. And I'm just wondering Mutia, what does that mean? I mean, not our own label, but we are independent. It's nice to be able to kind of do things your own way these days. I mean, when you're signed up to a record label, sometimes you're kind of tied down to lots of people telling you what to do and what you can release. But this time around, it's very much us giving, you know, giving the orders to people. How does that feel? Amazing.

Keisha? Yeah, when we decided to get back together as a group, it was actually like over 10 years ago. And we decided even at that point that we were going to you know self-invest into ourselves we're going to take our time and also we were going to sort of like rewrite the history so to speak and just kind of take it back to like what what we love which is music as Siobhan said earlier. I think that it's so nice to be able to have your schedule out your own diary around you know your life you know. Work-life balance is the same. Work-life balance is so and fun is important and you know even though we're on the road and we do have quite a busy schedule it's definitely tailor-made and it's based upon what what we've said yes to. But I am thinking I mean you're veterans at this stage at a young age because

you started so young and I wonder Ke, how you look at that little girl, for example, starting off on that journey that becomes so famous. And I don't know how you would advise her now or what have you learned about fame? Oh, goodness me. Well, I don't think that you can really prep anyone to be prepared, other than the fact that I think it's just super important that you sort of balance is key, but also it's just really hard.

I often think about that, what would I tell myself when I was younger? And I don't know how you prepare a 13, 14, 15, 16. I don't know. And I've got nieces that are that age and I don't know how I would say, be careful of this and make sure you read this properly and make sure you gauge it like it's too much.

So I would just say that the best decision that I've made really within the last 10 years is to actually not read anything. So I don't read any articles, so even if it's good, everyone around me, they don't share things with me. I obviously get updated with them if there's something amazing, we've got five stars, but I'll be told that and I won't necessarily read it.

And that's really helped me just with my mental health, because I think if you're told, you're amazing all the time, the one comment, the think if you're told, you're amazing all the time, the one comment, the one time you're not told you're amazing, that's kind of hard. And then if you're battered all the time, that's not good either. So I think you put your best foot forward,

it's never gonna be perfect, but as long as you know you've done your best, that's good enough, and that's it. And those who are around you, if you surround yourself with the right people, they will always give you healthy criticism and help you to grow in those areas. But for me, it just doesn't work if I'm sitting there like reading comments and it's done wonders for my...

It's so interesting because I've had lots of young, very young artists in here as well that were kind of grappling with that and walking the line. Mutti, anything else you'd like to add about how you see fame or look at it now, or looking forwards or looking back? I think now I enjoy it so much more. Do you? Yeah, I do. Well, that's lovely.

I do. I kind of wish I did enjoy it as much as I do now. But to be honest, I feel like being grown and, you know, we've all got our own families and stuff. I feel like it's like our time. I say it's my time all the time but it is our time. We've got our tribe, our people around us that are really good for us and I think that that's harder when you're a teenager. You're still finding yourself and it's not necessarily you that changes but it's the people around you and you don't have a lot of control over that. Whereas now that's kind of set in our lives. We've got good people around us and that makes a difference. Siobhan Donaghy, Mutia Buena and Keisha Buchanan, the Sugar Babes.

And their arena tour kicks off in Leeds on the 8th of April. To mark the fifth anniversary of the first UK lockdown due to Covid in 2020, the BBC has been examining the lasting effects of Covid restrictions in special programming called Lockdown's Legacy. Over 200,000 babies were born when lockdown was at its most restrictive. These were babies born with extraordinary birth stories. Mums giving birth alone, doctors in hazmat suits, babies meeting fathers and grandparents for the first time online. There were no health visitors, no visitors at all, no family cuddles, no baby groups. I could go on and on as there are so many examples. But how

has being born in lockdown impacted those babies? Also how can we support those lockdown babies now aged four in reception class or in P1 in Scotland? Well, I was joined this week by Nicola Botting, Professor of Developmental Disorders at City St. George's, University of London. She's also the co-lead on the Born in Covid Year Core Lockdown Effects or Bicycle Study. Also, mum of three, Frankie Eshun and Jane Harris, who is CEO of Speech and Language UK. First, here's an insight into the effect on some children born during lockdown from Sarah Baraclough, a teaching assistant

at Queen's Drive Primary School that was recorded for this week's BBC One's Panorama. We've got children who are coming in now who don't have the vocabulary, or if they've got some of it, they don't know what it means. Blue, green, yellow or pink? Yellow please.

Good boy. Pink. Pink. So you're looking at a quarter of your class who have got some sort of speech and language need for your mummies and daddy. You can colour whichever bit you want. Language has been declining for years as they've come into school. The impact of Covid has been huge because it's made that decline really steep. Good girl.

If you can't talk to your peers, you're not going to play with them. And so you're lonely. Lonely. Gosh, if ever there was a word that sums up lockdown, it probably would be lonely. But here we are five years later with some little kids experiencing it. Frankie, you took part in our 2020 programme about mums giving birth during Covid. Yeah. We want to know how is your lockdown baby? Not a baby anymore, now four and in reception.

Yeah, he's going to be five in two weeks. He's in reception. He's like any other child. However, he's interesting. There's certain things that you can tell he's a lockdown baby. Very quiet little boy, very quiet. I wouldn't say his speech is the clearest either At all, if I'm honest compared to my eldest I also have a two-year-old as well, which is really interesting. You've actually got a control group in your home. I do I have an experiment going on right now and delayed speech in reception at some point they give the kids books, you know to help them with their phonics and Loads of this some of the kids books, you know, to help them with their phonics and loads of this, some of the kids got it earlier. I've noticed some of them didn't and he just got his like after Christmas just because we've been working so hard with him to get his speech, you know,

up to where it should be. Obviously every child is different and just his phonics up to speed and yeah, he's just not the greatest talker. He's, you know, he can express himself in several ways, but his speech is just not clear. It's interesting though, isn't it? Because that teaching assistant Sarah that we heard there, that's exactly the bit she was picking up on, and that communication. I'm wondering how you feel about the term lockdown baby? Personally, I'm not bothered by it, but they are lockdown babies. If we actually think about it, when has there ever been a time where the whole world was on standstill and we've had these babies come into this world who would

normally socialize, meet different people, go to clubs, you know, he didn't even get weighed, you know, things like that. I had a c-section, unplanned one, and normally they'll come day one and day five, someone will come home. I had no one come home and I understand obviously it was on lockdown you know everyone's scared of contamination and stuff like that so at day five I had to go somewhere but it was literally empty you couldn't sit down I had a section I was holding this brand new baby. He wasn't even, he was born in March he did not get registered till August so you can just imagine. It's astonishing isn't it when we take a moment now just to look back. No doubt he has little kids his age as well, his peers. Do you talk about that

with the parents? Are there similar behaviors do you think? Well I think I kind of know more because I'm a parent governor in my school so just without saying this I think their cohort this year yes probably has the most kids with needs and we're not talking you know like all ASD or anything like that just actual learning difficulties in that year compared to you know the different calls they've had the year before and many believe that it is because of COVID, you know, during that time. And Nikki and Jane are nodding along here.

Let me jump over to you, Nikki. So what do we know for sure? Now, I know your study is ongoing. That's right. But you have some findings that you're looking at. So we've got findings emerging actually from other studies from these babies as they grew up. So we know that when they were, even they were really little at six months and at 12

months they were behind where we'd expect on that very early communication things like pointing which is a super important skill. Well I think that's Frankie hit the nail on the head when she said they didn't go out and have that social diversity. So obviously babies talk to their caregivers and their parents or not talk to them but her, brothers and sisters. But in fact going out and hearing background talking, different voices, different accents, different roles of people in the world was all missing. And so that lack of diversity in their very, very early months actually is super important for babies.

Because I suppose so many of the babies will have been meeting people, even when they did meet people in real life, behind a mask or whatever that may or may not mean. And others will be on a screen. That's right. So very different forms of communication. I mean, I think screens helped communication in lots of ways. So it's not that they were all terrible but we've certainly heard from parents who were holding their babies up to see other babies on the screen at toddler groups online which is a very unusual way for babies to see other babies and babies love looking at other babies. They learn a lot from just that socialization of observing other babies communicating touching other babies that was really missing in those very early months and they missed the other babies. How heartbreaking.

Right because they're probably surrounded with adults or maybe brother sisters but not little people like them. Jane let me bring you in here because as I mentioned at the beginning, you are, excuse me, CEO of Speech and Language UK. What evidence is there about the specific challenges when it comes to speech and language? So we know that the numbers of children who have speech and language problems, who have some difficulty with talking or with understanding words, are quietly and steadily going through the roof. So we ask teachers every year how many children in their classrooms are having problems with talking and understanding

words. In 2021 they said 1.4 million, the last time we asked a year and a half ago it was 1.9 million. So that's an increase of almost a third which is terrible and what's really worrying is that that has a huge impact on children's futures So we know that they are twice as likely to be unemployed when they're young adults 60% of young offenders have speech and language challenges and they have greater mental health problems So we are really just storing up problems for the future by not doing enough about this now So let's get back to these children that are now in reception or P1 as it's called in Scotland with the language, speech and language. I mean Nikki was kind of outlining some of the issues

there about why the communication isn't what it is or the socialization. Is that what it is for speech and language? Oh yes it's the same thing we're talking about. I guess it's also we should, the cost of living crisis has a massive impact as well. How? So speech and language problems we've always known are connected with disadvantage. So for example as well as not seeing other babies and other children, those babies and children were not going out say to a farm and seeing a cow and have somebody saying moo and pointing at the cow. And actually the real way you learn language is having lots and lots of new experiences and lots of new reasons to use language. When parents haven't got as much money and probably haven't got as much time because they're working more

and they're more stressed, they are just less likely to do those things with those children. And that's why it's so important that we equip nurseries and childminders better to fill in those some of those gaps because in those really disadvantaged areas that parents are not skilled up to do this. Well the thing is the lockdown I mean it felt like a very long time but the children have been out in the world over the past couple of years and people might wonder you know they're little sponges aren't they how come the catch-up hasn't happened? So I think what we don't know and what we're looking at in bicycle is exactly what's happened with these four-year

olds. That's why we're looking at them now to see how much has changed, whether they've caught up or whether they've lagged behind. I think the answer is going to be that it's going to be very complicated so it's very likely that some families, for some families and for some children, there will be significant impacts of COVID and for other families actually it will be less. By significant some of these issues, let's think of those kids that are in reception right now. Yeah, so we're thinking about maybe having less vocabulary like Sarah on your clip was saying, so not understanding words as well, not following

instructions, that's really important when you get into a classroom. And also some aspects of self-regulation, which we're looking at in bicycle as well. Well following instructions, do you think Jane that comes under speech? Absolutely, because if you don't understand the instruction, you are not going to follow it. And that's one of the real worries is a lot of these children get, get labeled as having behavior problems. 81% of children with emotional

behaviour problems have a speech and language problem. So it's not that they don't want to follow the instruction, they literally just don't understand it. Other governments across the world have done more to help these children. So for example, actually in Ireland, the government has put a programme called Early Talk Boost that we help to run into pre-schools in every single disadvantaged area. Now at the end of that program, it takes nine weeks, it takes about 14 hours of group work, children have gained five months of speech and language skills. Five months in what time?

So 14 hours over nine weeks. That's fantastic. And you can do it in groups of about up to about eight. We haven't got that in this country. It's interesting, you mentioned Ireland there that I do know quite well, because their lockdown was actually more restrictive than the UK and went on for a lot longer as well and particularly in those early months I know women were giving birth for much longer for example than they were alone, than they were here for example. Frankie I'd like to come back to you, you've

heard a little of what Nikki and Jane has been saying, how do you feel the intervening years, particularly that catch up that people are trying to do, I think is what I'm hearing. I think the kids, they are trying to catch up. But obviously, as they're catching up, everything else is moving. So as a parent, if you don't have that time to maybe sit down with your child just that bit more and give them the support they need, and then that's where the child misses it, and they do go into reception and they are struggling. I use my son as an example, we noticed that he had a reading problem. So we were like me and my husband was like, okay,

we need to knock her down with him. We need to get him up to speed. And he has caught up. And now I worked with the teacher, but not every parent has the resources or has that time are around. I'm a stay at home mum, so I'm at home, I work from home. So I'm able to have that time to do that, but not everyone has that advantage. Let's listen to a little of what the government's take is. This is a clip from Panorama which will air tonight. The Secretary of State for Education, Bridget Philipson. I worry about the youngest children and children who were born during Covid and it's why that we've set as a government our milestone about making sure that more children reach a good level of development at the end of

reception year because those are the children who were born during the pandemic and in the aftermath of restrictions where I'm really concerned about their life chances. And what would you say to parents about what their child should be able to do by the time they're starting in reception? I think it perhaps used to be clearer in the past about the things that you can do as a parent ahead of your child starting school to make sure that they're ready to go. And that is areas like being able to put on your shoes, being able to go to the toilet independently. Of course some children will need extra help and schools will step in to do that but I think we do need to consider each of us the responsibilities that we have.

And I just want to add a little to that from the Department of Education a spokesperson said despite our difficult inheritance through our plan for change the government is determined to get tens of thousands more children a record proportion school ready by the age of five. That means hitting key targets on personal, social and physical development, as well as supporting children and young people navigate any impacts on their mental health. We've started this work by extending early language support, investing 15 million pounds to deliver thousands of school based nurseries and strengthening and joining up family services through continued investment in the family hubs and the Start for Life program. So some of the aspects that are there you hear Bridget Philipson also talk about her concerns. They're very concrete things aren't they? Putting on your shoes or whatever those

little daily achievements might be. You mentioned the Irish program that I think you'd like to see here Jane. Absolutely. What else? Well, we'd really like government to bring back a program that actually ran under the previous government. And frankly, we're baffled that this government has discontinued it, which is called the Early Years Professional Development Program. And what that did was it worked with childminders, with people working in nurseries, to improve their skills in helping children with communication and language, maths and personal, social,

emotional development. We honestly just do not understand given this program had great results, you know, improved things like Ofsted ratings in nurseries, it improved staff wanting to stay in the earlier sex which is a huge issue. We just think it's baffling and it's horrendous that the government is risking children going into these new nurseries without the staff with skills in this area. It's just wrong. Have they given you a response?

We've talked to government about it. Everybody seems to recognise it was a good programme. I think it might just be stuck between Treasury and Department of Education. But given that government has said one of its five top priorities is early years, you would think this would something, you know, this is in the low millions of pounds to fund. We are not talking billions here. And it's about our children's futures. And of course I can just refer of course to the money that they say they have invested which which might be more of a priority

for them don't quote me on that. That is an aspect of course that they are highlighting. I want to come to the study again Nikki, you co-lead Bicycle, you're in the process of selecting children to follow now until 2027. That's right. So what do you want to find out? So what we're looking at is their talking and thinking skills. So some of the things we've been talking about, how well they can produce words and sentences, how well they can understand words and sentences, but also how well they self-regulate and how well their self-regulate, so let's talk about that a little bit. Staying on task, paying attention, but also multitasking, which doesn't sound like something

a four-year-old might do, but actually in a classroom and in life you need to sort of be able to hold information and work on something at the same time. Those sorts of very early, we call them executive functions in the research world, are super important for later development in terms of social development, in terms of language development, in terms of academic achievement. If you're just in your house you don't regulate as much necessarily. If you go out you need a different sort of, you know, your mum's doing a different sort of persona outside than she is inside. I love my mum's telephone voice.

Yes, exactly. So there's sort of a whole lack of very early modelling of those sorts of behaviours which we think might be affecting, in fact that's what teachers are telling us at the moment is happening in schools, is that the whole classroom feels busier and noisier and less regulated. Professor Nicola Botting, Jane Harris and Frankie E. Shun there. And as part of special programming across BBC Radio, which examines the long-term impact off Covid restrictions five years on, especially on children and young people, Catherine Carr presents Lockdown's Legacy, which you can hear by going to BBC Sounds.

Still to come on the programme, the women who set out to build a house using only tradeswomen. We find out what it's like working in this male dominated industry. Also, remember that you can enjoy Women's Hour any hour of the day. If you can't join us live at 10am during the week, just subscribe to the Daily Podcast for free via BBC Sounds. week, just subscribe to The Daily Podcast for free via BBC Sounds. My next guest is the author, broadcaster and campaigner June Sarpong. In 2019, June was appointed the first BBC director of creative diversity. And though out of that role now, she is still championing inclusion. June has co-written a new book, Calling Una Marson,

The Extraordinary Life of a Forgotten Icon. It's about the poet, playwright, feminist and activist who made history as the first black female broadcaster at the BBC. June joined me this week. I asked her what was her brief as the first BBC director of creative diversity and also what were her achievements. So my brief was all about content both on radio, what we see, what we hear, all of it and I would say the thing that I'm most proud of is a couple of things. One was the big investment that we made in

diverse content so originally it started with a hundred million for on-air programming and then eventually radio actually came on board with another 12 and since I left it's been upped to another 50. So it's just wonderful to see and then to actually be able to see these programs on air that came under that remit is just wonderful. You will remember of course much was made of the fact that you were in £267,000 a year, I have to say for a three day weekend that role, significantly more than the Prime Minister for example. Is that so?

I didn't know that. That is, even for a full-time job as Prime Minister. Did you understand the criticism that you received? I did understand the criticism. And I will say that actually, when you come from a background like mine, I'm from a working class background. My parents are immigrants.

In a way, I think I'm quite proud of the journey that I've made. And my team and I, I'm quite proud of the journey that I've made and you know my team and I we put a lot of work into everything that we were able to do but I did understand the criticism so yeah. Did you expect it? I think whenever you go into a big job at the BBC it comes as part of the territory doesn't it? The then director-general was Tony Hall he said of your appointment while we've made significant progress on diversity we also have to accept that the BBC is much further to go.

Dudes drive ambition and know-how will help further transform the BBC's programming to ensure that we truly reflect the public that we serve. You were sitting also on the executive committee. I mean when you look at on-air diversity, the content that which you were in charge of, it wasn't staff profiles for example. Do you think it's changed? For sure. I mean also don't forget I started out as on-air talent. We all know that too. And for many years I was the only person on a set that looked like me and that's why I was really passionate about taking up this role because we know the impact

that the BBC has on the industry as a whole and actually the BBC is able to get this stuff in a much better place, it impacts the whole industry and I think for sure. When you look at what you see on air but also who's working behind the camera, which was a lot of the work that my team and I did while I was here, definitely. And you have stepped down from that role. I mean, I see that there is still criticism. You will have seen it too, no doubt, recently, even in recent weeks.

And I did see in your words that you said you were horribly trolled. I'm wondering how you dealt with that. Oh my gosh, it was horrible. And to be honest, I just kind of stopped looking at it after a while. And it had never happened in my career ever. I've been so lucky. It never happened. So that's quite something to think about the trajectory.

Because you were such an icon in broadcasting as well that people knew. But as social media evolved, you felt with that role it was the worst it ever was. Worst it ever was. And stopped as soon as I left. Funny that. Yeah. There's something about the change of this institution and what it can bring out in people in terms of when they're fearful of what that means.

So yeah, definitely, as soon as I left it stopped. Let's talk about Una. Please. How did you first hear about her? Oh wow, when I was here. So when I was here, when I first started the role, I commissioned Robert Sita, the BBC's in-house historian, to piece together a timeline of the BBC's diverse history.

And he said, well, we have to start with Una. And I couldn't believe I had never heard of her. And so when I sort of was able to comb through the archives, I literally became obsessed. I mean, the archives are quite limited, unfortunately. But still, what there was, I was like, oh my goodness, this woman was amazing. And literally, I just decided that at some point, once I could, I wanted to be able to tell her story. Her remarkable story. And she was a Jamaican woman, her early life there.

But moved to England and as I mentioned, became the first black female broadcaster at the BBC. And the first black woman on British television in 1937. Well let's talk about that. I love that part of the book about how she's discovered. Yeah totally. So it was during the time when the Festival of Britain was taking place. And so she and the then Miss Jamaica were there to sort of speak on Jamaica's behalf. Who was a white woman. Who was a white, well back then, that would be the only face who would be considered sort of representative

of the colonies. You didn't have people of color doing that back then, unfortunately. And so she was white of British descent, but missed Jamaica. And so Una happened to be in the UK at the same time. So the two of them were on this stand representing Jamaica. And the BBC producer interviewed them and thought, oh my goodness, she's amazing. And so he then contacted Una later and then brought her onto radio and they started multiple programs which then led to

Calling the West Indies, which is what she became famous for. Not an easy journey for her though. Tell me a little bit about her life really within that career and the colleagues I suppose that she was surrounded with because she was always the only woman, black woman in the room. Yeah, anywhere she went. Yes. And also she never fit in anywhere. So if you can imagine, she was born in Jamaica in the early 1900s and in the 1920s she was this feminist,ist this ambitious woman so didn't fit in in her own community

Then she comes to the UK and and Britain doesn't know what to do with her She's this bright brilliant black woman, but there is nothing else There's no one else like her and there's no template for somebody like her But anyway being the force of nature that she is, she manages to put on a play in the West End, so becomes the first black person to put on a play in the West End in 1931. Then, as we said, ends up on British television in 1937. And then when Haile Selassie was exiled in 1935, she became his right-hand woman. So there's a speech that's gone viral at the moment of Haile Selassie speaking at the League of Nations, which has so many parallels with everything going on right now with Ukraine. And Una was

part of the team that wrote that speech. Her life was sad though. She never got the recognition during her life that she deserved. I was just thinking of George Orwell, the statue we have outside. He was a contemporary of hers. And her best friend. So George Orwell, T.S. Eliot, two of her closest friends. And it's incredible to see who they rightly became. But unfortunately, the world just was not ready to give her those sorts of opportunities.

Tune's her pong there and the book Calling Una Marson, the extraordinary life of a forgotten icon is out now. Let us turn to a new book, Abortion, a History. It aims to give the long view of something that has always happened, ending a pregnancy. From Ancient Greece to Roe v Wade, Mary Fissel charts the changing practices of and attitudes towards abortion. Mary is a professor in the Department of History of Medicine at Johns Hopkins University in the US and she joined me this week. I began by asking her why take this long view of abortion through the ages?

I think we see some interesting continuities as well as changes. When you take this really long view, we can see, for example, as you mentioned, people have always ended pregnancies, as far back in human history as we can see. We also see that prohibition never works. It makes things miserable, but it never really ends. So prohibition, when it is stopped. Can you tell us your own views on abortion and how you would say it has informed your research in this area?

Certainly. I feel that ending a pregnancy is something that should be decided between the person and their healthcare provider, period. Everyone will take their own views, I respect that, but it's a decision that's best left to those people. So that is your view. How has it informed your research? Well I began thinking about the book in the spring of 2022 when it was becoming apparent that Roe v. Wade was probably gonna fall. And that... Roe v. Wade was probably going to fall. And that... And Roe v. Wade is the law that gave a constitutional right to an abortion in the United States.

Exactly, in 1973. And I think many of us in women's history were concerned for a while. I like to joke that for a long time I thought I'd be spending my declining years driving women across state lines to get the care they needed, but actually I'm a not very good driver. I'm a much better writer. And so this is my work in that area. So being in a moment where things were changing so rapidly, I actually felt that the anchor of seeing this really long picture would be helpful so that people understood that we

were in this particular moment, but it would not last because they never do. So my book actually ends up in an optimistic note because when you see the big picture, you realize that these moments of intense repression burn out and they don't last. Abortion, you've made mention of it there as well, that it is a very contentious issue, obviously very strong feelings on both sides, and knowing as you've laid out you have a very clear personal position and a view on abortion, that some may feel that it makes it difficult, if not impossible, to be truly impartial on the history you select and present in your book. How do you think your views affected what you wrote?

Well, I think the strongest way that they affected me was that for me, abortion is healthcare. And I wanted to normalize that. And to do that, I told stories of individual women because I felt that we needed to see the context. We needed to understand where they were and how they reached the decisions that they reached. I wanted to humanize it so that in some senses it's an issue of hearts more than minds and stories, narrative does that. It reaches how people feel. And as a historian, I have to be true to the sources that I see in front of me. Can't make stuff up, can't cover stuff up. And there's some tough moments in the book as well when, say, a woman is coerced into ending a pregnancy she might not have

wanted to end, but you are true to those moments. You tell a complicated story as best you can. There was a lot that I was not aware of that I read. It goes through the chapters, for example, the botanist, the housewife, and so we meet these people. Let me go back to the Greeks and the Romans. Can you give us a brief explanation of how they saw it? Absolutely. So in ancient Greece, ending a pregnancy was not stigmatized in any way. When you look in the Hippocratic Corpus, this body of writings about ancient Greek medicine. There are many recipes for plant products that would restore a missing menstrual cycle or potentially end a pregnancy.

There's also a mention of the life-threatening moment of incomplete miscarriage when a woman could die unless the uterus is cleaned out properly. So all of those circumstances that we still know today, I mean it's still a crisis today in incomplete miscarriage, that was all in these texts. And that did surprise me a little bit to see how much they knew and how openly they discussed it. Religion often comes into discussions of abortion. How did the advent of Christianity change things, as you found?

That's a very rich question. It tied up sex and abortion in new ways that hadn't been tangled up in that way before. I think Christianity began to see abortion as a sign or a signal, a marker for people having sex when they shouldn't have been, outside of marriage, say. And abortion became this indicator and became extra bad for that reason. In early Christianity, there's a lot of different points of view about the famous question of when life begins. It's not uniform at all. And so that wasn't the key. The key was really making sure that Christians were sexually virtuous and abortion was an indicator maybe they weren't.

Right. Abortion and in addition, pregnancy, of course. Medieval nuns, This is perhaps surprising. They were fonts of knowledge on plants, medicines that could create an abortion. That surprised even me. I didn't know all of that. I think the most surprising to me was the sixth century Irish holy woman, Brigid of Kildare. This was new. I spoke to my mother about this last night. Continue. I love that.

So, she has a convent. Well, to call it a convent is overly formal, a holy place. And one of the young women who is going to join her loses her head and has sex with a young man, gets pregnant, is horrified, repents, and Bridget puts her hands on the woman's belly and the pregnancy vanishes as if it never had been. I think that's a really interesting moment because it shows us that Christianity did not yet have one single perspective. I think it's also a miracle because it was instantaneous. Irish women who would have heard this story read aloud would

probably have known about plant products that could end a pregnancy, but in that case it's a couple of days of cramps and bleeding and this happening all at once, it was a miracle. So that was amazing to me. I had never heard that story, St. Brigid is a patron saint of Ireland along with St. Patrick yesterday, and say call him kill. Generally it's more put in the Catholic sphere as I have seen it. And of course that story might seem very much at odds with the Catholic Church's teaching on abortion. Yes, and that only solidifies over centuries. The other thing I would say about medieval nuns is of course both nuns and monks are providing health care to their neighborhoods, not merely

to the people in the monastery or the convent. So it's not surprising that they would know about remedies to deal with health crises where they are. And I know you put the term of abortion under the, what would I say, the category of health care, which some people have an issue with, to be aware of other people's positions when it comes to this contentious issue. Let me turn to Eliza Wilson, who actually, you start the book, In a Churchyard in South London, looking for her. Tell us a little bit about Eliza. Well, Eliza Wilson was the first abortion case that I researched and I came across her in Victorian newspapers, 1848, because I was looking for something else. That's so often the way for

historians. And her story was there in such detail. So she was 32, a little old to be unmarried at that point, spinster you might say, and she'd been having an affair with Richard Orpin, a married coachman, and things went terribly wrong. She had what we now would think of as an abortion that went septic. She died of a massive infection. And then the midwife who provided that care went on trial for murder. And amazing amounts of column inches in the newspaper about her story, like unbelievable.

And part of me feels for her because this is something she never would have wanted to have been made public. And there it was in the newspapers, all over the newspapers. And she died a very unhappy death. But what struck me about her story was how very ordinary she was before this terrible thing happened. She was a dressmaker. You know, many London working women were dressmakers, needle trades. She and her family had come from up north, near the Lake District. Again, many London families were immigrants. And so the way I read her, she was reaching for a little scrap of happiness, you know, in her life, and then it went terribly, terribly wrong. But her very typicality moved me and made me want to bear witness to her as to so many

other women who just had the misfortune to have an infection before it could be treated. And what does she tell you about Victorian attitudes to the women who provided abortions as it was in this case? Well, it tells me actually how acceptable it was, which may surprise you. Spencer Linfield is the name of her midwife. And Linfield had been running what is basically reproductive clinic for decades in Wellworth in South London. She was the poor law midwife, so she's paid by the parish to deliver poor women.

She was the midwife for a charity that loaned out child bed linens to poor women. So that tells me she's very respected and known in her neighborhood. People knew what services she was providing. Women could deliver at her house, they could end a pregnancy at her house. And were it not for this very unfortunate moment, we would never know about her. She didn't advertise her services in the newspaper as far as I can tell. Word of mouth was plenty. And I think there's others like her that we don't know about who were providing this really crucial service. And that's going all the way back. There is also stories, of course, of

colonial plantations, really interesting as well. But just in my last minute, Mary, are you expecting others to disagree with your interpretation of historical record? Oh, that's how historians work. Absolutely. Absolutely. If I don't have people disagreeing with me, I've not done my job. Mary Fissel and her new book is abortion, a history, and it's out now. Last month, work started on a special construction project in Suffolk. Cat and feed Parsons are having the extension and renovation of their home constructed entirely by women. Women make up only 15% of the construction workforce today, and only 1% of those are in manual skilled roles. So finding the tradeswomen to work on the build has been half the challenge. The project has attracted people from all

over the country. One builder drives in from South Wales, another, who was with us in studio, from Brighton and soon scaffolders from Sheffield will join for the next phase of the project. I was joined by Cat Parsons who started the project on her home and also one of the builders at its heart, Yaz Poole. I began by asking Kat, what was the impetus for creating this all-females build team? So there was a number of reasons. I think the main thing is, Fia and I are very passionate about gender equality and gender balance. We're both construction background. We've had a bit of a mixed bag of response in terms of how we are received on site, from very

positive to the eye rolling of, oh no, they've sent a female. And what did you do? What's your trade? What do you do? So background is environmental consultancy, so contaminated land, so think building sites, digging holes, mudding jars, that sort of thing. So very, very male dominated. So there was that sort of element of it. And then really the main thing was this opportunity came up, we bought this absolute shack of a house, and we thought to ourselves, in 2023 when this sort of concept came up, we'd planned it, we thought, you know,

actually can you do this with an all-female team? You know, we have a huge network from our own background, so we thought, you know, it'd be quite easy from the design element, we could pull on the people, the women we already knew, but actually could we push that one step further and really use this as a showcase to really find women from all areas of construction and built environment all the way down from architecture all the way down to actually laying the bricks on site. You're a month in, you're still smiling. I am. Yaz, welcome.

Hi. You wanted to join the team that Cass was putting together. I did and they contacted myself and Emily who are the main contractors and basically said we want to do this amazing thing with all females and it's very rarely do you get any females on site but having everybody on site being female is just amazing. What's it like? What's the difference? The difference is women problem solve a little bit different to men and it's just a little bit more relaxed, it's a lot tidier and I think it's just so nice.

Well let's talk about the problem solving for a moment then. What is the difference there in the process? I would say we would have a little bit more patience and it's just looking at things a little bit differently as well. So yeah that really helps and I think we just, our temp part is, we don't lose our temper as much, basically. There's more collaboration as well. We found that from the design phase as well.

And again, even being on site this week, you know, there's always snags, there's always issues, but it's dealt with in a very different way. It's no one sort of then like stepping forward and saying, oh, no, actually I'm completely inflexible. There's this really nice, it's absolute teamwork to the same objective. It's a very different style. And so do

you, did you, either a few, I'll start with you Kat, feel that you needed to behave in a different way if the if you were on a build that was male-dominated? Massively, so again when I used to work in construction you know you were almost like two different people you'd go into work and I'd be swearing about the weather or all the traffic or you know almost to create this sort of you know, you were almost like two different people, you'd go into work and I'd be swearing about the weather or the traffic or, you know, almost to create this sort of, you know, I was a safe space, I wasn't sort of one of those women that was going to be, you know, a pain and cause issues. And then you'd go home and you'd have to shake it off, you know, on a Friday night, I had to sort of temper my language for the kids and, you know, and then turn back into me again, ready

for Monday, where again, same thing, you had to sort of put this shield up. Yes. Yeah, it is different. And I think for myself and Emily, we just try to put across that we're not trying to compete or basically want all females. We just kind of want to showcase our skill set and that we want to work alongside you guys and everything just to be teamy. Equal. Yeah, equal. That's what it is about for us. I want to read a couple of the messages that have come in because I was asking for tradeswomen. There are more women in the heritage sub-sector of the construction industry. Programs like the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings have two advanced

programs which are very popular with women. My biggest challenge of being female in building conservation has really been being a parent. the employer's attitudes and expensive, unavailable, flexible childcare while working. Frances, I have worked in construction since 95. I run my own decorating business. I'm 71, still on the tools, wallpapering today. Glad you have the radio on. I have had the time of my life. Nothing beats eating your lunch on the scaffold in the sunshine with your mates. I've never suffered misogyny from the other trades I work with, only from clients. More women should do it, it's an absolute joy. Yeah, no, yeah it is amazing but I think some of the feedback we've had from the women that worked

the project is being underestimated. So you know you arrive and it shouldn't be a surprise when you open the front door and there's a female engineer there or if you know we had Sky out there that it was a female engineer turned up it shouldn't be different and we walked past the construction site on the way in this morning and there was literally 30 men stood outside and you wouldn't bat an eye usually so why when you drive past our site in Ipswich should it be any different with an all-female team so that's what we're trying to do just positively disrupt. There is indeed you know we hear from more construction

experts whether it's builders or surveyors or electricians, the government has plans to increase the number of homes that are built in some counties by 400 percent. The Construction Industry Training Board has estimated that over 50,000 workers are needed to fulfill that demand. So you would imagine it should be appealing to more women. What would you say they need to do to change the culture that can be somewhat unwelcoming from what I'm hearing from some of my listeners this morning? I think it's just learning the skill set.

It doesn't really matter what gender you are. It's just if you've got the skill set and you want to get involved, be confident and go for it. Like, I love my job and I love the people around me and it is, it's a great industry to be with and I think if it's something you want to do, just go for it. It's great. Stories are coming in. I once had a client referred to me as a Rottweiler after I had delivered the residential project on time and on budget.

There is no way a male project manager would have been referred to in the same manner. Kat? Yeah, no, absolutely. And again, even our architect the other week was on a site and was asked why she didn't bring the bacon sandwiches and the tea and she's the most senior person on the project. What did she do? Absolutely nothing. She reported it afterwards and then it kicked off and was dealt with. But not a single guy in this room said, well, unacceptable.

So there is that thing about that allyship piece. And this is an all female project, but this is not excluding men. We have a very beautiful 15 year old son at home. My dad is involved, our daughter's involved as well. It's about showing them how to, that allyship piece, how to step forward. And again, as Yasmine was saying,

we have to work at 110%, 200% to demonstrate that we are capable and competent and we shouldn't have to. They have the most knowledge and we want to learn as much as we can off them but in a safe and comfortable environment and just be part of the team. Kat Parsons and Yaz Poole there, thanks very much to them. Well Claire MacDonald will be here on Monday. She'll be joined by two psychologists to discuss the TV drama Adolescents. It's about a young teenage boy

who has been charged with murder. All that and more on Monday's Woman's Hour. Until then, have a good weekend. Why are some countries happier than others and what can we learn from them? I'm Hannah Gelbart and we're talking about some of the world's happiest countries, Finland, Costa Rica, and how it's the simple things that can make people feel content. Maybe something as simple as listening to your favourite podcast.

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