This week's Difficult Woman is Donna Jones, the conservative police and crime commissioner for Hampshire, and the first female leader of Portsmouth City Council. This is a woman who knows how to get things done and makes no apologies whilst doing it. 

This week's difficult women is the loud proud and utterly brilliant Miriam Cates. Now the former MP for Penistone and Stockbridge, Miriam rocketed into the public eye as one of the spearhead figures of the NatCon movement. She now focuses her efforts on education and pro-natalism

This week's Difficult Women is the ceiling smashing Margaret Casley-Hayford. A successful businesswoman and lawyer, Margaret has now got her sights set on bringing diversity to the board room. She now aspires to be not just the first black person but the first woman to hold the title of chancellor in nearly a thousand years of the universities history.

**Warning - this show does contain descriptive language of a racist incident which some listeners may find offensive.

This week's difficult women is Kate Weinberg whose covid journey is as compelling as her writing. With a fierce determination to understand the mysterious fatigue that doctors couldn't explain, Kate embarked on a personal quest for a diagnosis that would empower her narrative and inform her creative work. Turned away time and again by doctors dismissing her illness, she was reminded of the very same doubts that her mother was subject to before her untimely death...

This week's difficult women is the Gardening Legend Bunny Guinness. You will be most familiar with Bunny's voice as a regular on Gardeners Question Time but her immersion within the horticultural world goes well beyond her broadcasting career. We delve into everything from her hitchhiking through Europe to the Great Peat Debate!

When she was 16, Natalie Fleet was raped. More than 30 years later, she will now use her role as a Labour MP to ensure that rapists have no rights to the products of their crime. Listen as she describes her incredible journey of resilience 

This week's difficult woman is writer and podcaster Bibi Lynch. Owing to a combination of factors, Bibi has found herself childless and single in her late 50s - she's not had a boyfriend since Tony Blair was elected and she's come to the realisation that the world just isn't quite comfortable with a middle-aged childless woman. Listen as she talks through the personal reckoning that comes with such a realisation.

This week's Difficult Woman is Alice Hendy. In November of 2020, she received news that her only sibling had taken his own life. Alice found that he had been researching techniques to take his own life via harmful internet searches. To ensure more help and support is given to individuals searching for harmful content online, Alice set up Ripple Suicide Prevention. Listen as she talks us through that journey from tragedy to triumph.

“On Saturday 31st August, the IDF recovered the body of Hersh Goldberg-Polin. To many he was the recognisable face of the hostages kidnapped on October 7th. Earlier this year, we spoke to his mother. Listen back as the world mourns his loss”

This week's difficult woman is the brilliant author and journalist Eleanor Mills to discuss her new book, which dives into the challenges and triumphs of navigating life as a middle-aged woman. With her signature warmth and with, Eleanor shares her personal journey of grappling with societal beauty standards and the sexism that often comes with them. Listen as we explore the liberation that comes with embracing who you are, wrinkles and all.

This week's difficult women is Kat Brown, author, journalist, and guide to all things ADHD. Upon being diagnosed as an adult, Kat's whole life began to click into place. She has used this to try and help others to recontextualise their life in light of this new diagnosis. All of this goes without touching on her greatest love, Difficult Women alumni - Jilly Cooper!