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The Liberal Democrats have announced today that they want companies with over 250 employees to publish the average salaries they pay their male and female employees. The idea is that public pressure would make them take steps to reduce the gender pay gap which is nearly 20% in the UK. Jenni is joined by Jo Swinson, the Minister for Women and Equalities, who explains why the Lib Dems are including this suggestion in their next manifesto. Emma Foley, from the Centre for Policy Studies, explains why she thinks the proposal is not a good idea.

Dame Maud McCarthy, in her role as Matron-in-Chief of the British Expeditionary Forces, was the most senior nurse on the Western Front during WW1. She oversaw the entire nursing operation in France and Belgium for the duration of the war and remained there until 1919. English Heritage has now installed a commemorative Blue Plaque at her old home in Chelsea, London. To discuss Maud McCarthy and the role trained nurses played during WW1 Jenni is joined by Christine Hallett, Director of the UK Centre for the History of Nursing and Midwifery and Sue Light, a nurse who runs a website on military nursing history called .

When Melissa Reid and Michaella McCollum Connolly were arrested and then sentenced in Peru in 2013 for smuggling cocaine, the media coverage was critical of the British girls who had been living and partying in Ibiza. According to United Nations figures from 2011 only 20% of drug traffickers arrested internationally are women. So why do they get so much attention from the media? To discuss the reality of the motivations and experiences of women working as drug mules, Jenni is joined by Dr Jennifer Fleetwood, author of ‘Drug Mules: Women in the International Cocaine Trade’ from the University of Leicester’s Department of Criminology, and Carlotta Allum, who was arrested for drug trafficking in the US in 1996 and now runs a charity called , dedicated to the welfare of prisoners.

Poet Jackie Kay has a passion for the blues and for the female blues singer Bessie Smith in particular. She joins pianist/composer Adam Fairhall and The Imaginary Delta band at the to perform some of her Bessie Smith poems and a new work – called The Imaginary Road. Jackie joins Jenni to talk about the concert and the new poem which she performs with Adam Fairhall in a special sneak preview for Woman’s Hour.