Â鶹ÊÓƵAV

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04th June 2024

bbc.co.uk/accessall

Access All – episode 108

Presented by Emma Tracey

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EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý I’ll tell you what, it is a long time since I’ve seen such a big response to a post we’ve put out on social media. We asked last week what you disabled listeners wanted us to talk about and think about and investigate between now and the General Election on 4th July, and you did not disappoint. We had messages coming at us from everywhere: we had WhatsApp text messages, WhatsApp voice messages – which I love, I love to hear your voice; we had Instagram posts; we had Twitter X posts; we had emails; we had people stopping us in the office, on the street; it was in my dreams. Honestly, you were absolutely brilliant. You ask, we deliver.Ìý On with the show.

MUSIC-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Theme music.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Hello, this is Access All, the Â鶹ÊÓƵAV’s weekly podcast dedicated to stories around disability and mental health. I’m Emma Tracey, and we’re hurtling towards the General Election 2024, which takes place on 4th July. We have a panel of experts here to answer some of those questions. Now, there are no manifestos from the political parties yet, keep that in mind, so keep your thoughts coming, keep telling us what you want to hear. Email us accessall@bbc.co.uk. Subscribe to us on Â鶹ÊÓƵAV Sounds or wherever you get your podcasts from. And tell your friends about us.

ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Well, let’s meet the panel. We’ve got Fazilet Hadi, Mark Brookes and Bethany Dawson. Fazilet Hadi, you’re from Disability Rights UK; what is DRUK and what impact is the election having on you and your organisation?

FAZILET-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Delighted to be with you Emma and colleagues. Disability Rights UK has been working with disabled people’s-led organisations across England for some time, and we’ve been waiting for this General Election. We’ve produced a disabled people’s manifesto that sets out what we want the main political parties to do should they take office. We’ve actually sent them all letters last week asking them questions about what they’re prepared to do for the 16 million disabled people in the UK, 24% of the population. I must admit, so far we’re pretty underwhelmed by the political campaigning.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Well, do you know what, you’re not the only person to say that, Fazilet. And we’re going to talk a lot more about that as we go through. And we’ve got Mark Brookes. Mark’s got a learning disability. You’re an advocacy king, I would say, always going round the country talking to other people with learning disabilities, helping people to understand the big issues. What have you been learning, just in a nutshell Mark, what have you been learning from the people that you’ve been meeting as you’ve been travelling around the country in the last week or two?

MARK-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý With the election it’s making people aware, checking that they are registered to vote, and that they can vote and finding out if they’re interested in voting as well. Because that’s been the surprising thing, people are not sure whether they can vote.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Right. Well, we’ll talk a lot more about access to voting later on as well. Bethany Dawson is here from POLITICO. Bethany, what’s your role at POLITICO and the Playbook?

BETHANY-ÌýÌýÌýÌý So, I am London Playbook’s diary reporter, which means I get to go out and about to all the events in Westminster and check what is going on on the ground. And I also cover policy, what people outside of the Westminster bubble are thinking about politics. And trying to get into the nitty-gritty of all things Westminster and beyond.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Brilliant. Well, our first big topic today and something we’ve had an absolute heap of messages about, which is something that Fazilet mentioned earlier as well, is that disabled people feel like they’ve been ignored by all parties. Matty McPatty on X, formerly known as Twitter, said, ‘Parties are not discussing disabled voters. Full stop’. And then Lincoln Tapper agrees with Matty. Lincoln Tapper says, ‘Every issue affects people with disabilities: education, health, housing, the economy, social care, employment etc. Politicians should be speaking with intersection, but instead they’re speaking broadly about the issues. And disabled people and other groups are feeling unseen and unheard’.

ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý So, basically so many of our listeners feel like they’ve been forgotten. Cleo from Rochford sent us this voice message:

CLIO-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Hi, I’m 45 and live with many invisible chronic illnesses, including Ehlers-Danlos syndrome which affects both my mobility and cognitive function. I’ve yet to hear a politician even acknowledge the existence of disabled people in the news, and that’s 16 million votes they’re ignoring. There are so many of us falling through the cracks of this current broken benefits system that it’s only a matter of time before millions of people like myself who have had to give up work from becoming disabled and are living off their life savings are forced into dire poverty and have nowhere to live.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý According to the UK parliament website 16 million people are estimated as being disabled in the UK, so that’s 24% of the general population; and it goes up to 45% of pensioners. That’s an awful lot of people feeling ignored, isn’t it, Fazilet?

FAZILET-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý I couldn’t agree more with the sentiments being expressed by disabled people to Access All. I mean, I feel it myself, you know, as an individual blind person, and I feel it as a professional at Disability Rights UK. When you think about disproportionate poverty, the disability employment gap, the disability pay gap, the fact that disabled children in schools aren’t getting the educational support they need, the fact that social care charges are going up and millions of people are turned away from getting social care, you kind of think: ‘I’m living in a different universe to these politicians; I really don’t know what world they’re in.’

And as I said, disabled people’s organisations have got a disabled people’s manifesto. I’d like to assure all your listeners we have sent it out to the political parties, they’ve all had it. We’ve sent it out to trade unions. We’re asking them questions in four big areas really: What are you doing about our voice and our representation? Because, as we know, there’s a handful of people in parliament who say they’re disabled, when there should be more, like, 160 of them. We’re saying what are you doing about our rights and enforcing them? The Equality Act is largely unenforced, and the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Disabled People is not adhered to. We’re saying what about our benefits, our social care, our housing that enables us to live independently? And finally, what are you doing to remove barriers and to support us to get a good education and get good jobs? And honestly, as someone just said, everything affects our lives but no one is talking about disabled people.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý And why are they not talking about it, do you think? And do you think you sending your manifesto to them will make a difference? Will they start talking?

FAZILET-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Do you know what? I don’t know. I’m sure Bethany call tell us more about this. But I sometimes feel they care about the constituencies where there’s a swing vote, and the focus groups in those constituencies, and how they’ve got to please a very small percentage of the electorate. And I feel they’re not seeing the whole electorate and they’re not talking about the whole electorate. That’s what it feels like to me: it feels like they’re talking to someone but it’s not me and it’s not disabled people; but they’ve no doubt got someone in mind, but it’s not us.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý What do you think, Bethany, are they talking to the whole electorate? Does the whole electorate feel like disabled people do? Do many more groups feel like they’re not being talked about as well?

BETHANY-ÌýÌýÌýÌý Well, it’s really interesting if you look at polling done, it was published by The i, if you look at polling in terms of reactions to Rishi Sunak’s kind of war on sicknote culture that was announced just before the election was – and this poll wasn’t done specifically of disabled people – a lot of people don’t support it. A lot of people don’t support the reforms to PIP as well. This is not just a disabled person’s issue when it comes to a reaction to it. But when it comes to these big issues like housing and like employment and like education, disabled people very often are forgotten in this big picture, as people have written in saying, as Fazilet has said. And often we see this come up in campaigns when politicians have a personal relationship to it. Now Ed Davey was speaking really passionately about the treatment of carers because he himself is a carer to his disabled son, and his wife also has MS. But he speaks so passionately and does relate it to his own personal experience. Now, this is a bit of a problem because we have such low representation of disability within politics.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Why are there no disabled MPs? What, were there six the last time?

BETHANY-ÌýÌýÌýÌý Yeah. And one of the major problems in this election is that the Access to Elected Office fund, which has existed since 2010 with slightly different names, doesn’t exist. So, this was a pot of money from the government Equalities Office used to support disabled candidates’ campaign. And Marsha de Cordova, who is a blind Labour MP, she used it and told me that it really changed her first campaign when she first got into office. But that doesn’t exist. That pot of money isn’t there. It stopped in 2020 and it just wasn’t reimagined. I actually asked an MP what they thought about this a couple of weeks ago, and I think this perfectly explains the situation of accessibility to politics: they didn’t know what it was.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý I mean, that’s interesting that they didn’t know because it was mentioned in the Disability Action Plan. Do you remember the Disability Action Plan from last year, from earlier this year actually, short-term plan for getting stuff done around disability. And they’ve said that there will be some help for disabled candidates in 2025; so not for this election but for future appointments.

FAZILET-ÌýÌýÌýÌý Added to that I just feel political parties don’t take this issue seriously. They took getting more women, and we just still don’t have 50% women, but we’re so far away from 24% disabled people representing us. And really they should do a lot more to get disabled-only shortlists or encourage disabled people into politics. Because, you know, the fund is great, but actually it is a failure of our political system that there aren’t more disabled representatives.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Mark, you’ve been going around the country, do the people you’ve spoken to, people with learning disabilities, do they feel like this election is for them? Do they feel represented?

MARK-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Absolutely not, no. I’ve been going to all the party conferences for the last six years and every time I ask the question at the panel debates they say, ‘What’s learning disability?’.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Right. So, you don’t feel like the awareness is there. And that’s across all the parties, Mark?

MARK-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Yes, very much so.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Cleo from Rochford, her message also mentioned financial support, which leads us neatly to the next big topic in our very full to bursting postbag. Honestly, we got so much interest when we asked what people wanted to talk about. And a lot of them said benefits; PIP, Personal Independence Payment in particular. Here’s one of the messages that we got about this on X:

ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý ‘#PIP Reforms. Will the Green Paper be dropped? Can the next government commit to supporting disabled people? Not everyone is able to work; welfare supports all disabilities, not just physical health. We’re very anxious.Ìý #Disabled Twitter.’

ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Just to say, Personal Independence Payment is a non-means tested disability benefit. It’s designed to meet some of the extra costs of being disabled. We know that those costs are huge. The government currently spends £21.6 billion on Personal Independence Payment, they have done in the last year, and they say that it’s going to rise to £32.8 billion in 27-28. And the Tories say that that’s not sustainable. They have suggested moving away from a cash-based benefits towards vouchers or ordering from a catalogue and being reimbursed. They opened the consultation on Personal Independence Payment in April, and that’s supposed to run until July, Fazilet. But what’s going to happen now that there’s been an election called?

FAZILET-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý The consultation is still live, and we are going to respond, as I’m sure other disabled people and disabled people’s organisations are going to. I’m that frightened, so many people say is it an unnecessary thing to do, like, six weeks before a General Election. And actually an extra cost benefit, the thought of taking that principle away from us as disabled people when that actually helps us to have a level playing field with our non-disabled peers, is so unjust and so scary. There’s a level of real anger I think in the disabled community and I really hope we get a new government.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Bethany, I mean we’ve just talked about what the Conservative government have proposed over recent times, but are there any indications from any of the other parties of plans to reform the benefits system in a way that disabled people would want or would be keen on?

BETHANY-ÌýÌýÌýÌý Well, I think this is one of the really big sources of anxiety that are coming from the disabled community around these problems because no, like, we don’t really know what we’re going to see. Obviously there are big hopes that that is going to change once the manifestos are published. The Labour party before the election recently said that they will seek to reform and review the carer’s allowance system. But Rachel Reeves, the Shadow Chancellor, didn’t commit either way to supporting or rejecting Rishi Sunak’s review of PIP and of the benefit system. So, we don’t currently know what an incoming Labour government, if that happens, will do in regards to benefits. Ed Davey, the Lib Dem leader, said that he wants to pledge free home care support and raise care workers’ pay. But we don’t know in terms of concrete numbers, which of course are so important, what could happen.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý So, it doesn’t look from your perspective like this election is going to be the reset between disabled people and politicians?

BETHANY-ÌýÌýÌýÌý I would like to re-answer that question in hopefully two weeks when we have the manifestos, because there is still a chance for this all to change. There is still a chance for the numbers to materialise and for really concrete pledges to come. But right now that hasn’t happened yet.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Let’s move on now to social care. And Bethany you just mentioned there that Ed Davey from the Lib Dems pledges free social care for older and disabled people, and that means care that they might need at home, help to live their lives. But we have had a lot of messages about social care as well, and here’s one from Susan:

SUSAN-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Hi, my name is Susan and I live down in the West country. 14 years of austerity and cuts in local council funding has affected all adult social care, of which it should be remembered about 50% is care of the disabled. My son has Down’s Syndrome and autism with very high care needs, and I had a long fight to get him the care he needs to enable him to live independently of me. And I’m far from alone in this. Not only is there a crisis in adult social care funding now, but this is a time bomb waiting to go off when the elderly unpaid carers of disabled sons or daughters start to die. And councils’ social care funding has been cut to the bone by central government.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý That’s a really serious and sad message from Susan, Mark, isn’t it? What does social care mean to people with learning disabilities? What kind of help do they get and need?

MARK-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Okay, well Dimensions are a non-profit organisation and we support around 3,500 people in England and Wales, so we rely on councillors to give us money to support people in and around the country. And for the past five, six years funding has been cut, and support workers have been having to think outside the box. One-to-one support has gone so people now have to share support. And also pay for support workers is really low. So, we’ve been doing a campaign along with other organisations to get pay up for support workers.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý And how do you think future governments could address the issue?

MARK-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý More funding actually. And it’s really bad that they’ve linked NHS money in with social care funding, because NHS funding has got that money first. So, they need to come up with a new way so that the money goes straight into social care.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Okay. Well, Ed Davey said that the pledge to make social care free and to up the pay of care workers could be funded by reversing tax cuts given to big banks by the Conservatives. But independent experts say that it won’t quite cover it. Labour have pledged some neighbourhood health centres to bring care and healthcare closer to home. And the Conservatives have pledged to build 100 new GP surgeries. Fazilet, what do you make to all of that?

FAZILET-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý It’s not enough. None of them are really taking it seriously, are they? We’ve had report upon report saying that we need much more investment in social care, saying that social care and healthcare should be seen as equal and given parity. At the moment what we see is no major party, except for the Lib Dems, actually facing up to the fact that we need billions more in investment in social care and that we must stop increasing social care charges; moving people into institutions because it’s cheaper than getting care at home; councils turning away millions from getting social care – for a decent society that cares about each other. How can politicians not see that that issue needs fixing, and fixing now?

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Bethany, all the politicians can see what’s happening, they can see that there’s massive social care shortfall and cuts, why are they not dealing with the issues? Is it because they’re running scared? Because politicians have come unstuck, haven’t they, in terms of social care policies in the past?

BETHANY-ÌýÌýÌýÌý All of it often comes back to there just simply isn’t enough money. In this election we’ve seen a lot: Labour not committing to certain numbers or big kind of post-election transactions because there is so little left in the government pots. I think that’s the kind of, like, non-cynical answer: there isn’t a lot of money. But then the more difficult-to-grapple-with answer would be of course that disable people’s issues are so rarely discussed in politics, and sadly so often swept under the rug, that when it comes to these really life-changing problems that the change doesn’t often come from them.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Okay. Let’s move on to access to actual voting and disabled people getting their voices heard, finding the information they need between now and polling day. I mean, it’s something quite close to my heart because I can’t see and actually can’t vote in secret at all; I need to use a plastic thing that’s quite difficult to use, or I need to get someone to help me. But we’ve also had messages from people who struggle to access the polling station for physical impairment reasons, including FourQ on X, formerly known as Twitter.

FOURQ-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý French doors at the voting location. There’s a permanent ramp, but one door was locked above and below. They couldn’t hear me, I like to think, when I shouted for someone to go and ask for the other door to be unlocked. Wheelchair use never even occurred to them. That’s why we postal vote now.Ìý

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý And some people find it really difficult to access the information that they need in a way that suits them. We’ve had this Instagram message from Andy Bowen:

ANDY-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Getting to the ballot box in the first place. People with a learning disability are society’s least likely to have photographic ID, therefore making them ineligible to cast their votes.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Mark, you know all about this, this is your lifeblood at the moment, people with learning disabilities and voting. What are the ways in which they struggle and you struggle between registering to vote right up to actually casting the votes?

MARK-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Right, so before last year one of the issues was around voting ID, as people say, didn’t have a driver’s licence, maybe not had a passport. And also the other thing that was really an issue is people having a copy of their birth certificate, because they didn’t know that they had one or that their parents had got one. So, My Vote, My Voice actually helped changed that. My Vote, My Voice was launched back in February last year with Mencap and UK Respond to help get people ready for this election. There’s a web page called My Vote, My Voice which is really accessible, it tells you how to register, if you’re not registered, by June 18th I believe is the deadline for people to register, if they’re not registered it’s by June 18th. There’s also voter ID. There’s a new easy read of what voting ID. So, people have got their bus pass now with their photo on, they can take that along to vote.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý So, people need to know that they can do that and they can get ID that’s not a passport or a driving licence?

MARK-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Yes, so they can take that. And also there’s lots of accessible information around the parties, what the parties stand for. But one thing we’re waiting for is their manifestos. Some parties have pledged that they will have an easy-read manifesto, but until we’ve looked at it we don’t know what that easy-read will look like.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý And easy-read is a plain English, short sentences, lots of pictures, making it easier to digest for many people.

MARK-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Yes.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý I often go for it, if I’ve got a big report to read, I’ll go for the easy read report first so that I can get an idea of what’s happening. So, it’s a really useful thing to have. What about polling day, Mark? What are the things that could make it easier for people with learning disabilities on polling day?

MARK-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý When people get their polling card, hopefully it’s got a map on and the address, and again sometimes the address of the map is not accessible. Where I live in Romford my map is not accessible.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý What makes it inaccessible?

MARK-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý It’s too small.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý So, is that not visual impairment? Why does making it bigger help someone with a learning disability?

MARK-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Because of their eyesight and if they wear glasses, and if the writing is too small.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Okay. So, the bigger writing is easier to get your head around and to digest?

MARK-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Yes.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý There are so many hurdles, Bethany. Why are there so many hurdles and why are they still happening?

BETHANY-ÌýÌýÌýÌý One of the really interesting things about disabled voter participation in the UK is there’s actually never been a big study of it, which I personally think is such a great representation of how such a big topic is just not paid attention to. But it is a big issue and I think after every election there needs to be a kind of review of issues of accessibility and how to mend them. One of the things, so in the 2019 General Election the major parties all did come out with easy-read manifestos. However, there was often a delay between the publication of the kind of, if you want to call it, the standard manifesto and the easy-read. Which of course in terms of equality you need to make sure that everybody gets the information at the same time and has the same amount of time to make their informed decision when it comes to polling day. But I think again this is just, as Mark has been working on, it is about making sure that people with disabilities are heard, and that the problems that they face when it comes to access, whether that is voting or whether that is running, are heard and they don’t just fall flat after every election.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Okay. Fazilet tell me about the physical barriers to voting. I hope you don’t mind me saying, but I think you’ve voted in a few elections now, haven’t you? You’ve seen it all over the last few years.

FAZILET-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý I have, yeah.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Have things changed for the better?

FAZILET-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý No, they’ve changed for the worse. And, you know, almost 30 years…

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý How!?

FAZILET-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý …30 years after the Disability Discrimination Act we shouldn’t even be talking about this. Yet we’re still talking about it because polling stations aren’t physically accessible enough; there’s no details about physical accessibility on polling cards. The laws have actually been, I think, weakened, saying that reasonable adjustments have to be made but not specifying what those adjustments are, so you could get inconsistent levels of accessibility and equipment at different polling stations. Postal voting is not that accessible if you’re visually impaired or have a learning disability. And now we have photo ID for the first time at a General Election where the most marginalised people are expected to apply for a voter authority certificate. Well, for goodness sake, there was hardly a problem with fraud, and now another barrier is being put in some of the most discriminated-against people’s way. We’re not seeing any improvement as far as I’m concerned. We’re going back in time. And, as I say, this shouldn’t even be a subject of discussion.

EMMA-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Fazilet Hadi, Mark Brookes and Bethany Dawson, thank you so much for your insights and expertise into all the topics that we’ve covered today.

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ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý That is it for this episode of Access All This has been our very first Access All dip into the General Election ocean, but you know how much I love a sea swim, and there are a few weeks to go so we will be bringing you so much more where that came from. Keep your questions coming, keep your thoughts coming, tell us what you think about what was said this week. Send us an email accessall@bbc.co.uk. You can send us a WhatsApp message 0330 123 9480. And you can find us on Instagram and X, formerly known as Twitter, @Â鶹ÊÓƵAVAccessAll. Subscribe to us on Â鶹ÊÓƵAV Sounds or wherever you get your podcasts. Please do tell your friends about us. And I will see you next time. Bye bye.

[Trailer for Reliable Sauce]

KIRSTY-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Do you want to know what’s going on in the world but you can’t really be bothered to read the news?

JONELLE-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Want to understand what’s gone viral and what’s trending?

BOTH-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Hey, hey, hey!

KIRSTY-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Join me, Kirsty Grant.

JONELLE-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý And me, Jonelle Awomoyi on our weekly podcast, Reliable Sauce.

KIRSTY-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý We’re both journalists at Â鶹ÊÓƵAV News.

JONELLE-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý And each week we’ll be breaking down the stories everyone’s obsessed with. What the hell is going on with this Stanley Cup craze?

KIRSTY-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý How often do you think about the Roman Empire?

MALE-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý There are weeks that it will come up in my brain more than once.

JONELLE-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Expect interviews with the hottest influencers and content creators.

KIRSTY-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Jordan Theresa, welcome along. Matt, joins us now. Welcome to the Reliable Sauce studio!

MATT-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Thank you for having me.

KIRSTY-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Let’s talk more about this with Catie Baser who’s in the studio with us.

CATIE-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Hi.

KIRSTY-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý And hand-picked experts to help us make sense of it all when we need them.

FEMALE-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý So, the law is there, but we really need these social media companies to act.

FEMALE-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Terms like this seem quite flippant, but of course they can be really serious.

KIRSTY-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý And we willÌý have a little giggle too [laughter].

JONELLE-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý So, please come and join our spicy band.

KIRSTY-ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Listen on Â鶹ÊÓƵAV Sounds now.

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