Mina Smallman, activist

Desert Island Discs

BBC

Society & Culture, Music Commentary, Music, Personal Journals

4.4 • 13.7K Ratings

🗓️ 16 March 2025

⏱️ 51 minutes

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Summary

Wilhelmina – Mina – Smallman is an activist who campaigns for the safety of women and girls and police reform. She is a former teacher and priest who was the first woman of colour to be an archdeacon in the Church of England.

In 2020 her daughters Bibaa and Nicole were murdered as they celebrated Bibaa’s 46th birthday in Fryent Country Park. It later came to light that two policemen, who were guarding the crime scene, had posed for and posted selfies with Bibaa and Nicole’s bodies in the background. They were later jailed for misconduct.

When friends first reported her daughters missing the police didn’t launch an official search for them and it was their loved ones who eventually found Bibaa and Nicole. Mina’s anger at the failings of the Metropolitan Police, led her to start her fight for justice. In 2021 an Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) report, highlighted the Met’s failings and advised the force to apologise to Mina and her family.

Mina was brought up in London. She was a drama teacher for over 20 years before training for the priesthood. She was ordained in 2006 and took up her first job as vicar at Christ Church on the Thames View estate in Barking. In 2013 she was appointed the first woman archdeacon of Southend in the Diocese of Chelmsford. She retired as an archdeacon in 2016.

DISC ONE: Silly Games – Janet Kay DISC TWO: Handel: Messiah, HWV 56 / Pt. 3 - 43. Air: I know that my Redeemer liveth Performed by Dame Joan Sutherland (Soprano), London Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Sir Adrian Boult DISC THREE: Easy Terms - Barbara Dickson DISC FOUR: Amazing Grace - The Pipes And Drums Of The Military Band Of The Royal Scots Dragoon DISC FIVE: We Are The World - USA for Africa DISC SIX: Miss Independent - Ne-Yo DISC SEVEN: Hit Me With Your Rhythm Stick - Ian Dury and the Blockheads DISC EIGHT: I Look To You - Whitney Houston BOOK CHOICE: Woman in White by Wilkie Collins LUXURY ITEM: Hair moisturiser CASTAWAY'S FAVOURITE: I Look To You - Whitney Houston

Presenter Lauren Laverne Producer Paula McGinley

Transcript

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0:00.0	Did you know that you can listen to many of your favourite podcasts first on BBC Sounds?
0:06.6	Like Desert Island Discs, where you can hear castaways like Cher, Gareth Southgate and Nick Cave,
0:12.7	and enjoy longer versions of the music they've picked.
0:15.7	Good things come to those who don't wait.
0:18.7	Listen to your favourite podcasts first on BBC Sounds.
0:23.9	BBC Sounds, music, radio, podcasts. Hello, I'm Lauren Leverne and this is the Desert
0:30.1	Island Discs podcast. Every week, I ask my guest to choose the eight tracks, book and luxury
0:35.4	they'd want to take with them if they were cast away to a desert island.
0:39.4	And for rights reasons, the music is shorter than the Smallman. She was a teacher for 20 years before following her faith and training for the priesthood. In 2013, she became the Church of England's first woman of colour to be appointed an archdeacon, serving Southend in the Diocese of Chelmsford. But it's as a mother that she became a campaigner.
1:29.4	In 2020, her daughters, Bieber and Nicole, were murdered in a senseless attack after a
1:34.6	birthday picnic in a local park. The horror of her daughter's deaths at the hands of a complete
1:40.0	stranger was compounded by the news that two policemen who were guarding the crime scene
1:45.1	posed for and posted selfies with Bieber and Nicole's bodies in the background. They were later
1:50.9	jailed for misconduct. When friends first reported her daughter's missing, the police didn't
1:56.6	launch an official search for them and it was their loved ones who eventually found them.
2:01.5	On hearing the news of her daughter's deaths, she says she simply screamed.
2:06.1	Four years on, that scream has turned into a demand for change,
2:09.9	an end to violence against women and girls and for reform of the police.
2:14.4	She says, I'm here to speak out, to fight for a better tomorrow and make sure that
2:19.3	Bieber and Nicole have not died in vain. And I believe that if my girls could see me now,
2:24.6	they would be saying, yeah, go for it, Mom. Mina Spolman, welcome to Desert Island Discs.
2:29.9	Thank you for having me. You're most welcome. So, Mina, campaigning wasn't a path that you'd envisaged for
	...

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