Woman's Hour - 17/03/2010

With Jenni Murray. Including: Maggie Atkinson is just a couple of weeks into her new job as childrens commissioner for England but already there are have been calls for her to resign or be sacked following what some have considered ill-advised remarks. In a newspaper interview at the weekend, she was reported to have said that the age of criminal responsibility, at 10, was too low, and that the killers of Jamie Bulger should not have been tried in an adult court as they were still children. She joins Jenni to talk about those remarks and her new role championing children's interests. Parkour, or free running as it's commonly known, is an outdoor sport that can involve running and jumping over steps, walls, trees, railings - even buildings; you only have to think of Catwoman to get the picture. It started off on the streets of France and is now practised all over the world. Agota Mahop runs workshops for women and will be hosting Parkour demonstrations in 16 UK cities to help raise money for Sport Relief. Anna Bailey joins her at an outdoor class on a housing estate in south-west London to find out why the sport is taking off. In the last few years there has been a surge of divorce in older women. The Office for National Statistics estimates that between 2002 and 2008 the number of divorced women over 45 rose by a third. So what is making long-term marriages break down? Is there such a thing as an enduring relationship? And what does it feel like if you are left newly single after 20 or more years of companionship? Linda Kelsey, former editor of Cosmopolitan, has just published The Twenty-Year Itch, a novel with these themes based on her own experience. She talks to Jenni about long-term relationships, why they break down and what it's like to be newly single in your 50s. Is it true that 'victim' has become a dirty word - almost a term of abuse? Some feminists are arguing that women are no longer prepared to admit to their own vulnerabilities, with devastating social consequences. But other commentators are convinced that being a 'victim', and thus deserving special treatment, has actually become an aspiration for many of us. Jenni hears from professor Alyson Cole, author of The Cult of True Victimhood, and asks Valerie Walkerdine, professor in the School of Social Studies at the University of Cardiff, and the writer Jane McLoughlin whether reclaiming the notion of 'victimhood' in the 21st century would help or hinder women.