Latest news with #Harriet
Daily Mirror
21 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Daily Mirror
Jeremy Clarkson's co-star Harry Cowan shares harsh four-word verdict on the TV host
Jeremy Clarkson's Clarkson's Farm co-star Harriet Cowan has opened up about their time on the Amazon Prime Video series and issued a brutal verdict on the TV host Harriet Cowan has taken a cheeky dig at her new TV co-star, Jeremy Clarkson, whilst discussing the presenter's farming methods. In a candid interview, Harriet, who has become Clarkson's Farm's latest breakout sensation, revealed how she landed her role working alongside Jeremy on the massively successful Amazon Prime series, which has now reached its fourth series. The rising star had already begun building her fanbase before her television breakthrough, racking up an impressive 40,000 TikTok followers (now soaring to 730,000) through her tractor-focused videos. Her journey onto Clarkson's Farm also kicked off via social media when she was contacted by the production team. Harriet revealed how they were seeking someone to "come and help," reports Gloucestershire Live. Speaking to the Sunday Times, Harriet explained: "Charlie (Ireland, Clarkson's land agent) let me know they were looking for someone to come and help. I think they were keen for it to be a woman who could do that role and show they could do it well." The agricultural expert then shared her impressions of Jeremy, confessing she wasn't particularly acquainted with his previous work, though she'd certainly heard his name, remarking that she wasn't "really into the cars". She described Jeremy as being "very much like every other farmer I've ever met" and "very much willing to learn. He wanted to do well by the farm." In a particularly cheeky observation, she quipped that "he's got the physique of a farmer." The 24 year old nurse and farmer, Harriet, filled in for Jeremy Clarkson's usual sidekick, Kaleb Cooper, from the renowned Diddly Squat farm in the Cotswolds, while he was away on a live tour. Derbyshire-born Harriet chose dual career paths, inspired by her parents. Her mother, a nurse, hoped she would follow in her footsteps, whereas her father manages the family farm. After graduating from the University of Derby in 2023, Harriet now juggles full-time nursing with helping out on the farm, using social media to shed light on the realities of farm life. Her stint at Diddly Squat Farm saw her tackle tasks ranging from animal care to fence repairs. She has also expressed that she'd be "very open" to returning to the farm should Jeremy require her assistance again. In his Sunday Times Magazine column, Jeremy Clarkson shared insights into his farming journey, pinpointing what he finds to be the most "difficult thing" within the industry, admitting there are still elements he fails to grasp. Despite being a seasoned presenter on The Grand Tour, Clarkson confessed that certain aspects of food production baffle him, such as not knowing how to "turn a pig into a sausage" and stating it's "even worse" with cows. Yet, one challenge reigns supreme as the "most difficult" for him: "But by far and away the most difficult thing would be turning my wheat into bread. This is something that has fascinated me for years because how on earth did anyone figure it out?"
Times
4 days ago
- Health
- Times
I used to think it was a waste of money keeping an old dog alive
O ur border collie had a stroke at the weekend and it turns out I'm a hypocrite. Five years ago I watched in disbelief as a friend spent thousands of pounds he didn't have on improbable surgery for his 12-year-old dog. It wasn't even one of the good dogs. It was a pug with a face that looked like it was pressed against a dirty window and a cough like it smoked 40 a day. My friend loved that dog, though, and no amount of reason could convince him that it was time to let go. A wheelbarrow of money and six months' rehabilitation later, the pug had recovered. Another eight months passed and it died of old age. I resolved then not to make the same mistake. 'When Floss is old we're not going to spend a fortune keeping her alive for our benefit,' I announced, all man of the house. Harriet and the kids seemed to take it well.
Refinery29
5 days ago
- Refinery29
Women Assaulting Women Is The Crime We Can't Ignore — & Alex Cooper Is Opening The Conversation
Trigger warning: The article discusses rape, sexual violence, assault and harassment. Alex Cooper, of the Call Me Daddy podcast, recently alleged in her new documentary, Call Her Alex, the she was the victim of sexual harassment during her time at university, at the hands of her soccer coach. The coach, being a woman, would interrogate Cooper about her sex life, her relationships, repeatedly instigate moments so that they'd be alone, and would comment on her looks, Cooper claimed. Since then, other women have come forward about sexually inappropriate behaviour that took place within that same soccer team, again with the abuse allegedly happening at the hands of a (different) woman. Boston University will now conduct an external review into the claims, all these years on. If the idea of a woman being a predator is difficult to swallow, think again. There are plenty of reasons these stories rarely come to light. A small study sample used for research on female-perpetrated sexual violence found that often people don't disclose what's happened to them, and they struggle to label it as sexual assault until retrospect kicks in. When women report acts of rape, assault and harassment, most times, we're talking about male perpetrators. Although the statistics show men are far more likely to incite this kind of violence than women, that doesn't mean women aren't assaulting women. By outdated definition, rape involves a penis. As a lesbian who experienced rape by another woman while at university, Harriet* (name changed to protect identity), 28, struggled to make sense of what happened to her. It was only seven years later that she felt able to call it what it was. The fact that a woman that had done this to her left Harriet confused as to how to define it. 'I was 18 and having the time of my life, getting drunk, partying and having too much fun. There was a girl on my course who was a little bit older than me. We flirted from time to time and had kissed on a night out, but that was it really,' says Harriet. 'One night we bumped into each other at the bar on campus and spent the evening hanging out, drinking and eventually making out.' The bar closed so they went back to one of their flats. 'I hadn't been there long before I passed out from being too drunk,' continues Harriet. 'I had laid down on her bed fully dressed, with everything fastened correctly but when I woke up my top was lifted and my trousers were unzipped and the waistband of my pants was twisted, like someone had tried to pull them up. My vagina also ached internally. When I realised, immediately I felt gross and very anxious but also very conflicted. In my heart I knew something wrong had happened, but she'd always seemed so sweet and gentle, so I tried to persuade myself that this was okay, that she wouldn't do anything violent toward me.' For the next three years, Harriet had to see this woman frequently. 'She was always friendly and acted like nothing had happened,' she says. 'If she had violated me, surely she wouldn't be acting like this? This happened 10 years ago, then last month she sent me a friend request on Facebook.' Harriet only processed what had happened to her three years ago while in therapy after struggling with disassociating during sex, something that began, she was able to pinpoint, after that act of violation. 'My therapist affirmed I had been raped, which in a strange way was comforting to name it but also completely horrifying. I'd never named it that, mainly because she was a woman, but I was penetrated without consent within the framework of how I have sex as a lesbian, so what else could it be?' Even so, Harriet still sometimes feels as though the word 'doesn't belong' to her. She still gets heart palpitations. 'I make myself believe that she didn't realise she'd raped me, because how could she when she'd looked me in the eye and smiled in my face for the three years afterwards? When she seemed a bit confused when I withdrew from her? But when the delusion thins, I do get flickers of rage.' It took Harriet many years to tell people what she experienced, including her wife. She was afraid that friends might minimise her experience because her abuser didn't fit the classic profile associated with these crimes. 'She's quite petite, smiley, knew lots of people… she didn't give off the vibe that this would ever be something she'd be capable of.' In 2023, a Springer Nature journal published a piece focused on the Republic of Ireland, in which researchers wrote: 'Female-perpetrated sexual assault is under-represented in sexual assault research, and indeed possibly an underreported crime.' Of those studied to inform this research, many knew their attacker already. They might have even been friends. This is common in cases of male-perpetrated sexual violence, too. When rape or sexual assault happen at the hands of a woman, it can be very disorientating for the victim. Ana Flores Reis, a therapist specialising in trauma and abuse, says gendered assumptions can play a huge role in how someone might process their assault. 'Most dominant cultural narratives frame men as perpetrators and women as victims, and while this reflects the majority of cases, it leaves little room for alternative experiences,' she explains. 'As a result, when women do perpetrate abuse, their actions are often minimised, dismissed, or reframed as less harmful, playful, or even flattering. These reactions are rooted in gendered assumptions about harm, power, and agency in sexual violence.' Victims can end up isolated, holding the belief that what happened 'doesn't count', Reis adds. 'Many may internally minimise the abuse because it doesn't match mainstream representations of sexual violence. In LGBTQ+ contexts, this can be further complicated by concerns about reinforcing harmful stereotypes or being disbelieved within one's own community.' When someone's experience of sexual assault isn't validated for years, there are many ways it can play out. It can affect their mental health, how they view the event and themselves. Possible outcomes include internalised doubt, shame, compounded trauma, low self-trust and worth, depression, grief, dissociation and anxiety. This goes no matter who perpetrated the crime. However, imagine coming to terms with not only what happened, but the added confusion of processing who enacted this. Of the limited research out there on female-perpetrated sexual violence, much of it references child abuse. Frankie* (real name withheld), 36, from Northern Ireland, experienced this at the hands of her aunt, aged four to 10. Her aunt was around the age of 18 at the time. When acts of sexual assault were instigated, her aunt would refer to it as 'playing that game', which involved being touched and kissed. Frankie didn't realise what exactly happened to her until her teenage years, when she confided in a friend who had also experienced child sex abuse. 'It made me question my sexuality as a teenager, not in that I was attracted to women, but because a woman had done this to me,' says Frankie, who is heterosexual. 'It made me have a lot less respect for myself with sex. I definitely slept with a lot more people than I would have liked to through university. I think a lot of that was almost like for me to try and reclaim it for myself.' Frankie also went on to experience sexual assault at the hands of men, because her perception of 'normal' had been skewed before even understanding sex. She at one point joined a sugar daddy dating app and was having sex for money, because sex had such little personal and psychological value to her at that point in time. 'I feel annoyed that she would never be assumed to be a perpetrator,' Frankie says. When she told her parents what had happened, she wondered if her mum would have been more sympathetic had it been her uncle instead of her aunt. Her dad was more sympathetic and still wants her to go to the police about what happened, but for Frankie, 'there is still that shame attached to it, I think, because it is a woman.' She isn't confident she'd be taken seriously. Public perceptions of sexual violence go completely against what these women describe. Sherianne Kramer, PhD, author of Female-Perpetrated Sex Abuse, says we implicitly are taught that men are aggressors. As a result, 'a lot of people who are victimised by women don't necessarily see it as sexual'. When Kramer started researching in this field in 2008, there were only 14 articles on the subject worldwide. Although much of that research claims that 1-8% of sexual violence cases are perpetrated by women, Kramer believes it's closer to 25%. 'It's very difficult for people to fathom a raping woman,' she says. 'I've worked with people who were victims of both male and female-perpetrated sexual violence and they tended to report the male sex abusers rather than the female ones.' This was because people didn't have the language for what had happened when it was done by a woman, and they feared police wouldn't believe them. 'The system validates that feeling,' says Kramer, 'because of those [that I worked with] who did report it, the police laughed and said that wasn't possible.' Kramer had spent some time working in correction facilities in South Africa between 2009 to 2016, and what she witnessed there reinforced how widespread these attitudes are. When women were there for sex crimes, they were often given 'gender realignment therapy', because the act of committing rape was unwomanly. Instead of targetting the issue of sexual violence, the system works within the constructs of gender, 'invisibilising the possibility for women to be sexually violent.' There's this idea Kramer has witnessed that if you experience sexual violence at the hands of a woman, it can't be anywhere near as damaging as having experienced it by a man. The repercussions can deeply impact a person's psychological wellbeing. 'Once someone is abused sexually, it is likely to happen again,' Kramer adds, which is why it's so vital that people who go through it at the hands of a woman are validated and understand the reality of what's taken place. 'It's really important to me that we talk about sexual violence as something that can happen to anyone by anyone — anyone can hurt anyone else using sex as a mechanism. That way, no victims get left out,' says Kramer. That is the very least we should be taking away from the conversations Cooper's documentary has sparked. We owe it to all the women whose experience of sexual violence happened to be instigated by another woman.
Daily Mail
5 days ago
- Business
- Daily Mail
Househunter compares renting in London to 'the Hunger Games' after revealing bizarre list of 'tips' for tenants from letting agent
A woman revealed the bizarre email she received from an estate agent while looking for a flat - as she compared the London rental market to the 'Hunger Games'. Taking to TikTok, Harriet shared the message a friend got after doing viewings in the capital, which included a series of baffling 'tips' on how to get the landlord to accept an offer - such as paying a year's worth of fees upfront or pledging to increase the price each year. She hit out at the 'out of control' demands being placed on tenants, in a clip that has now racked up more than 288,000 views. The letter also stated they would need a 'bio' about each of the housemates and encouraged offering 'above the asking price'. 'Do you think I would be viewing a flat at this price if I could afford a flat over,' she quipped in the video. 'Anyway, moving along, "long contract length". Fine. Okay, whatever. Both things actually aren't really going to matter once the renters' right bill comes in.' Harriet was then appalled by the third piece of advice, which was to 'stick to the moving date or sooner'. 'Right. So, do you want me to stick to the moving date, or do you want an earlier one?' she questioned. 'Because if you wanted an earlier moving date, why didn't you just put an earlier moving date? I don't really understand this.' She continued: 'This one really got me paying up front from three to six to 12 months if possible. Oh, yes, sorry. Let me just get this £27,000 that sitting in my bank account and give it to you up front for a rental. 'Why didn't I think of that sooner? Oh, my goodness. I'm so glad you gave me these tips and tricks because now, I just feel like I'm going to get every flat I've ever wanted. F***ing idiots. The fifth was to 'offer a rent increase each year if possible'. 'Again, where is this money coming from?' Harriet questioned. 'Rent increase, absolutely fine,' she added. 'I'm not going to offer that. Why the f*** would I offer a rent increase? Landlords grab it from us already. I don't need to be offering that sh**.' She continued: 'These tips were hilarious on their own, but let's carry on. Lastly, "if your offer would be accepted, we will contact you first to give you the good news and then take the holding deposit, which is equivalent to first week's rent". 'First week's rent. Fine. Standard. You're ready for the Ending.' The email concluded: 'Thanks and good luck.' 'Is this The Hunger Games?' Harriet asked, referencing the dystopian fantasy novel series which sees poor people forced to kill each other in an arena for the wealthy to be entertained. 'I mean; to be honest, the rental market does feel quite like The Hunger Games, but this whole thing really made me laugh. 'And I just thought, this person has typed out or copied and pasted or got this email from somewhere and thought, these renters are going to love all of this. 'These tips and tricks are going to be exceptional. They're going to take all of them on board. It's just really made me laugh. God bless estate agents and the rental market in London.' Many rushed to the comments suggesting the 'tips' were 'appalling', with some saying it is 'gangster behaviour'. One person wrote: 'Who in their right SANE mind would OFFER a rent increase?!?!???' 'Estate agents are responsible for all the problems with house prices, price gauging, pitching people against each other,' another added. 'It's all gangster behaviour and seems unregulated.' A third penned: 'Literally if I had 27k I'd get a mortgage.' Many rushed to the comments suggesting the 'tips' were 'appalling', with some saying it is 'gangster behaviour' Elsewhere someone joked: 'They left off point 7 which is actually to kneel at a landlords' feet to kiss them, whilst throwing around £50 notes (which you may not keep).' Meanwhile some estate agents took to the comments to try and explain some of the 'tips'. 'It's obviously not the agents, it's the rental market,' one defended. 'Agents are only the messengers, if landlords weren't selling up there wouldn't be this level of demand.' Another suggested: 'As an estate agent most of the time we are actually instructed by our clients on what to say, sometimes we don't always agree but we must act on the clients' instructions! 'In my opinion I think this email is managing the viewers expectations and making sure that no one's time is wasted on both parties' side. Just remember it's not always the agent's fault!' 'In defence of the estate agent here, they're actually doing what many renters wish agents did: giving fair warning about existing interest before a viewing,' another advised. 'It might not be what you want to hear, but at least you know the situation upfront. 'Agents often get backlash when people view a flat and are later told their offer was too low in a competitive market. This heads that off. 'Yes, the spelling errors are a fair criticism, especially if it's a professional template. But a lot of these roles are filled by younger or less-experienced staff. You ask, "would I be viewing a flat at this price if I could afford more?" 'But yes, people often do. Some are downsizing, relocating, or going through breakups, they might have savings or sale proceeds and want to rent short-term rather than buy. 'As for the request to "offer more if possible" that's not a demand. If it's not possible, don't. But if someone else can and does, at least you know why they got it. Even the "good luck" sign-off, I think that's just human. 'There might be several viewings lined up. Would you rather they wrote "regards" instead? I know plenty of renters who complain when they lose out and say, "I would've offered more if I'd known" but this agent's giving you that chance in advance?' The Renters' Rights Bill is expected to come into effect from Autumn 2025. The bill proposes significant changes to the private rented sector in England, aiming to improve security and fairness for tenants. Key changes include ending 'no-fault' evictions (Section 21), strengthening tenants' rights, and improving property standards. The bill also seeks to ban rental bidding wars, introduce a landlord ombudsman, and create a private rented sector database.
Sky News
5 days ago
- Politics
- Sky News
The '£7bn' government secret
👉 Click here to listen to Electoral Dysfunction on your podcast app 👈 Who knew what about the Afghan data leak? And could anyone in parliament have done more to help scrutinise the government at the time of the superinjunction? Harriet thinks so. So in this episode, Beth, Ruth, and Harriet talk about the massive breach, the secret court hearings, and the constitutional chaos it's unleashed. Plus - the fallout from the latest Labour rebellion. Four MPs have lost the whip - officially for repeated defiance, but unofficially? A government source called it "persistent knobheadery". So is Keir Starmer tightening his grip or losing control? And how does this compare to rebellions of Labour past? Oh and singer Chesney Hawkes gets an unexpected mention. Responding to claims in the podcast about whether Commons Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle could have scrutinised the government, a Commons spokesperson said: "As has been made clear, Mr Speaker was himself under a superinjunction, and so would have been under severe legal restrictions regarding speaking about this. He would have had no awareness which organisations or individuals were and were not already aware of this matter. "The injunction could not constrain proceedings in parliament and between being served with the injunction in September 2023 and the 2024 General Election Mr Speaker granted four UQs on matters relating to Afghan refugees and resettlement schemes. "Furthermore, as set out in the Justice and Security Act 2013, the Speaker has no powers to refer matters to the Intelligence and Security Committee."
