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Woman's Hour

Helena Merriman, Bus driver Tracey Scholes, Pardons for women tried as witches

Woman's Hour

BBC

Society & Culture, Health & Fitness, Personal Journals

4.22.9K Ratings

🗓️ 10 January 2022

⏱️ 58 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Three years ago, BBC radio broadcaster Helena Merriman received a shock diagnosis related to hearing loss after giving birth to her son. This prompted her to explore how people handle life-changing news about their health in a new radio series called Room 5 that airs on Radio 4 this week. Helena joins Emma to discuss the power of resilience.

One of the first female bus drivers in the UK says she is fighting to keep her job after a new bus design left her unable to reach the pedals. Emma speaks to Tracey Scholes from Manchester who says that because of her height - five feet - she can no longer drive the new buses safely. The bus company involved say other staff of a similar height to Tracey are able to drive the vehicles safely.

New figures from the Office of National Statistics show that an estimated 1.3 million people in the UK have "long Covid" – defined as symptoms lasting more than four weeks. We know that women are more likely to be affected by long Covid, and that it can also occur in children. Dr Nisreen Alwan is Associate Professor in Public Health at the University of Southampton.

In Sudan, thousands of people have again taken to the streets of the capital, Khartoum, to protest against military rule, following the resignation of Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok. Reports from medics on the ground say more than 50 people have lost their lives since a military coup took place in October last year. For several years, there has been continued unrest in the country, and headlines around the world have shown women at the forefront of the revolution and pro-democracy movement - but is that the full story? And how are things for women there now? Raga Makawi, a Sudanese democracy activist and editor at African Arguments and Will Ross, the BBC's Africa Editor join Emma.

Almost 300 years after the Witchcraft Acts were repealed, a bill has been bought forward in the Scottish parliament to pardon those convicted. This comes after a two-year campaign to clear the names of nearly 4,000 people accused of witchcraft, of whom well over half were executed. Zoe Venditozzi co-founded the campaign and co-hosts the Witches of Scotland podcast. Marion Gibson is Professor of Renaissance and Magical Literatures at the University of Essex and author of Witchcraft: the basics.

Transcript

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0:00.0

Choosing what to watch night after night the flicking through the endless

0:06.8

searching is a nightmare we want to help you on our brand new podcast off the

0:11.8

telly we share what we've been watching

0:14.0

Fladiated.

0:16.0

Load to games, loads of fun, loads of screaming.

0:19.0

Lovely. Off the telly with me Joanna Paige.

0:21.0

And me, Natalie Cassidy, so your evenings can be a little less

0:25.0

searching and a lot more auction listen on BBC Sounds.

0:29.0

BBC Sounds.

0:30.0

BBC Sounds Music music radio podcasts.

0:35.0

Hello, I'm Emma Barnet and welcome to Woman's A from BBC Radio 4.

0:40.0

Hello, good morning to you, welcome to the programme. Another Monday, another week. Here we go again together.

0:46.0

But for Tracy Scoles, a 57 year old from Manchester, one of the first female bus drivers in the city,

0:52.0

it is Crunch Week week she faces her second

0:54.9

appeal to recoup her lost earnings after she was put on a different bus route

0:58.4

after she says she was too short at five feet to all to drive a newly designed bus.

1:05.0

She's been driving buses for the last 34 years, but since the company she works for

1:09.1

changed the positioning of the wing mirrors, meaning she had to lean around a pillar to see them

1:13.7

see them and then couldn't keep her feet on the pedals. Tracy says she wasn't

1:17.8

allowed to keep driving for the same pay. Well I'm going to talk to her

1:21.0

shortly you'll hear the details of her case, including the fact that more

1:24.8

than 20,000 people have signed a petition to support her. But having been one of the first women

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