Violence Against Women and Girls strategy, Hanukkah food traditions, DIY

Woman's Hour

BBC

Society & Culture

4.2 • 2.9K Ratings

🗓️ 15 December 2025

⏱️ 57 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

The Government is set to unveil its long-awaited Violence Against Women and Girls strategy later this week. Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood has described violence against women and girls as a 'national emergency'. Some early releases of what will be in the strategy have been reported in the press over the weekend, including establishing specialist rape and sexual offence investigation teams in every police force across England and Wales by 2029. Andrea Simon, Director of the End Violence Against Women Coalition, and Harriet Wistrich, founder and Director of the Centre for Women's Justice, join Nuala McGovern to talk about what we know so far.

According to a survey in lots of the papers today, nearly half of younger women surveyed said they are confident in painting and decorating, compared to just 28% of young men. The stats are from the motoring and cycling firm Halfords who said its study revealed a reversal from previous generations. Vickie Lee, DIY YouTuber known online as The Carpenter's Daughter, joins us, alongside Caroline Henn, founder of bePractical DIY in Bristol, who runs courses aimed at making DIY accessible.

Food is a ‘form of conversation between people, between generations of the same family, or between members of local and global communities’, says Alissa Timoshkina, a food writer and historian, whose family has a Ukrainian-Jewish lineage. At the start of Hanukkah, Alissa - author of new recipe book Kapusta - joins Nuala to talk about why she believes food is the language of unity.

The Midlothian singer-songwriter Brooke Combe first came to prominence with her singalong, handclapping debut single, Are You With Me? Her early cover songs found mass appeal, particularly her rendition of Baccara’s Yes Sir, I Can Boogie, the Scotland international football team’s anthem in summer 2021. She has performed at Glastonbury and opened for Benson Boone on his American Heart World Tour. She joins Nuala to discuss her music and debut album, Dancing at the Edge of the World.

Presenter: Nuala McGovern Producer: Simon Richardson

Transcript

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0:00.0	BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, podcasts.
0:07.0	My Christmas Mix is pure 90s festive nostalgia.
0:11.1	You know, the Christmas songs you listen to on repeat.
0:14.0	Ho!
0:14.3	Ho! Ho! No, no, no.
0:17.5	I'm all about the big hitting Christmas anthems.
0:20.4	Come on, guys. What about those tunes that really slay? It's Christmas kitchen disco season, surely. Give me hip-hop Christmas bangers every day. Those Christmas tracks that are straight out of Lapland. Get all kinds of Christmassy. Just search Christmas music on BBC Sounds. Hello, this is Newell and McGovern and you're listening to The Woman's Hour podcast.
0:40.4	Hello and welcome to the program.
0:42.9	Around one and eight women were victims of sexual assault, domestic abuse or stalking in the year to March 2025,
0:51.1	according to the Office for National Statistics.
0:54.0	And those figures are something the government is hoping to drastically reduce.
0:58.5	Now, after long delays, it has released some details on a much-anticipated new strategy
1:04.0	to combat violence against women and girls, we will discuss.
1:08.2	Also today, reaction to the shootings on Bondi Beach targeting Jewish people
1:11.9	who were attending a Hanukkah event. Also this hour, we'll chat to this Scottish soul singer
1:17.5	and songwriter Brooke Kome about her debut album and also why she left what she described as the
1:22.7	confines of a major record label. And what about this survey
1:27.5	that we came across this morning
1:28.9	from the firm Halfords?
1:30.5	Out of 2000 adults,
1:32.1	it found nearly half of young women
1:33.9	were confident in painting and decorating
	...

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