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Sam Wright is a Senior Community Midwife and WRN Derbyshire & Staffordshire member. She is a powerful advocate for women as they go through their pregnancy and birthing journey.

Sam begins with the history of midwives and takes us through the ages. She explains the meaning of the word "midwife" as being "with women" throughout their pregnancy. How midwives have been historically persecuted as witches, and in more modern times are marginalised and erased with the increasing medicalisation of pregnancy.

She discusses how because of this women are losing trust in the medical profession and midwives. How the gender neutral language and the erasure of female specific words like "woman", "mother", "breastfeeding", have all impacted on women, including women whose first language is not English, who have no understanding of terms such as "birthing person".

She goes on to discuss how midwives are impacted by the rise in commercial surrogacy in the UK and beyond, and what is really going on in the murky world of commissioning parents and baby manufacturing using women as the factory unit.

If you enjoyed listening to this podcast and would like to hear more, go to womensrights.network/wrn-podcast to listen, download and subscribe to more of our episodes.

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2025 saw WRN hold our first ever Women’s festival in Derby. Organised by local WRN members in Derbyshire and Staffordshire, it attracted a large audience from across the UK.

The Festival theme was Celebrating Grassroots Activism and we welcomed speakers and guests from England, Ireland , Scotland and Wales to give presentations on their local activities and tactics.

Sorcha Nic Lochlainn is a Director of and Sports Spokeswoman for "The Countess Didn't Fight for This" a voluntary, non-partisan group - with members from all corners of Ireland - dedicated to defending women's rights and child safeguarding. Sorcha explained how the group became established in Ireland.

If you enjoyed listening to this podcast and would like to hear more, go to womensrights.network/wrn-podcast to listen, download and subscribe to more of our episodes.

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2025 saw WRN hold our first ever Women’s festival in Derby. Organised by local WRN members in Derbyshire and Staffordshire, it attracted a large audience from across the UK.

The Festival theme was Celebrating Grassroots Activism and we welcomed speakers and guests from England, Ireland , Scotland and Wales to give presentations on their local activities and tactics.

Mary Howden is a former Head of Education and Workforce Development at the Scottish Social Services, Director of WRN, and Coordinator for WRN Scotland She talked about the journey taken by WRN Scotland to establish a grassroots women's movement. From small beginnings with 14 women working together to get their message out, to how they grew their membership to cover the whole of Scotland.

If you enjoyed listening to this podcast and would like to hear more, go to womensrights.network/wrn-podcast to listen, download and subscribe to more of our episodes.

And if you’d like to join our conversations, go to womensrights.network/join-wrn

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When a relationship breaks down and one parent relocates a child to another country without the ongoing consent of the other parent, the 1980 Hague Abduction Convention can be invoked.

Anita Gera, co founder of Hague Explained joins the Women’s Rights Network to explain the key principles and little known pitfalls of the Convention that have resulted in an increasing number of mothers and children being ripped apart.

A fascinating, disturbing expose of an international treaty that trumps all UK law and has the power to inflict irreparable damage on mothers and their children.

If you enjoyed listening to this podcast and would like to hear more, go to womensrights.network/wrn-podcast to listen, download and subscribe to more of our episodes.

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Julie Bindel joins WRN on Zoom to discuss defining lesbian culture.

Julie is a feminist campaigner, writer, and investigative journalist. She is the host of The Lesbian Project podcast, with Kathleen Stock.

She writes for Unherd, Observer, Sunday Times, The Critic, Spectator, Telegraph, Mail on Sunday, Tortoise, Prospect, and more.

She is a keen broadcaster and travels far and wide to investigate stories which relate to misogyny.

Her latest book is ‘Lesbians: where are we now?’ Part-memoir, part frontline reportage and part cultural commentary, Julie examines what defines lesbian culture, love, friendship and happiness today. She distinguishes the particular challenges facing lesbians from the very different experiences of gay men, and asks: why do lesbians so often seem to face particular hostility?

Link to Julie’s UNHERD article on Yehudis Fletcher:

https://unherd.com/2025/05/the-charedi-have-a-woman-problem/

If you enjoyed listening to this podcast and would like to hear more, go to womensrights.network/wrn-podcast to listen, download and subscribe to more of our episodes.

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The Women’s Rights Network Afghanistan group works to connect silenced women with volunteers in the UK to give them a voice - through mentoring, education and friendship. Since the Taliban retook control, women and girls have been forced to live under the most oppressive edicts.

This summer a symbolic mass action in honour of them was held in Parliament Square, led by international yachtswoman and WRN member Tracy Edwards, whose charity Maiden raises funds for girls' educational programmes around the world. Plus, it gave a voice to some of the women known to WRN in Afghanistan.

You can hear more stories from Afghan women on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/@saarstories8146, and on X https://x.com/SaarStories

Download a UK education pack from https://www.themaidenfactor.org

If you enjoyed listening to this podcast and would like to hear more, go to womensrights.network/wrn-podcast to listen, download and subscribe to more of our episodes.

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Jo Phoenix is an academic author and professor of criminology known for her gender critical views, having founded the Gender Critical Research Network at the Open University where she was a professor of criminology.

In 2024, Jo successfully sued the Open University at an employment tribunal for constructive dismissal, victimisation, harassment and direct discrimination.

Listen to a short excerpt from that conversation.

Useful Links:

Sex Matters’ piece: Learning from the Jo Pheonix case.
https://sex-matters.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/Learning-from-the-Jo-Phoenix-case.pdf

Office for students: Regulatory advice 24: Guidance related to freedom of speech
https://www.officeforstudents.org.uk/publications/regulatory-advice-24-guidance-related-to-freedom-of-speech/

If you enjoyed listening to this podcast and would like to hear more, go to womensrights.network/wrn-podcast to listen, download and subscribe to more of our episodes.

And if you’d like to join our conversations, go to womensrights.network/join-wrn

Send us a text

If you enjoyed listening to this podcast and would like to hear more, go to womensrights.network/wrn-podcast to listen, download and subscribe to more of our episodes.

And if you’d like to join our conversations, go to womensrights.network/join-wrn