Woman's Hour - Women’s refuges and disability, Aisling Walsh, Roxanne de Bastion

Episode Date: January 29, 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 about 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. Singer Roxanne de Bastion’s grandfather was a Holocaust survivor and a renowned pianist. She joins Anita to discuss bringing his music to a modern audience and tracing his story for her book, The Piano Player of Budapest.Aisling Walsh, Bafta-winning director of Room at the Top and Elizabeth is Missing, has a new project – the BBC series Miss Austen. Aisling speaks to Anita about the series, which reimagines the life of Cassandra Austen, Jane's sister, and her career in giving a voice to unheard stories through film and TV.The Creative Industries Independent Standards Authority (CIISA) was created to tackle misconduct across the arts and media sectors. But more than a year later, it’s struggling to secure funding and deliver on its mission. Anita hears from the CEO Jen Smith and Charisse Beaumont, CEO of Black Lives in Music, to explore the challenges CIISA faces and how the music industry can work towards being safer for women.Presenter: Anita Rani Producer: Lottie Garton

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. Good morning and welcome to the programme. This morning, Stephen de Bastien was a Hungarian pianist and Holocaust survivor. Tapes of him playing piano were unearthed by his granddaughter, Roxanne. Not only has she

written a book about him, The Piano Player of Budapest, but she's also released an album sampling her grandfather's music, which you'll be hearing later in the programme. Director Aisling Walsh will be here to tell us about the new BBC drama Miss Austin. Plus, one year on from a landmark report

on misogyny in the music industry, what progress has been made? And you might have heard in the news that the Mona Lisa, one of the world's most famous paintings, will be getting her own room. Not only a room, but her very own grand entrance

to deal with the amount of visitors, 8.7 million last year that visited the Louvre and the Mona Lisa. Anyone who's been in that throng to catch a glimpse of her will know it's time she got some space. Well, the author Virginia Woolf famously wrote, a woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction. So what about you? Do you have the privilege of a room of your own? Is it a den, a cave, a sanctuary just for you? What is it? Where is it? A shed in the garden, your own office, a potting shed, a greenhouse, a dressing room, or is it simply sitting in the car for five minutes after school drop off that's your sanctuary um okay i do get that space is a dream luxury for most so imagine i was granting you today the wish of a room of your own

what would it look like where would it be get in touch and tell me all about it and where in your life can you make time just for you as it happens when was the last time you did it and what did you do get in touch with me and the usual way the The text number is 84844. You can also email me via our website or you can WhatsApp the programme on 03700 100 444. And if you'd like to follow us on social media, it's at BBC Woman's Hour. But first, 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. Where does this leave women with disabilities impacted by domestic abuse and what can be done about it? Well, a little earlier,

I spoke to a woman we are calling Lise. She told me about her experience of domestic abuse by a former partner. Her words are voiced by an actor. I would say I'm very lucky to be alive, a very lucky victim-survivor to be alive. The level of abuse was horrendous, from physical, financial, coercive, emotional, and I still live with the impact of that every day. It was horrendous. And so eventually you fled the relationship and you went to your family home but but he turned up there yes um it was very difficult at the time to get into any particular safe accommodation and you don't often get a lot of chances to flee and that was my only chance and I wasn't going to get another chance I realized that so I had no choice

but to go to the family home because whilst I was pregnant I also tried to flee and I reached out to professional bodies and unfortunately the responses I got were not acceptable but they happened and it happens we know that it's never easy to even get to the point where you're ready to flee yes once you've found the courage, the bravery, all of it, whatever it takes within you to get out, to flee. And then you came up against challenges. So what did you face when you were trying to find a safe place? 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 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 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 refugees 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 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 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 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 uh 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? 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. How are you coping? I take each day at a time. Right now I feel I'm just getting by but I don't want to just get by. I want to live. I feel I have a second chance at life, but it's very restricted and limited

because of the fact that I have this disability. Because of the domestic abuse that I've gone through. You can't just wipe that away from you. It's trauma. Psychological trauma that doesn't go away. They were the words of a woman we're calling Lise, voiced by an actor. Well, I'm now 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 who work with women and children experiencing domestic violence. Welcome to both of you. Angie, I'm going to come to you first to tell me what you made of what Lise had to say. Does her life matter? Absolutely it matters. It's the whole premise behind our charity Stay Safe East, Anita. So the reason that the charity was founded was to try and dismantle some of the barriers which disabled victims, survivors face in attaining safety and justice around their experiences of abuse and crime. So, yes, 100 percent. Lisa's life matters.

She doesn't feel like it does, though. No, absolutely not and 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 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? Like Angie, you know, we unfortunately we do see this as an experience of survivors that have disabilities. And at Solace, we do have spaces that are wheelchair accessible, but it's only in some of the properties we have. Often they are owned by landlords rather than the charities themselves. And that means 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. 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 some that are ground floor, 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 you know that's not good enough as a you as across england we need to ensure there's sufficient spaces yeah absolutely and then

angie obviously you they come to you because you advocate on their behalf um 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 what can you explain a bit more why is that and what is why is the uh abuse different um i think there's quite a multitude of reasons so it starts right back in the education system so very often um disabled young people are not considered considered sort of people who need to be educated about relationships for example so they might not have the same level of sexual relationships education that people who aren't disabled would have. So it's often perceived that disabled people are kind of sexless and don't get into relationships.

So for that reason if somebody does get into a relationship, they often feel that if it does become abusive, that they should put up with it because it's kind of no more than they deserve or that there's nothing better out there for them. 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 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 even though they may not be taking on any caring responsibilities which then deprives a woman of external support. They may control medications 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 what's 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 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 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 new environment.

And we really need to see that, I suppose, joined up approach across agencies. One percent of refuge vacancies in England 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 percent of their refuge 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 well i mean that's a really impressive figure anita and i'm

surprised and pleased to hear that figure but i think think there's several sort of barriers in the way to having further accessible accommodation. So for starters, as Rebecca referenced, when an organisation has a refuge contract, generally the property comes along with the contract. So it 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 Kidd, 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, is that what it's about? More money? It is partly more money. There is definitely drive to make change, I would say, both by local and central government so for example in Warwickshire and they created some disability accessible refuges in what we call dispersed accommodation so that single properties out in the community which is probably a way of actually doing it on a more a cheaper basis I guess I know also that central government is creating a domestic abuse housing group under the auspices of Minister Rishan Raleigh which we've been invited to join as Stay Safe East. So I think

there is focus on this issue. It is partly about money but it is also about awareness as well. So I really feel that services don't feel that they have the confidence to support disabled victims of domestic abuse. And it's not all about physical disability. There are so many other types of disability, sensory learning, for example, there's one refuge that supports people with learning disabilities in this country. And we should have more as rebecca says of that specialist provision yeah well thank you both of you for joining me to discuss that and highlighting a really important issue angie early and rebecca goss hawk if you've been affected by anything you've heard in our conversation this morning there are links to support and resources online all you need to do is head to the bbc

action line website it's 84844. That's the text number to get in touch with me. Debbie in Devon has been in touch to tell me that her greenhouse is her personal space when she's left alone and can grow her flowers and clear her mind. And a lovely photograph has been sent in by someone saying, I have a happy place to paint and sew. It's my sanctuary. And it does look like a sanctuary.

Keep those coming in. Where is your happy place, the space, if you are privileged enough to have one of your own? Now, all this week, we've been seeing images and services around the world commemorating the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. On Monday's Woman's Hour, Claire spoke to two women whose mothers were both Holocaust survivors.

It was a powerful conversation, which you can listen back to on BBC Sounds. Hearing from survivors firsthand, it's a reminder of our responsibility to ensure that these memories and accounts of lives continue to be heard for generations to come. And my next guest has been

tracing her own family history to do just that. Singer Roxanne de Bastien listened to a box, not just one, box upon box of cassette tapes of her grandfather Stephen de Bastien. He was a successful pianist in Hungary who survived forced labour and concentration camps throughout the Second World War. She's not only documented his story in her book, The Piano Player of Budapest, but she's also re-recorded some of his music, adding her own contemporary lyrics to his original melodies. And I'm delighted to say Roxanne joins me now. Welcome. Tell me about these tapes.

Hi, thanks so much for having me. So I had no idea that we were in possession of just such an incredible treasure trove of memorabilia. As you mentioned, I'm a singer-songwriter. And I never got to know my grandfather, Stephen, because he passed away shortly after I was born. But I did grow up with his piano. So I always knew that this piano was super special. It's this lovely weathered Blüthner baby grand that was definitely like at odds in our home growing up in Berlin so I knew I'd like to say I knew the headlines of that side of the family in the story I knew that they were of Jewish descent that they were originally from Hungary and that my grandfather Stephen had been a professional piano player

how much of his story were you aware of growing up? Well, bizarrely, I really didn't know much about his career at all, which with hindsight seems weird. But when you're a child, I suppose you just don't think to ask. But I did always feel very close to him because of this beautiful instrument we had. But the catalyst of getting to know him was really when my dad passed away what happened well

my dad was also a singer-songwriter so we were really close he taught me how to play on that piano and um I don't know there was this moment after he died that it really hit me that it was now on me to take care of this piano and I really wanted to find out more and my sister and I were going through things and that's when we came across so so many cassette tapes I really wanted to find out more. And my sister and I were going through things. And that's when we came across so many cassette tapes. I think there are about 100 of them. And it's not just of him playing piano. Sometimes they just hit record when they had guests over. So it was hugely emotional, like listening to it,

hearing them chat away in the background. And I knew that he had actually recorded his war story onto cassette late in life so I knew that those tapes existed but up until that point I never really felt ready to sit down and listen to them sure and and when you did what did you discover about him and his life yeah well it was so incredibly moving to hear his story in his own words. I can only imagine, yeah. He still has this thick Hungarian accent. And I mean, there are several things I find really moving about his account.

Firstly, he starts the tapes super formal. He introduces himself and says, I'm going to concentrate to speak on the years of 1940 to 45 and what happened to me. But he then totally didn't do that. He then sort of takes the listener, in this case me, on this incredible journey from his childhood through his music career, talking about how he, yeah, how he came to be a musician. And I found that so moving because it really goes to show that, you know know we are so much more than the worst things that happen to us. And how did he become a musician? So his parents had a textile business quite a successful business they were quite well to do they moved to the

capital Budapest when Stephen was just 17 so he was good, charming, and very much aware of those things, and was supposed to take over the business as the firstborn son, but was just super headstrong and didn't want anything to do with it really, and just played piano at every single opportunity that he could. So how does it feel to know your grandfather's music will be introduced to a huge new audience? Oh it makes me so emotional I just it brings me so much joy to not just share his story but bring his music back to life and discovering his music has just been such an incredible journey. What's it what's that I can't imagine what it's like to hear the voice of your grandfather telling his story a man that you never got to know in your life.

What was that like? Well, so grief was the catalyst. And I was, you know, in that raw stage of grief and missing my dad so much. Of course, I still do. But it was this beautiful experience of almost gaining a new family member. You know, I was getting to know Stephen and really intimately as well through yes just speaking to you directly so I was writing the book right and using direct quotes from him from the cassette tapes weaving them in and out so there are sort

of two narratives in the book but whilst I was writing I was listening to him playing and then suddenly I thought hang on I'm missing a trick if I'm not also I was listening to him playing. And then suddenly I thought, hang on, I'm missing a trick if I'm not also using this opportunity to shine a light on his music. We're going to talk about the music in a minute. I'd like to know a bit more about his life, though, because we've got to the point in the story where we know he, this young, handsome, good-looking man who just wanted to play piano and not take over the family business.

But then when did things change? What happened? So it was excruciating listening back. And there's a lot to be learned from his story because, you know, they felt safe in Hungary. Above anything, they were staunch patriots. And he never thought, he was just steadfast in this belief that his country would never sell him out.

So the whole family, but particularly Stephen, really lived in this false sense of security. He was out playing music, mostly in Hungary and in Switzerland, which remained neutral throughout the war anyway. So adding to that sense of security. He had loads of opportunities to leave. He was invited to America. Many of his musician friends left. He didn't. So it all really took a turn. He was called up to a first labor camp in 1940, although that was only three months and in his own words, nothing compared to what was to come. And then in 1942, he was sent out to the Russian front as a forced laborer. And he was one of 1,070 men, all Jewish, who were sent out.

And conditions were incredibly tough. There was a lot of abuse. Some of them, you know, died at the hands of Hungarian soldiers. And at that point in January, I think it was, the Russian soldiers approached and that mission was abandoned and they were essentially all left to die and the part of my grandfather's story that seems to be truly unique is this walk through Russia so he ran for it together with some some of his acquaintances from from that. And he was incredibly sick from the cold

and from the terrible conditions in the camp. And at some point he was abandoned by his friends as well because he was slowing them down too much. So he ended up walking through the Russian winter on his own. And he made it all the way out to the outskirts of Kiev where he finally collapsed and also got some medical support he made it back to i won't go into too much detail but he made it back to budapest to recover but only to then be sent to first a ghetto sopran ghetto and then on a death march to mouthausen concentration camp. But eventually got out.

Yeah. So he was in Mauthausen and then in the sub-camp Konzkirchen. He was there until liberation. And he did make it back. And not only did he survive, but his immediate family also did. And the piano. And the piano. It was truly the mind-blowing element. The piano, which you have learned to play on and your family played on, your father played.

And what was it like then dueting with your grandfather? Because you've taken his music and you've sung alongside him. What was that experience like? It truly felt profound. It was so magical. There's one track on this album called Vienna. It's his original piano playing, but in the background, you can just about hear him and my grandmother humming this melody. So I wrote a melody to go alongside that.

And that, you know, truly felt like singing together. And that's just very, very special. Why is it important to share your grandfather's story? Well, there's so much to learn unfortunately our collective memory just seems to be so short and it's terrifying um i really i really don't want to name him but it just feels so bizarre to be sat here talking about this story when one of the most famous and richest men on the planet who has such a large platform is currently speaking at far right rallies, is supporting the AfD in Germany. I mean, I grew up in Berlin and this party was always considered a bit of a joke. You know, it existed, but nobody really paid it much mind so to see the rise of this far right across the across the globe is truly terrifying

and regardless of who the scapegoat of the day is I just think you know we need to learn and not make the same mistakes again that we have so much more in common than what sets us apart and everyone deserves a peaceful place to live and it's just not going to not going to end well if we go down those same roads of blaming one another and othering one another. Roxanne de Bastien thank you so much for coming in to speak to me and sharing your grandfather's beautiful music and the music that you've made with your grandfather's music and Roxanne's, The Piano Player of Budapest, is available to buy now. Thank you.

Incredibly moving. I think that's going to stay with us all day. 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. Now, on to my next guest. I'm sure you're familiar with Jane Austen, whether it's reading Emma or Persuasion or watching Colin Firth emerging dripping from a lake in Pride and Prejudice, we know the stories. But how much do we know about the woman herself

and her family? There's a new BBC One drama, Miss Austen, which tells the story of Cassandra Austen, Jane's sister, and her bid to protect their secrets. It's a story based on the novel of the same name by Jill Hornby, and it's directed by the BAFTA award winning Aisling Walsh, who I'm delighted to say joins me now. Aisling, welcome to the programme. Thank you. Thank you for having me on. It's absolutely our pleasure. Tell us a bit more about this story without giving any spoilers away.

It is the story of Cassandra. I mean, people don't know very much. We all know about Jane Austen and the novels that she wrote, but we don't really know much about her private life, her life with her sister, Cassandra, their relationship and their life together.

And that's what Jill's book is about. The letters that they wrote to one another, the lives that they spent together as young women. How much of it is factual and how much of it is artistic license? Oh, I think Jill spent a long, long time researching. And there are letters that survived. There are a huge amount of letters that Cassandra burnt 20 years after Jane's death that people believe would have given us, you know, great insight into her.

But obviously there were letters that Cassandra felt were private, you know, letters among themselves and close relatives. And then, you know, from the novel Andrea Gibb, the screenwriter adapted The Four Hours. And, you know, some of those letters had to be reimagined. But very much based in great research that was done by everybody on the team why did you want to take this project on and direct it i'd worked with andrea before and elizabeth is missing i wanted to work with christine langan producer and stella murse producer i am always fascinated by complex relationships and jane and cassandra's relationship was very complex um i wanted to work with keely halls oh yeah um great cast by the way you've got keely halls

rose leslie and patsy faran that's right incredible i know what was it like on well it's lovely to have uh you know work with a group of women I mean I felt some mornings quite sad for the boys on on on set no we had a lovely lovely team but it's interesting you know to stand in a room and talk about a scene and rehearse a scene with six or eight women I don't know if I've ever done that before um and so it was a lovely atmosphere not Not different, but, you know, rather lovely. Everybody so passionate about making the project. I have to mention Cy Bell, my cinematographer as well, and John Hand, my designer.

So it was a beautiful team of people with all of these lovely, lovely actors, Keely and Rose, Jessica H hines patty foran sinova carlton all central to telling this story um and it's uh it's a powerful cast of women telling the story of of powerful women could you say that the independence that the austin girls had was quite ahead of their time i think very unique yeah um there were two girls in the middle of a family of six or seven boys um and the life at the time we have to remember was spending a lot of time in your little parlor sitting room sewing and reading and you know painting it would have been a massive

journey to go to the next county yeah which they did and visited relatives uh would have been a massive journey to go to the next county yeah which they did and visited relatives and would have stayed overnight and maybe for several nights um so that you know that relationship became very close because of that they they spent a lot of time together in that little room jane would have read her stories aloud or chapters of, you know, her book aloud to Cassandra. I don't know if they would have survived without one another. Yeah, it's a great story of sisterhood. Yes. I want to pick up on something you said about yourself on social media. And you said you describe yourself as a former revolutionary now quietly making pictures are you still a revolutionary i hope so in my work go on explain um well i think it's uh the choice of uh projects

that you take on um you know there are pieces i've done that i think have sort of pushed you know brought stories into the light i I think that's what you'd try and do as a filmmaker. It is like Miss Austin, you're bringing the story into the light of a woman that really nobody knows very much about, really ahead of her time. So

protective of Jane, so protective of that legacy. You know, Never Married, for example. Shock horror. We do know that, you know, they were proposed to at various stages, possibly, and they stayed together.

And so it's to bring that story, you know, to a younger audience as well that, you know, are now being introduced to Jane Austen, her novels. I remember when I first read them, I was a young girl at school. And a big BBC audience as well. Yes, indeed. A lot of your earlier work, the film Joyriders, for example, the series Sinners, that expose the cruelty of Ireland's Magdalene laundries. They focus on subjects that might be seen as taboo

in Irish Catholic society. Well, they were taboo. Why did you want to address them? Personal kind of connection, actually, to... I don't think there's anybody in Ireland that doesn't have, of my generation, that doesn't have a connection to either the Magdalene laundries or to the industrial schools I had a very dear friend who spent a lot of his life in industrial school I had

a lady that came to live with us and looked after us as young children who was a child of a Magdalene mother and I went to a convent school and it was an opportunity to I wasn't from a very religious family at all not at all actually although I went to a convent school and I just thought you can stand I said you can bring these stories into the light I made a film called Song for Raggy Boys about boys in the institutions in Ireland

and I still they're the stories that interest me because it's to although i studied painting at art school i think i started to want to broaden out because the canvas wasn't big enough and um i kind of got involved with um you know making little documentaries and short films and i think maybe that's what brought me there and I just think you get one opportunity to tell a story like that and you know you have to try and do it yeah and then the impact it can have because you mentioned earlier Elizabeth is missing that's a film that many of our listeners will know it made a huge impact it

starred Glenda Jackson as an elderly woman with dementia and you got a massive reaction were you expecting it no i mean you never you don't know you know something goes out you've no idea i think the fact that we got glenda um to do it because she hadn't acted on screen for 27 years yeah what, as people, listeners will know, a Labour MP for almost 30 years. She always said she'd retire, I think, when she was 80. And, you know, we were so lucky to get her. And it was a dream of mine. I loved her.

I remember seeing her on screen and everybody will remember the series, Elizabeth Orr, and they'll remember films like Women in Love. It was a real joy, joy, joy to work with her. But I never realized that there were so many people affected by dementia. Carers, you know, the novelist actually wrote the book as a tribute to her grandmother who had dementia. And so it reached a huge audience. And then Glenda actually became, you know, a spokesperson for some of those groups. As she always said, it's the black hole that we don't talk about because we're living longer.

We're living well into our 80s and 90s. And again, it's something that has affected a lot of families. And so it brought that story into the light. And I was really proud that I could do that. Yeah absolutely now we hear a lot on Woman's Hour about life behind the camera from directors and producers screenwriters all of it and how difficult it is to create space and put your mark on an industry where it's very male dominated. You've been doing this, I don't want to age you, but a few decades now. Ever a problem for you?

And do you feel like now, you know, you're in a different, it's a different world? It's never been a problem for me. I'm talking about out on set. There may have been projects that I didn't get because they went with a male director but you kind of knew that i lived and operated in a world at art school you know there were like five girls in a year of 30 the same as i was at the national film school in beckonsfield again the same thing five or six girls in a you know in a group of 30 so that's the way it was up until it changed um and it's i always stood outside i'm not crazy about

groups i always sort of stood outside as an individual so for me i never thought of myself as male or female it's very yeah that's the way i was brought up yeah you know my i had the most amazing father that you say to you can do whatever you want to do but it's interesting that thing isn't it because you might not feel that way but the world around you will definitely put you in a box you know i've walked on on set on some occasions not not recently but you know some time ago and somebody would say oh the makeup truck is over there presuming your makeup or presuming you're in costume um and i'm not very tall and so that's that also sort of puts you into a little bit of box something to think you're you know the little girl that's in as i said costume customer makeup or maybe in the production department or something.

And then, you know, they realize... Is there a sweet satisfaction when you turn around and say, actually, I'm the boss? Yes, I think that's... It has changed hugely in the last, you know, four or five years, there's a way to go. But the atmosphere on set with that lovely mixture of, you know, kind of guys and girls is great. Well, you've certainly paved the way for a generation and atmosphere on set with that lovely mixture of you know kind of guys and girls is great well you've certainly paved the way thank you for a generation and we thank you for that

um and do you have a room of your own where you write um i do actually um i do i have a little kind of table in tucked into uh the corner of a room that looks out into the garden. But actually, I can kind of write anywhere because one travels so much, you've got to be able to kind of, you know, to be able to do that too. Adaptable. Yes.

Aisling Walsh, it's been lovely to speak to you. What a pleasure. Thank you. Thank you very much. And the first episode of Miss Austin is on BBC One this Sunday at nine o'clock. Now, lots of you getting in touch about the rooms that you have,

that your happy place. This is my happy place. It was a horrible cold corner, which I avoided for years, having no money, but my dad's teaching me how to build. And it's now the coziest reading nook you could imagine.

And it looks delightful, beautiful open fire. My room of my own would display my collection of my little ponies. Bliss, says somebody who's 48 years old whatever works for you now one year on from the publication of a report into misogyny and music and very little has changed that's according to industry experts who were speaking to mps as a meeting of the women and equalities committee yesterday their findings in 2024 were that sexual harassment and abuse were

common in the music industry and the non-reporting of such incidents was high. Well, Jen Smith is the chief executive of CISA, which stands for the Creative Industries Independent Standards Authority. And Cherise Beaumont is the chief executive of Black Lives in Music. And they both join me now. Welcome to both of you. So you gave evidence yesterday to the select committee. Jen, what did you tell MPs? Well, what we told MPs is that there are still present failings within the music sector where women particularly are being given

the opportunity to report concerns, are still experiencing significant harm. And that's why CISA is so necessary as a safe, confidential place to get impartial advice and independent reports if you're facing bullying, harassment and discriminatory behaviour. How about you, Charisse? What did you tell them? I told them there was no change as well. And that's the general sentiment across the industry. We recently uh conducted a piece of research focus groups um with 150 women across the industry about 300 plus stories of bullying and sexual harassment and 55 percent of the uh the people that we spoke with said they are currently experiencing bullying and harassment 78 said they've experienced it in their lifetime at work and 50 said within the last 12 months they've experienced it and in regards to sexual harassment

you know 55 of women said they've experienced unwanted sexual attention. And 40% of the women we spoke with experienced behaviours that they felt were sexual assaults. These are serious, serious figures. Jen, why has there been so little progress in your view? Well, it's really distressing to hear how little progress there is. But the reason why we are so important as an independent, impartial service is that people feel tremendous fear in coming forward. There's significant evidence of people feeling the fear of victimisation if they raise their concerns and feel that their careers may be at risk. And in most parts of life, there's a professional body,

there's a place you can go where you can report concerning behaviour, one place to join the dots where issues of concern can be raised. And that's currently missing in the creative industries and particularly acute in the music sector, which is why an independent body is so necessary. But why has nothing changed you know you've been the you've been talking about this for a while what's where's this where's the block so where we find ourselves now obviously we're building this organization carefully

diligently meticulously listening to people they would like to see this body being developed but we are funded by industry and what we are asking for is just a 0.1 percent tariff from uh music bodies to make this go live and what we're finding is some organizations not all as there are many leaders who welcome susa and recognize it's an inevitable necessity in order to drive change but we are seeing some people being slow to pay in on a tariff structure and this is how many standards bodies are funded. So the industry itself isn't prepared to put the money there to fund it. How much from your experience sharice is this body needed definitely it's needed you know um it's bullying harassment is cultural in the music industry

you know sexual harassment is normalized um they say you know it's so normalized it's almost expected being a part of working as a musician in the industry you know some people feel like you know there are structures in the industry that prevent people from speaking out and when they do speak out the abusers are that the institutions that they represent they are protected. So there are no actions or any recourse for people who do report it to see any consequence. So if there aren't any consequences, that can breed anybody doing whatever they want to do. And you know, there's a saying that the music industry is like the wild west and that what you look at financial industries and there's a financial conduct association there's governing bodies there's Ofsted there's the advertising association there's all of these regulatory bodies that govern and make sure

things are correct within those industries the music, the creative industry doesn't have one. So unfortunately, abuse and bad behaviour happen without any consequence of action. So we do need something that goes past what we currently have in terms of HR, et cetera. And we believe that CESA is it. And what's the situation like for women of color within the industry um for women of color unfortunately is worse um i don't really know where to start but we can start they are at the most disadvantaged in the industry they're treated the worst they're the ones that have um a lack of career progression so 84. They're the ones that have a lack of career progression.

So 84% of black women feel they have a lack of career progression. 88% of black women believe that promotions don't happen for them. And that's if you're an industry professional. But in regards to racism and bullying and harassment, the figures are higher. 78% of women say they've been bullied and harassed. And we can see that, and it is a controversial subject, but we can see that in regards to how black women can be over-sexualised

in the music industry, particularly in the areas of pop and hip-hop, and how that stereotype is reflected in society and how that can easily happen in regards to the workplaces particularly if you're in the music industry and if you're in creative industries women saying they're not feeling safe in music studios being abused by their bosses, production. There's even people highlighting how male producers are grooming young female vocalists. And these are issues that have been going on for decades.

There are thousands of voices out there from all people, from all different types of backgrounds. This is why this is something that needs to be stamped out now. Yeah. Jen, let me bring you back in because, like Charisse has just said, it's stuff that's been going on for decades we're living in a post Me Too, Black Lives Matter era and women are calling things out doesn't mean that things are changing particularly fast. What are you hearing from women in the industry as to why things aren't improving within music? What makes it different? Is there something about the structure?

I think that's a really interesting question and it's one i get asked a lot i think in music you know i see people being really concerned about the prevalence of non-disclosure agreements for example to silence them coming forward feeling that their whole career hangs on on one relationship and i think it is still true to say that it is male-dominated in the music sector more so than other elements of the creative industry. But look, there is an answer in terms of fast-tracking Sisa, in terms of getting us on our way.

And one of the issues that I raised with the Select Committee yesterday was looking at other models of funding. So a mandated tariff. So we would never be asking money on the public purse but industry could pay their 0.1 percent through a mandated levy we've seen the government in the gambling sector to prevent harm in doing a similar thing and so if those harms why not these harms you know we know that there is a model and that's what we're

talking to government about at the moment so that we have the sustainable funding so that we can urgently serve women and everybody who are facing bullying, harassment and discrimination in the creative industries. And Cherise, very quickly, what recommendations would you want the government to take on uh the women in equality select committee report that they published last year i believe is the blueprint for change right you know it's such a good report and to see that the previous government rejected that um was awful well i would like the new government to enact the recommendations from that report and i think we'll see some and all the hard work that's gone into it. Jen Smith and Cherise Beaumont, thank you both for joining me this morning.

And thanks to all of you for your messages about the spaces that you have for yourselves. I'm going to end with Julia's message. Julia says, the secret of a happy place is to have one you can go to anytime, anywhere, because it lives in your imagination. Mine is a room full of sunshine.

Yes, you can even control the weather overlooking the sea. Thank you. I'll take that and run with it. Enjoy the rest of your day. That's all for today's Woman's Hour. Join us again next time. There's a divide in American politics between those who think democracy is in peril and those who think it's already been subverted,

hollowed out from the inside. As President Trump returns to the White House, we go through the looking glass into a world where nothing is as it seems. The Coming Storm from BBC Radio 4. Listen on BBC Sounds. I'm Sarah Trelevan, and for over a year, I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there who was faking pregnancies. I started, like, warning everybody. Every doula that I know. It was fake.

No pregnancy. And the deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth. How long has she been doing this? What does she have to gain from this? From CBC and the BBC World Service, The Con, Caitlin's Baby. It's a long story, settle in. Available now.