Episode 1 - The Brief

Episode 1 - The Brief So David Thompson who is the assessor of the Nolan show He comes to you with stories and he gets obsessed with all of his investigations So I thought here we go, what's next, but obsessed actually means he digs in deep Oh by the way another F1 response According to the exact same as the BBC's What's that? Raisins for disclosure So they're all popular? Yes, it looks exactly the same He came to me about a year ago since Stephen there's a story in Stonewall There's a story in the BBC in Stonewall And there's a story in lots of public organizations So that was about a year ago, here we are today Which plays an island The right to skip the stuff 1855-55 Standard rates apply, Tweet, add Stephen Nolan Here we go, go David's on for a bit later this morning Mary She's on the. So who do we have at the top here? Oh, sometimes they could play you through We'll come in a couple minutes Biggest show in that country Starts Now Well a big message from the Chief Scientific Advisor to Northern Ireland Well first and foremost the Nolan Show Does the News Without Formality That's what we do We've been the biggest show in the country in Northern Ireland for 16 years Because we don't read out press statements without scrutinising them If organizations come back to us and refuse to comment We absolutely torture them Within what we're allowed to do to get the public answers I think we're probably one of the most robust parts of the BBC Why did it go wrong Greg? As you put previously you're going to keep digging And as I responded, digging works both ways You take a man with that? Remember? Take away This story came to me in 2018 When I was looking at how the BBC had described Just a comment on the BBC staff page Which I wondered how the BBC stood over Because it seemed to me it didn't really stack up And I asked them and they said "I came from Stoomwell" Stoomwell said it was correct So there they experts and I kind of thought Well that's all it For the BBC to be taken on outside lobby groups Position as a matter of fact on anything So that's kind of how it started And I've been asking questions about it for a couple of years And kind of working on it more intensely In the past sort of six months or so Oh Well I just wanted to see if you might be available One day this week to do that Stoomwell podcast with us But a recurring theme that you will hear throughout this podcast Is that some people from all different sides of this debate Either don't want to Or because of that backlash Or to afraid to ask Or even answer questions About sex, gender, self-id And trans issues I think most people are probably associates still more with the gay rights movement In sort of eighties, nine days The campaign for same sex marriage As advocates of gay rights From today homosexuality will no longer be a bar to service In Britain's armed forces For the first time gay couples in England and Wales could get similar legal rights to married people Where Stoomwell's views are quite controversial At the moment is around gender Historically sex and gender were essentially the same thing But it meant are you male or female What Stoomwell would argue for is that there are a multiplicity of genders And it's about how you feel as a person So you could be in a male body But you could be a woman And it's about how you self-identify And there are other genders People who identify as non-binary Neither male nor female There's gender, queer, gender-fled Lots of different ways that people can identify What Stoomwell essentially are arguing for As a change to legislation to protect Having a different gender identity To give a legislative basis for that Which there isn't currently Some feminist groups feel that By doing this it does start to impinge on sex-based rights And that's where the conflict comes So for example if you're looking at women's change in rooms A lot of feminists argue that They should be based solely on sex But if you change the law To allow people to self-identify their gender And there's a concern that undermines safe spaces For women and girls on sports Another area where it's become really contentious Obviously there are physical differences between males and females And should trans women be allowed to compete in women's sport Lorraine Kelly on ITVs Lorraine Eddie Isard is keeping really busy this journey She's running 31 Maths and performing 31 stand-up gigs In 31 countries In 31 days You were in the news Obviously wanting to be known as she now And can I apologise to you if I get that wrong Because we're still kind of just going along with it I was asked, I was on National Portrait Gallery Portrait artist of the year And they said what would you like to be known as And I thought well I'd quite like to be she Because I mean girl knows She, her But basically there's a request But it's never demand, it's never an assistive This is all new territory The gender debate is a debate that's been happening for just a few years And some of the changes that Stonewall want to bring in are pretty radical In terms of how we perceive gender And how fluid your gender can be and how easily that can change But just to be clear We are not nor are we allowed to Within the BBC attack Stonewall In fact If anything What this journalism might do Is show how effective Stonewall are At what they're supposed to be Which is a lobby in group They lobby incredibly well What this journalism is about Is all of the public institutions That should have their own thought of mind Should be standing back And should be saying to themselves Is this in line with our ethos Our policies And with big questions around some of that It's institutions like the Scottish government, the Welsh government Whitehall Police NHS All of these organisations have brought Stonewall in Presumably aware that Stonewall hold some controversial views So why did they bring them in And allow them to influence their own policies And can they then say That they are truly independent When my guest today Ruth Hunt became chief executive She extended its work to include the trans community But many Stonewall members have been upset at the line the leadership has taken on gender recognition That anyone can declare themselves to be male or female And at their refusal to share a platform with anyone who disagrees Translates and policies Translates and laws are made When you consider how controversial some of these issues are Stonewall's position of often not debiting I must just meant that the potential policies That Stonewall are advocating for Can't be scrutinised and can't be debated This is a hinge moment in history If a man is gender reassigned And he feels inwardly is a woman In you of you can he be a woman or not No Do you understand how people feel that's insulting? The debate around trans rights and trans issues Is incredibly controversial to the extent Where people who have legitimate views on both sides of that debate Get trolled, get attacked There are attempts to silence them It's a really difficult space then for families and young people to be part of A lot of the time people don't feel confident enough to speak up Because they feel like if they say anything remotely negative They're going to be branded as a transphobic bigger And anything remotely positive They're going to be branded as a lefty liberal Snowflake social justice warrior But I think my job is to resist that pressure From any side and just to get the truth out there as the what's going on Where the conflict comes is how you legislate for this And how as a society we lay down the law In a way that allows people to be themselves But doesn't infringe in other people's rights The DUP MLA Jim Wells, a former health minister Rears this issue in the Finance Committee at Stormon I don't think it's appropriate Did any government agency has a relationship with a very militant one-sided campaign group? So far we've gone to the Scottish government, the Welsh government, the Northern Irish government And to the Whitehall departments, the UK government We've gone to NHS trusts, the police, universities And the BBC, so these are all big public sector organisations Who already have a relationship with Stormon So in this we want to see how governments across the UK and public bodies across the UK Have interactable Stormon Because we know there's a relationship there, we know money's paid But we want to see exactly what these governments and institutions have got for their money What we're still more asking for and what policies changed Because of this relationship, if any So that's what we're trying to find out Is how much influence have Stormon had over public policy One of Stormon's finding members Isser Ian McKellen. When people say we should have been a democratic organisation, our demands should have been passed by unanimous votes. It was tapping into supporters in very important places, like Parliament. The MP whose daughter was gay, who understood the problems, when Stonewall arrived as an organisation, with that backing he could then confidently go to a young rising politician like Tony Blair and get him on board. I think there's just a principle here about how government works. We do this day and day out in the radio about how government works and making sure that government is transparent and open. And as a journalist, everything's about public debate and some of these issues that Stonewall lobby on in terms of self-identification. These issues are not settled issues, they're contested. The government has rejected proposals for self-identification but yet Stonewall have this influential position within these organisations which is filtering that down through them. So, demay there's a really important principle there as to whether that influence within government means the democratic process could be undermined. And that might sound quite dry but it's important because if we don't scrutinise these types of issues, I guess not about the rights and wrongs of what Stonewall are doing there and titled a lobby, it's about the process. And is it right that in a democracy, a lobby group can have so much influence within government, on government policy? And if Stonewall can have it, who else can have it? [Music] Bro, we've got two with the podcast and the thing is the opener being done or is it still being ripped off? No, because we have loads of rights issues. All the stuff we want to use for the opener but we've got that sort of thing there. Hello! Hello! Morning! Hello! Hello, the ears? Can I see London, my nice ******* car form won't link up? That's because that's super s**t and being a god of a s**t. By the way, I'm at the set here for a recording for the podcast this morning. As you're listening to this podcast, you might be wondering why we're also giving you a sense of what the Nolan Radio show is and who the people are behind the scenes and why we share them with you some of the banter and some of the interaction that we have on a daily basis. We just want you to know who we are as people and our erotite, Nike and Bay, you know, to the rest of the team and our intensely boring Thompson can be. Just in case he comes across as this charismatic investigative journalist, he boars me silly sometimes, don't you Thompson? Yes. So we're trying to explain, aren't we? Come here! Come here! We're trying to explain where we're keeping this banter in. Why are we keeping this banter in? A sex floor executive may ask. I don't know why you're calling it banter. Who says banter? Oh, what is it? Crack! I have a bit of crack. Right. We just. We're just really keen that you take this and us for who we are. We're a team of journalists trying to bring you what we think is a really important story and hopefully if you get a little flavor of who we are, it just might encourage more of you to connect with us to email us, [email protected] and let us know what you think of this podcast Good or Bad. I can sum up why this story is important to the audience in a nutshell. If you have any organization that becomes so powerful, that it has penetrated the thinking of many of our public institutions, then there needs to be a lot of transparency around that. The public need to be able to look at that par and scrutinize it and ask these big public, that's the key word, public organizations. Sorry, how much are you influenced by this group? What about other groups that oppose Stonewall? Are they allowed to influence your policy? This is critically important to the public. That's why we're spending months and years investigating this. And yes, we are asking questions to of the BBC. We will be looking at many organizations, but the first couple of episodes of this podcast is looking at the BBC. My and Robert's director general is to absolutely make sure that the BBC is in pass out these first and foremost protective. I think where it becomes a problem for the BBC is that Stonewall obviously has a set of views and we are as an organization or pride ourselves in independence and impartiality and being separate from grips and it's very difficult to have any relationship with any charity or any group if you work for the BBC, particularly charities you're lobbying on sensitive areas. What are the different gender identities? Do you know there are so many gender identities, so we know we've got male and female, but there are over a hundred if not more gender identities now. So there's a lot of criticism about how the BBC provide educational material for young children, about there being a hundred and more genders which most people probably won't have heard of. So lots of people are very angry about that and it's that type of thing that we want to find out is that the BBC's position or is that Stonewall's position? And did Stonewall influence the BBC and say, look, this is where you've got to go to, you have to teach kids about this. We know that Stonewall wants to influence the education system, on matters around sex and gender, like why wouldn't they? But if you're a member of the public who doesn't agree with Stonewall, and you see Stonewall and the BBC have a relationship and that Stonewall provide advice to the BBC, you'd be questioned is the BBC really impartial in these issues? The BBC will say there's like a Chinese wall between their diversity and inclusion, people and the journalism and the independence of the BBC as a broadcaster. But if there's a perception out there that the BBC has taken a position on all of these issues around gender and people will argue that by saying there's a hundred genders they have taken a position, is that because Stonewall have asked them to? And is there a political pressure for a public service broadcaster to push the agenda of a lobby group? And that's what we're trying to get an answer to. [Music] In the next episode coming up, here how the BBC suggested straight people might be listened to more than gay people. And the workplace equality index, a league table, which big organisations were very keen to climb up. Were they too keen? [BLANK_AUDIO]