Zadie Smith, Baby banks, Pat Hume, Irish tampon ad, Victoria Cilliers, Kids against plastic - a podcast by BBC Radio 4

The multi award winning writer Zadie Smith on 'Intimations', a collection of personal essays about lockdown. Photo courtesy of Dominique Nabokov.

The rise in families with children under 5 needing help from baby banks has risen significantly since the pandemic began. We hear from Lauren Elrick who has a fifteen month old daughter and uses Abernecessities in Aberdeenshire. Sophia Parker, chief executive of Little Village baby bank in London and Tracy Thorn, an NHS family nurse.

A television tampon advert has been banned in Ireland for causing widespread offence. Alexandra Ryan, CEO of Goss Media, and the radio presenter and former doctor Ciara Kelly discuss.

Victoria Cilliers’ story made headlines in 2015, when it emerged her husband had tried to kill her by tampering with her parachute. Against all odds, she survived. After two trials he was sentenced to 18 years on two counts of attempted murder. Now she's written a book called 'I Survived'.

At the funeral service of John Hume, the Northern Irish politician and Nobel Prize winner, it was said that 'when the history of Ireland is written, if Pat Hume's name is not beside John's, it will be incomplete history'. Pat, his wife, had been at his side during the Troubles, during peace, and his years of living with dementia. Jenni hears from Eimear O'Callaghan, former BBC News Editor, and Monica McWilliams, Emeritus Professor at Ulster University.

Teenage sisters, Ella and Amy Meek are the founders of Kids Against Plastic. This week they were speaking at online climate change forum, hosted by the all-electric Formula E race Team Envision Virgin Racing. They told us about their concerns about the rise in single plastic use, and how we can all be plastic clever.

Presenter: Jane Garvey
Producer: Dianne McGregor

Further episodes of Woman's Hour

Further podcasts by BBC Radio 4

Website of BBC Radio 4