hello, welcome to political thinking, a conversation with rather than an interrogation of someone who shapes our political thinking about what has shaped theirs. my guest this week once described herself as young, black, and loud, and nimco ali has plenty to be loud about. she led a global campaign to end the cutting of girls, fgm, female genital mutilation, and in that role, she met borisjohnson when he was running to be mayor of london. she became an adviser to him, a friend of his and of his girlfriend, now wife, carriejohnson. nimco ali has praised the prime minister as "a real champion of women's rights and one of my feminist heroes." he appointed her as a government adviser on tackling violence against women and girls. nimco ali. hi. welcome to political thinking. thank you very much. are you still getting used

to being the campaigner who suddenly finds herself on the inside, walking through the corridors of power? no, i think nothing has really changed in that kind of instance, in the fact that i still see these people that i can actually help, so whether i'm sitting around the table with them or chasing them down the street, i think they are quite similar in that sense. but i will actually correct you, i'm appointed by priti patel and not the prime minister. not directly. not directly the prime minister but directly by priti patel, and this was a position she asked me to take up. but i sense that the reason you are correcting me is that you have the problem that many people find in public life, which is people go, oh, she has only got the job because she is a chum of the prime minister. 100%. and as somebody that has kind fought my way in order to a voice and actually really, you know, believes in integrity and also democracy, it is something that i have worked for and it is something that the home secretary, when she said that she was going to do a violence against women and girls strategy, came to me with,

and i said i would be more than happy to do that, because ironically i do have this kind of space where i can to the sector, in terms of the violence against women and girls sector who don't actually feel that comfortable with talking to the conservative party, and also with talking to ministers. so, i see myself as a kind of bridge between power and those with purpose. so, being a bridge is a helpful thing. at times, is it actually a barrier, the fact that people think she is mates with the prime minister and his wife? does that then become a bit of a barrier to people? only to people that are disingenuous so the whole point is having been in the sector for almost a decade, or actually, more than a decade, 11 years of fighting to end female genital mutilation and other forms of violence, i think those that want to be able to do the job in order to end violence against women and girls actually know what my credentials are. what about the protection of girls and young women as theyjust walk around the street? we all remember those scenes at sarah everard's vigil, and you were amongst those who condemned the way the police reacted.

100%. i think there are more culture changes that need to happen, and for me, i would specifically love public sexual harassment to become a crime. but that is something that again, one of the things that i have seen is that the department and secretary of state have an opinion and there can be other things that kind of pushback... other things or other people? other people, and cabinet responsibility is a thing so that is what i am saying, it is notjust individuals, so i think there is at times a very masculine conversation where the government and how government and institutions work, so we need to be able to address that. so, why isn't this happening? because a lot of people come to the same conclusion... hold on, you are the government's adviser, i'm trying to work out why it doesn't happen. i know. is it because people at the top of the government, is it those people in number ten who advise the prime minister, saying, i'm not sure i would have this argument, if i were you. well, i am still going to have the arguments,

i think that is the key thing about being an independent adviser, i think that we are actually corroding society and we are allowing young women to be subjected to lived experiences which are going to have a massive detriment to their health on a day to day basis. what i'm trying to get at, though, is it this, the kind of political advisers, is it that the people that try to win elections for the tory party are going, "don't have this row, this isn't the row you want to have, this isn't going to win votes." it is a lot closer than that. and, obviously, they can become au fait with how to avoid the questions so you can take from my silence as like, you know, to where ever you want to put, but i think i can say the home secretary and other people within the home office are very much behind... i'm going to assume that the prime minister is not, in this case. let's go back to what brought you, actually, to his attention, to the world's attention as well, which is this extraordinary campaign you ran for many years, and are still running, against the cutting of girls, of fgm.

for those that don't know your story, let's talk about that, if we can. when did you first know that this was going to happen to you? it was just before it happened so there was a conversation around this, i was seven at the time, and we were in djibouti, having just left somaliland when the civil war had broken out, and we were on our way back to manchester, so we were waiting for visas and things to kind of clear. there was a conversation around the fgm but i didn't necessarily know the realities of what it was. and, for me, it wasn't necessarily that i didn't know what the act was going to entail, but when the cutter came to the house, i was very much taken aback by the way that she looked. ironically, she looked quite similar to one of those dementors in harry potter. she was dressed in black and it was stories that the nannies and others used to tell us about if we misbehaved, then there would be these people that did these things. so, yeah, it was ultimately something that i felt a bit uncomfortable in, or with, essentially.

you raised it with your teacher, didn't you? i did, because i wasn't embarrassed by it, i was confused by the whole thing. but when you raised it, did you say, this terrible thing has happened to me? no, it was just this weird thing. and what is really interesting is the fact that i don't actually equate it with pain after the first few kind of weeks of having it, initially, until obviously i had major complications afterwards. you say major complications, you almost died. i did almost die, yeah. because? because i had a very invasive form of fgm which is called infibulation, and it is very common in the horn of africa, which ended up leading to me having near kidney failure. my most kind of upsetting moment was when i was 11 and i ended up having this seizure in the middle of, well, ifainted in the middle of school, in primary school because of my kidneys failing. i remember waking up in the hospital, and i still vividly

remember this nurse who had this incredibly curly ginger hair, and i was thinking, well, you have actually seen my anatomy so you must be able to tell me what is wrong, and she was just smiling at me, so ijust smiled back, thinking, ok, this is really bizarre because you have actually physically seen my anatomy and you know that there was something that happened to me, so can you at least put that into context? so, i think there was a level of fear that was created by this political correctness of not asking what brown people do because it was racist to care about me, but ironically it was actually racist to not care about me. a subject that's it's better not to talk about it. better just to say, that is up to you, that is up to your family, your community. 100%. and the whole point is that my race in my community was put before my humanity and, yeah, basically, and my childhood, to a certain extent. but thanks to your campaign and the campaign of others, are you as confident as you can be

that girls in a similar situation to nimco ali, girls that are at the age you were then, you can't eradicate it, i imagine, but it is much less common than it was? i never use the word "eradicate" because it sounds like a virus, this is a purposeful act where you have to take several steps in order to kind of do that, so we use "end" more kind of precisely. no, ioo%, i think if i was seven years old today, i would not, like, you know, i would not have had fgm because my mother would have been supported in the sense that she knew it was a crime. if i was 11 and i turned up at a hospital, there would be child protection people that would come in. so, i do think that girls are protected more. there is a fallacy that a lot of people think that the numbers of fgm in the uk are new people that are coming into the country that are being added to the statistics that we currently have. at the moment, i have an 11—year—old niece, and i look at her sometimes with pride and envy at the same time that the issue that almost killed me

when i was her age is something that is nonexistent to her, so i think within a generation, we can change the lives of women and girls in this country. now, it is this campaign that first introduces you to borisjohnson more than ten years ago now. and you shouted at him on the street? in putney high street. i didn't shout at him, i actually ran after him because i was actually confused as to why he was walking down putney high street, but that is when he was running for the mayor of london. i said, oh, can i talk to you about fgm? and he was quite horrified that it was still going on, and then he gave me his contact details. and were you surprised? that was your first encounter with a major politician, iwould imagine? from a labour supporting background. yeah, from a blairite. and he's a tory. yeah. were you surprised at his reaction? do you know? at the time, and this is one of the things that has been quite successful for him as a campaigner is the fact that i wasn't seeing him in his political kind of element, i was kind of seeing him as somebody

that was going into power and do, like, you know, kind of make change. i wasn't really actually expecting him to win, i thought ken livingstone was going to win at that time, and i had written to ken livingstone and he replied back saying, we are going to see how this plays with the mosques, how this plays out with the mosques to the actual question. literally those words? yeah, that was the message i kind of got back, and it was this... again, it was being taken back to when i was a child, where community and votes came before my well—being and the well—being of girls that look like me. so, at that stage, borisjohnson did a lot more than just giving you his card, you worked very closely with him or at least his team. 100%. and one of the things that he did is that he actually set up a violence against women and girls board, which was bipartisan, there were people that were from the labour party on that campaign and everything else. i think what he does do very well is that he does delegate and have key people that are able to understand. did you then get what you've got now that we discussed at the beginning?

people saying to you, how can you work with him? how can you work with a tory? 100%. it is always said to me, but my saying is that i am trying to... this is the thing that i say about the way that i do politics, is the fact that i will work with anybody in power. when it comes to personal stuff, it is about voting for people and dating. i'm not going to vote for people i don't agree with, but if they are in power, i am going to work with them. i don't have the privilege, and i'm not that egotistical, to think that i am going to wait until somebody that i politically agree with can actually make changes. like, for example, the un spent 30 years trying to ban fgm in sudan. i started to work with mike pompeo, it was done within six months. so, the reality is that a broken clock can be right twice a day, and i found that many times with people that i don't politically agree with. working with people you disagree with, but being political in a different way, you said it was like dating, you actually did run, not for the conservative party, not for the labour party, you ran for the women's equality party in the 2017 election.

yeah, i did, because the thing about politics, and for me, i'm not going to stand for a party that i don't believe in everything that they stand for, and the women's equality party, fundamentally stood for the things that i would be whipped on if we had gone into power, they were the things that i cared about. and those were policies that would lead to real democracy and equality. and given your upbringing, why not labour? do you know what? politically, i don't want to be a politician. i need to be honest about that, the fact that i have a lot of respect for people that are politicians, and that is just the choice that they make, but again, coming back to the dating analogy, knocking on doors, trying to get people to vote for you is asking somebody that told you they are not interested in you for a second date. it is honestly one of the most soul destroying things that i have ever done in my life. it's notjust embarrassing, it can be frightening, these days, can't it? you had threats.

but this is what i mean. imagine if i stood for the conservative party. i had threats. but the threats for me, what made those threats more painful was they became legitimised because the left and the labour party, specifically, were wondering why the hell am istanding? wondering or do you mean actually abusing you? they were abusing me but i am trying to be polite. so, when you got... tell us what you got. it was a letter, wasn't it, when you ran as a candidate? yeah, idid. what did it say? basically, it was full of vile, racist kind of language, and it was threatening to harm me. was it signed? no, it wasn't signed, i don't think, at the time. one letter i am told you got from catherine mayer, who is the co—founder of the party was signed jo cox. oh, yeah, but it wasn't signed byjo cox, it was the fact that... but at that time, getting a letter in 2017, she was murdered in 2016, the threat was not only

revolting but clear. it was. do you know what? it was scary, and i don't want to put young black women of politics and that is one of the key things. catherine mayer said that you said, "hell, yes", when she asked you if you are going to carry on campaigning after that letter. 100%. you had no doubt. yeah. do you think that abuse you received, not the letter, not the death threat, but the political abuse you got from some on the left in a sense pushed you closer to the conservatives, pushed you closer to people like boris johnson? no. do you know what? the conservative party, when i found them in the kind of post—blair, it was a very interesting space for young people like myself to be in, and the coalition party was very interesting, and i don't think, actually, that david cameron was that dissimilar to tony blair. so, i think i actuallyjust found more commonality... the reason i say that is you say politics is a bit like dating

and you will work with anybody. yeah. you did more than work with borisjohnson, i mean you praised him as a real champion of women's rights, you described him as "one of my feminist heroes," this wasn'tjust working with him, you were saying, he is the guy. the guy is going to sort it. yeah, no, i really wanted him to become prime minister so i was happy to do that because he did and he does believe in gender equality. do you know what? sitting down with people and getting to know them personally, you get to know what makes them tick and whatnot, and as an example, i wouldn't write that kind of stuff forjacob rees—mogg because i don't think he is a feminist, i don't think he believes in the basic human rights that women are meant to uphold, and it kind of scares me that if there is a leadership again, that there will be people that are in the forefront, likejeremy hunt, for example, who doesn't believe in access to abortion to 2a weeks, he wants to bring that, he has been open about bringing that down to 22 weeks, sorry, 12 weeks. so, for me, it is about protecting the fundamental things i care about. and when you look over the pond,

when you look at the debate that is now happening about roe v wade, the critical legaljudgment that gave women what is referred to as the right to choose, do you think if it happens, we might see an impact on our politics here? 100%. it is actually quite embarrassing that no senior government person stood up, like the canadians have, and said that the right to an abortion is a fundamental human right. canada has said that, other g7 leading countries or people within those governments, have said it. now, you became notjust an ally in this campaign of borisjohnson�*s, but a close friend of the family, particularly a close friend of carrie, who went on to be his wife, partly because you campaigned together and you are an admirer of her campaigning. why is that? no, i completely respect anybody that uses something that happened to them in order to be selfless and be able to speak up and change the lives of other women. she was attacked byjohn worboys? he attacked about a hundred people. known as the black cab...

women. 100 women. yeah, so, the fact that she waived her anonymity and spoke as passionately as she did and made sure that a dangerous man is now behind bars and isn't abusing other women, i think that is something... that, for me, was one of the most incredible things that kicked off our friendship. and were you valuable to her, do you think? well, because you've been a campaigner, remember, because you've been in the public eye. were there things you could teach her? oh, i didn't teacher anything because she is an incredible campaigner and an accomplished comms director. i assume you pause then because in a sense, you think there is a limit to what the public have a right to know about what is a personal friendship, is that right? 100%, yeah. i definitely respect her and i think, for us, yeah. how do you feel, though, as a friend, and this may be something you can talk about, about the abuse that she has suffered? do you know what? it is horrific, and the fact

that it is a young woman, a new mother, and in a position where she is not elected, her husband is, and shejust happens to love somebody that is in power, i think it is incredibly painful to watch anybody that you care about suffer like that. so, names like lady macbeth hurt? 100%, i think if you look at social media, i think there are a lot of things that are said and again... it is notjust social media, is it? i mean, goodness me, these are quotes coming from inside downing street, they are not coming from some guy in a pub or in their bedroom. yeah, but there is a lot of insecure men around in this world so the fact that the first thing they do, when they see a woman of power, is they push back. but that, to be fair, is the confusion in the position of carriejohnson, isn't it? is she somebody thatjust happens to be in the public eye because she is married to someone in power? or is she someone of power herself, who after all was a political adviser to senior ministers,

is a friend to senior ministers, was a senior press officer for the conservative party, someone who has their own political agenda, her own ideas, her own allies, and in that sense, isn't she entitled to have some scrutiny? well, like me, she respects due process and democracy so i think, in terms of me saying power, i am talking about her campaigning on animal rights and on climate and the whole point when she let the whole campaign around plastic, so this is a person that is actually renowned and able to do things in her own right. i think it is actually quite sexist to reduce her to the wife of the prime minister when she in herself has her own campaign and the ability to be able to change the things that she believes in and is passionate about. let's just tick them off and then we can move on. there are other things, you are godmother to wilfred, is that right or is that wrong? he is an incredible young man. understood. we interpret your silence. and, of course, there was some controversy around the fact that you went into the flat during covid

to give support to them, does it annoy you, people ask questions about that? do you know what annoys me is the fact that the same people that will write it, asking for questions to be answered, were the same people that were inboxing me, saying, i know it is within the rules, so actually sometimes it just becomes a spectacle. it was within the rules, i was a single person in london, i spent 18 months of lockdown on my own, i still am on my own, so it was allowed in tier 4 in order for a single person to be able tojoin in a childcare bubble. sometimes, it is a little bit offensive, where this kind of thing #thenanny was said and all these kinds of things, but you know what? it was my friend, i was grateful to be able to spend... because my birthday was on the 27th of december so i was grateful not to spend time alone after spending almost a year lockdown on my own.

you've been really clear that working with someone on things that you agree about is not the same as sharing their politics. you ran for the women's equality party, at the last election you did not vote conservative, you made it clear that you were voting green, now you don't work for him, as you made clear, you work for his government, are there times when you just, when you are looking after wilfred or something, you just want to cut through all that nonsense, all the civil servants committees and say, come on, boris, why don't you just do this! 100%, no, because that would be lobbying, and i am very clear on that whole point so... oh, really? you've been told that that is inappropriate? no, no, i'vejust read the constitution, the semi—written constitution of this country so... the thing that people don't necessarily understand about me is the fact that i am a product of civil war so i know when you don't respect the due process of a country, things can actually kind of fall apart, i would never kind of step outside of my remit

as being a friend or when i am in a political space or in a work space. and, for me, the ethics and those kind of principles really matter to me. and, ultimately, whether boris stays or goes or whatever happens, i want to be able to make sure that there are civil servants, there are ministers, and there are people that are in this country that continue the work that i care about. well, if he ever does go, some people will think it is because he doesn't do what you have just said you do, he doesn't respect due process. is that a fair comment? politics is an interesting space. has it been an uncomfortable thing for you? somebody who believes in those values? yeah. to watch some of the things happening in downing street? it is a very interesting space to be in and i think, i think that the greatest friends are those that hold you accountable, hold a mirror to you, so, you know, like i say, i can kind of respect people but not necessarily agree with them wholeheartedly. you think mistakes were made,

that breaking the rules on covid was a mistake? for me, actually, iam more interested in the fact that we are failing and falling behind in being a global leader that we could be, so, for example, things that we really should be on the forefront of, afghanistan, ethiopian, which is basically a civil war at the moment, droughts in the horn of africa, and other things that really should be taking precedent at the moment are not being talked about. i think a lot of the departments that could be doing great work are actually falling behind. afghanistan, in what way? afghanistan, the fact that 90% of afghans�* population are starving, the fact that we have actually just ignored the taliban, the way that they are treating women. i think we were completely wrong in the way that we cut and run, and, yes, america did what it did but, ultimately, i think we should have held ourselves to a higher standard of respect and duty of care to the people that we were basically working with for almost 20 years. you, earlier when i ask

you something, you said people will notice my silence. people have noticed your silence, when it comes to boris johnson, more generally. you have been quiet about it. he once said, i believed in him, i believe in his ability to deliver. do you still? did i say that publicly? you did. i believe in the fact that he can still deliver, there are still 18 months left in this parliament. it must be awkward at times to be so close to the prime minister's wife, frustrated about policies, is that awkward for you, or put for her in the end? it is not really that awkward, it is the fact that we both love and respect each other and i don't necessarily disagree with him or his kind of policies but it is the fact that sometimes things that you care about has to take a back burner to other things and that ultimately means that you don't give up but you keep pushing along.

if you could now talk to your old self, the campaigner, perhaps even the person you haven't met, the future prime minister, the future mayor of london, would you say do it, do exactly what i have done? or would you say, you have much more power on the outside, keep your independence? i think i would definitely have done it but i would have worked smarter, not as hard, because is actually exhausting trying to keep everyone happy. nimco ali, thank you very much forjoining me on political thinking. thank you. a question critics of nimco ali might have is whether she has benefited more from her association of borisjohnson or whether he has benefited more. has he, in other words, adopted and gained from her brand of campaigning power? if i put that to her,

i suspect, we'd get one of those nimco ali silences. thank you for watching. hello, sunshine on the way for many parts of the uk this afternoon, but for some it will be accompanied by a serving of showers. driest, brightest closest to this area of high pressure, so across southern and eastern most counties of england. low pressure to the northwest feeding in more in the way of cloud. the sun is going to have a pretty good go at breaking that cloud up in many areas, but it is likely to produce some showers i think across western wales and northern england into the afternoon and potentially some thunderstorms for southern scotland and northern ireland. up to 23 degrees, though, in the sunshine towards the southeast.

just 13 or 1a where we have a band of more persistent rain across northwestern scotland stretching up to the northern isles. and more rain to come out of that through the course of the night for northern—most scotland. elsewhere, we are looking at an essentially dry night and a mild night, with temperatures widely in double figures. for monday, it's a bit of a two—pronged attack in terms of our weather. we've got weather fronts trying to push down from the north and we've got an area of low pressure trying to push in from the south. the theme, really, for the week ahead is that it's going to be unsettled and it will also turn cooler. this area of low pressure could make for some pretty intense rain across eastern—most counties of england through monday and then fronts heading south i think will start to produce some showers that lump together into longer spells of rain, particularly for wales and the south west come monday afternoon. we are having some questions around exactly where this rain sits across eastern england through monday and how heavy it is. so just keep that in the back of your mind through the course of the day.

but cooler as you can see for everyone. temperatures no longer in the low 20s, mid—teens very typically. tuesday, low pressure to the east of the uk means i think many eastern areas will see some quite heavy showers. there'll be strong winds along the length of the north sea and some of this rain could also be fairly persistent before the low drifts away. towards the west, a very different story, actually. light winds, sunshine and a pretty pleasant and quiet day. but by midweek we've got an area of low pressure coming in from the atlantic and all areas that will turn it windy and bring a chance of showers just about anywhere. it does look like things will start to settle down, though, again towards the end of the week and we might see some warmth creeping back in by then, too.

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