Jazz pianist Zoe Rahman, Allegra Stratton's resignation, Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, Germany's abortion law

Woman's Hour

BBC

Society & Culture

4.1 • 3K Ratings

🗓️ 9 December 2021

⏱️ 54 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Jazz musician Zoe Rahman has been described as one of the brightest stars on the contemporary jazz scene. She takes influence from her English, Irish and Bengali heritage to write music with swing, lyricism and intimacy. She’s a MOBO Award winner, British Jazz Award winner and now an Ivors Composer Award winner. She speaks to Emma - unfortunately we aren't able to include her live music performances in the podcast for copyright reasons.

We discuss the resignation of senior government advisor Allegra Stratton over the Downing Street party video, with Daily Mail columnist Sarah Vine and the Mirror's Political Editor Pippa Crerar.

Richard Ratcliffe, the husband of British-Iranian detainee Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe talks to Emma about his recent 21 day hunger strike outside the Foreign Office in London and his ongoing campaign to secure his wife's release from Iran, and he and their daughter face another Christmas without her.

German leader Angela Merkel has officially left office after 16 years and a new chancellor, Olaf Scholz has been confirmed. His party, the centre-left Social Democrats now have a substantial majority in a three-way coalition government. But the new chancellor has already faced opposition from conservatives over plans to reform abortion law. How will he impact the lives of women in Germany? Chief Political Editor, Michaela Kuefner from Deutsche Welle, joins Emma to discuss.

The revival of Sex and the City – a new series called And Just Like That… airs tonight on Sky TV. It comes at the same time as a brand new TV show on Prime – Harlem – focuses on four ambitious best friends navigating relationships and careers. Emma speaks to Dr Kadian Pow – who teaches Sociology and Black Studies at Birmingham City University.

Image: Zoe Rahman Credit: Ilze Kitshoff

Transcript

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0:00.0	Just before this BBC podcast gets underway, here's something you may not know.
0:04.6	My name's Linda Davies and I Commission Podcasts for BBC Sounds.
0:08.4	As you'd expect, at the BBC we make podcasts of the very highest quality featuring the most knowledgeable
0:14.3	experts and genuinely engaging voices. What you may not know is that the BBC
0:20.4	makes podcasts about all kinds of things like pop stars,
0:24.6	poltergeist, cricket, and conspiracy theories and that's just a few examples.
0:29.7	If you'd like to discover something a little bit unexpected, find your next podcast over at BBC Sounds.
0:36.0	BBC Sounds, Music Radio Podcasts.
0:41.0	Hello I'm Emma Barnet and welcome to Womensa from BBC. podcasts. that England was indeed moving to Plan B COVID rules, which crudely summarized means don't go to the office,
0:56.3	but you can go to Christmas parties. And speaking of which, and following on from our conversation
1:00.4	yesterday, where so many of you got in touch to share your reactions to that leaked
1:05.1	video of the Prime Minister's former Spokesperson Allegra Stratton practicing a mock press conference
1:10.6	in which her colleagues joked about what her response might be if she was
1:14.6	asked about Christmas parties at number 10 during lockdown last December, do tell me
1:20.4	how that will affect your following of these rules. We were only talking
1:24.8	about this yesterday and the rules came in last night or rather were announced
1:29.2	last night to come in this Monday. Let me know. But the other development yesterday was a resignation, not of
1:35.7	a minister, not of a civil servant, but one Allegra Stratton, very tearfully tendering her resignation and offering apologies outside of her London home.
1:46.4	Is it significant that the only person to resign so far over the Downing Street parties is a woman and a woman who didn't even
1:55.1	intend them. My first guest today thinks this is another prime example of what
1:59.9	she calls the pure sexism at the heart of British politics.
2:03.7	But what about you?
	...

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