Andy Burnham’s in tray, Dr Emma Chapman, Snail Mail
Woman's Hour
BBC
4.1 • 3K Ratings
🗓️ 20 July 2026
⏱️ 58 minutes
🔗️ Recording | Apple Podcasts | RSS
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
As Andy Burnham takes over as Prime Minister, we ask leading campaigners and experts on women’s issues what they think he should prioritise on day one of his premiership. Clare McDonnell is joined by Labour MP and former Violence against Women and Girls minister Jess Phillips, senior midwife Donna Ockenden who led the recent review into maternity care failings in Nottingham, and Chief Executive of the Fawcett Society Penny East.
Fatboy Slim, one of the biggest DJs of the 1990s, has just finished playing four nights to appreciative crowds in his home town of Brighton. And among the crowd were a number of midlife women. More women in their forties and fifties, who are often experiencing the pressure of caring for both children and older parents, are exchanging an early night for being up raving at 4am. Clare McDonnell finds out more from Alinka Greasley, Professor of music psychology at the University of Leeds who has carried out research into women and raving and is a raver and DJ herself.
How can we explore distant stars, buried water on Mars, or witness the first moments after the Big Bang? And what can we see without having to leave our back garden? Dr. Emma Chapman an award-winning radio astronomer based at the University of Nottingham, and a Royal Society Dorothy Hodgkin research fellow. She will be appearing at the Buxton International Festival this Friday. She joins Clare McDonnell to discuss the radio universe, the upcoming Perseid Meteor Shower and a partial solar eclipse.
English Heritage has warned the tradition of sending postcards could become “a distant nostalgic memory", after half of Brits surveyed said they never send them. But with the rise in popularity of 'Snail Mail', largely driven by social media, how are women leading the charge to stay connected through post? To discuss, Clare McDonnell is joined by Great British Bake Off finalist Alice Fevronia, who set up The Artful Baker Club, and Rebecca McMillan, who co-founded The Sunday Letter Project.
Presented by Clare McDonnell Producer: Louise Corley
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, Podcasts. |
| 0:07.0 | Hello, I'm Greg Jenner, I'm the host of You're Dead to Me, the comedy podcast that takes history seriously. |
| 0:12.6 | And we are back for a 12th series. |
| 0:14.5 | Everyone in that film is wearing their own pants. |
| 0:17.8 | We're joined by comedians like Kyle Smith Bino and Desiree Birch. |
| 0:21.2 | Can't see how this would go wrong. |
| 0:23.4 | We'll meet many medieval saints. |
| 0:26.1 | Motivational speaker saint with like a sort of Madonna head mic on. |
| 0:30.3 | We're doing a history of underwear. |
| 0:32.1 | Plus there's loads more. |
| 0:33.6 | You're dead to me. |
| 0:34.4 | Listen first on BBC Sounds. |
| 0:36.5 | Hello, I'm Claire Macdonnell and welcome to Woman's Hour from BBC Radio 4. |
| 0:42.3 | Just to say that for rights reasons, the music in the original radio broadcast has been removed for this podcast. |
| 0:50.1 | Hello and welcome to Woman's Hour. |
| 0:52.9 | We are hours away from a new Prime Minister crossing the threshold into number 10 Downing Street. He will be the seventh in 10 years. But what might Andy Burnham do for women? Well, maternity rights, equal pay, child protection online. All topics up for discussion with an expert panel we have assembled for you this morning, |
| 1:13.8 | which will include former safeguarding and violence against women and girls minister Jess Phillips, |
| 1:19.6 | who recently resigned over slow progress on the protection of women and girls online. |
| 1:25.4 | Here's a question, are you a midlife raver? Well, it turns out more |
| 1:29.2 | women are returning to their raving roots and embracing the release and connection raving brings. |
| 1:36.0 | We're going to hear from a professor, a rava herself, who has done a deep dive into this world. |
| 1:42.2 | How a fascination with radio ariel's as a child led Dr. Emma Chapman to |
... |
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