Women's Views on News |
| Remembering deaths in state custody Posted: 30 Oct 2015 12:28 PM PDT
On 31 October 2015, the families and friends of those who have died while in the custody of the state will hold their annual remembrance procession from Trafalgar Square to Downing Street. They will assemble at 12noon in Trafalgar Square and make their way in silence along Whitehall for a noisy protest at Downing Street. Although they receive far less coverage than the sickening news of black deaths from the USA, deaths 'following police contact' are a major issue in the UK as well; 1,433 in England and Wales between 1990 and 2012, for example, according to campaigning group Inquest. And not a single police officer has been convicted over any of them. The United Families and Friends Campaign (UFFC) was set up in 1997 by the families who had lost loved ones at the hands of the state to challenge the injustice in the system. It began as a network of black families because disproportionate numbers of BME people were dying in police custody, and has now grown to include families and friends of all races that die in custody. The UFFC has held an annual remembrance procession every year now year since 1999. The UFFC wants to see: Prison deaths subjected to a system of properly funded investigation that is completely independent of the Prison Service; Officers involved in custody deaths suspended until investigations are completed; Prosecutions to automatically follow 'unlawful killing' verdicts; Police forces be made accountable to the communities they serve; Legal Aid and full disclosure of information made available to the relatives of victims; and Officers responsible for deaths face criminal charges, even if retired. This year the family of Sheku Bayoh, who died earlier this year in Kirkcaldy, will join the march for the first time. The UFFC network includes the families of Leon Patterson, Roger Sylvester, who died after being restrained by police in 1999; Rocky Bennett who died in psychiatric custody in 1998; Harry Stanley shot dead by police officers in 1999; Sean Rigg, Habib 'Paps' Ullah, Azelle Rodney, Christopher Alder, Brian Douglas, Joy Gardner, Paul Jemmott, Ricky Bishop, Mikey Powell, Jason McPherson, Sarah Campbell, Jimmy Mubenga, Paul Coker, Mark Duggan and many others. It was early morning when five men and women burst into Joy Gardner’s home, cornered and grabbed her, and forced her face down on to the floor. They sat on her body, bound her hands to her side with a leather belt and manacles, strapped her legs together and wound yards of surgical tape round her head. Joy Gardner was a 40-year-old Jamaican woman who died when police officers came to deport her. Despite repeated demands from her family, campaigners and Amnesty International, there has been no inquest and no public inquiry into her death. Leon Patterson was found dead in a Stockport police cell on 27 November 1992 . He was 31 years old, of mixed race and lived in North London. He had been arrested on the 21 November on suspicion of being involved in a till snatch. Six days later he was discovered dead in his cell. During the last 20 hours of his life despite being seen by two police doctors he was left lying naked, his body covered in injuries, on a stone floor groaning and incoherent. Neither doctor prescribed any medication or treatment nor took any steps to get him to a civilian hospital relying on the unsuccessful efforts of the police to get him into HMP Strangeways, Manchester. Likewise the police took no steps to take him to hospital once they were aware that the facility at Strangeways was not available. The inquest jury returned a verdict of "Misadventure to which neglect contributed". Roger Sylvester, an Islington council worker, stopped breathing at the emergency psychiatric unit at St Anne’s hospital, Haringey, when six police officers held him down on the floor for about 20 minutes, St Pancras coroner’s court heard. He fell into a coma and died later at the Whittington hospital, north London. The UFFC’s annual procession is supported by 4WardEver, Migrant Media, INQUEST, BirminghamStrong Justice 4 All, Tottenham Rights, London Campaign Against Police & State Violence, LARAG, Newham Monitoring Project (NMP), the Pan African Society Community Forum, Defend the Right to Protest, Joint Enterprise Not Guilty by Association (JENGbA), the Institute of Race Relations, the Edge Fund, UNISON, the RMT, FBU, UNITE and UCU. The hashtag for the event on Twitter is #UFFC17 This year the Home Secretary, Theresa May, announced the first ever public inquiry into deaths in police custody. But remarking on this, Deborah Coles, the director of Inquest, said there has been no consultation with the families or with Inquest about the terms of reference, and the terms of reference were going to be critical. There is also that sense of déjà vu, she told New International. "In 30 years of our organisation's existence, there has been review after review, and there is a whole wealth of evidence out there about what the problems are," she said. "The key issue is the fact that recommendations are not implemented."  |
| Posted: 30 Oct 2015 08:25 AM PDT
It is with huge sadness that we report this: Eaves has announced that it will cease operations on 30 October 2015. Eaves has been a member of the End Violence Against Women campaign – an unprecedented coalition of individuals and organisations set up in 2005 who are calling on the government, public bodies and others to take concerted action to end violence against women. But Eaves has been operational since 1977 and is particularly known for its specialist services for helping and supporting women victims of violence. These include the Poppy project, the London Exiting Advocacy and the Alice project. The Poppy project has supported some 2000 women victims of trafficking since its inception and helped 45 women bring their traffickers to justice, obtaining combined sentence of 423 years. The London Exiting Advocacy (LEA) project for women exiting prostitution was linked to unique primary research with 114 women and a specialist exiting prostitution training programme. The Alice project has averted homelessness for 294 women this year – women with multiple and complex disadvantages including no recourse to public funds, mental health, benefit "sanctions", child custody, needing access to foodbanks and transport and basic welfare etc. Announcing the closure, Eaves’ chair, Louisa Cox, said, "Eaves has done its best to ensure service users have other services to go to and we have been able to transfer some of our projects to other organisations. "The quality of services and safety and well-being of our service users has always been our priority." Outlining how Eaves reached this state of affairs, Cox continued: "Eaves has had to contend with high rents, project funding that does not cover the core costs so an increasing deficit and most recently the tragic illness, and subsequent loss, of our inspirational CEO Denise Marshall. "We have taken a range of measures to diversify our funding base, increase donations, cut costs, move offices, but ultimately none of these steps was enough to save us." Cuts, reductions and closures have of course hit a whole range of non-governmental organisations, however, there is much evidence to suggest that women are bearing the brunt. Fair Deal for Women found that it is women who have paid off 79 per cent of the deficit to date. It is more likely to be women in low-paid, insecure, part-time and public sector work, it is more likely to be women with caring responsibilities who may have to top up their incomes or rely exclusively on benefits and it is more likely to be women who need to rely on public, voluntary sector and specialist services. Yet these are precisely the areas being cut. But it is not purely and simply cuts that are at play. It is abysmal commissioning whereby commissioners either do not know or do not care what they should be looking for or how to assess a bid other than by lowest unit cost with no regard to quality. This is evidenced by the fact that large, generic, non-specialist organisations are winning tenders, expanding, accumulating vast reserves and specialist, smaller organisations with 40+ years of history with high levels of self-referrals from women (a sure sign of the value of the service to the women) – are shrinking and having to use their scarce reserves to survive. The Independence Panel in their report "An Independent Mission; the voluntary sector in 2015" have been charting, since 2011, a combined attack on the voluntary sector. They highlight gagging clauses, poor commissioning and threats to the distinctive identity, character and campaigning voice of the sector to name but a few. The Big Society, transparency and accountability touted by the LibDem-Conservative government when they came into power, always had a hollow ring to some of us. Cox said: "Cutting away and undermining accountability mechanisms and the independent voice, purpose and action of the sector is the completion of an ideological project to shrink the state, silence opposition and monetise misery. "But both the staff and the service users at Eaves are resilient and determined. "Even if Eaves is not there, the women who have made Eaves what it was are still there and still fighting," Cox added. "The fight to end male violence against women continues and will be won."  |
| Dealing with the past in Northern Ireland Posted: 30 Oct 2015 02:58 AM PDT
The United Nations’ Security Council Resolution 1325 (UNSCR 1325) recognises the important role played by women in the "prevention and resolution of conflicts, peace negotiations, peace-building, peacekeeping, humanitarian response and in post-conflict reconstruction" the world over. And the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) calls on the UK government to ensure the full implementation of UNSCR 1325 in Northern Ireland. But to date, this has not happened. Any negotiations in Northern Ireland tend to be male dominated, and women are often side-lined – and the processes set up to date seem to suggest that the promise made in the 1998 Good Friday / Belfast Agreement regarding women having ‘full and equal participation’ in the province’s politics have long been forgotten. The Haass-O'Sullivan talks, in 2013, and the ensuing Stormont House Agreement all cemented the view that women were being forgotten – and left out of the ‘peace process’. But a report launched by the Legacy Gender Integration Group last week, with the title 'Gender Principles for Dealing with the Legacy of the Past', highlighted the shortcomings around gender when dealing with the past and recommend steps the government could take to address them. The Legacy Gender Integration Group is an independent initiative made up of a diverse multidisciplinary group of individuals with different perspectives and affiliations. It is an initiative is supported by the Reconciliation Fund of the Irish Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. Ten recommendations were made in the report. These are: Gender Integration – the report recommends that a "gendered lens must be applied holistically throughout the process". ‘There are’ the report says, ‘clear gender patterns to victimhood and survival. The vast majority of those killed in the conflict were men. The majority of surviving family members are women. Women are a significant presence in victims' organisations in providing and receiving services. Moreover, one's experience of conflict and one's conflict legacy needs are heavily shaped by gender. Victimhood is gendered, as are coping strategies.’ The authors suggest that these different gender patterns ‘must be recognised… further explored and addressed in the conduct of that process.’ Process Orientation – the authors suggest that the ‘experience of victimhood and survival is enduring’ and recommend that ‘victims and survivors must be enabled and supported to engage with mechanisms to deal with the past in their own time.’ Empowerment, Participation, Ownership and Control – work undertaken by the Women's Resource & Development Agency in partnership with the Community Foundation for Northern Ireland and the National Women’s Council of Ireland over a two-year period aimed to distil and disseminate learning from the Northern Ireland peace process. It used the framework of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 on 'Women, Peace and Security' as a tool to enable women in Northern Ireland and the border counties of the Republic of Ireland to talk about their own experiences, with a particular emphasis on post-conflict issues. These workshops raised the issue of women feeling left out of the process. The Gender Principles report recommends the resourcing of local support to instil a sense of trust, ownership and control of any process involving victims. Inclusivity: Be inclusive and accommodate complexity – the report suggests that ‘Victimhood and survival are highly personal, complex, and gendered experiences. Hierarchies of victimhood fail to account for this complexity. They instead encourage narrow and prescribed accounts and categories of harm. ‘Recognising diverse, shifting, multiple and gendered forms of harm, victimhood and survival, is essential to the construction of an inclusive and gender-sensitive process to deal with the past.’ The report recommends setting up ‘fair procedures’ and recognising the complex needs of victims as a way of avoiding the pitfall of thinking that all victims have the same needs. Addressing Structural Obstacles – the report highlights the multiple harm faced by some victims – including poverty – and recommends that direct and practical support is needed. Holistic Approach – putting in place ‘services, supports and acknowledgement must be included as essential elements of reparations to victims’. This point is about addressing the distinct and complicated needs of victims in a way which puts the woman at the centre, and having a suite of tailored services around her which she can draw upon as and when they are needed. Giving Voice and Being Heard: Honour individual stories – this recommendation is about listening to the victim, to the full story she has to tell. ‘This type of testimony can jar, however, with fuller, richer and broader accounts of victims and survivors seeking to tell their stories and to be heard and that can provide important documentation of the facts about and impact of harms,’ the report says. ‘If a gendered lens is not incorporated in how a story is gathered it will impact the rest of how a case is addressed. ‘Official processes must be ready to hear, to honour and to document, in their diversity and complexity, the stories of victims and survivors. Done properly, such processes can counter broader dynamics that result in silencing women and victims’. A recommendation in the report is the provision of ‘practical measures to this end’ as they are very much needed. Macro Analysis: Be attentive to the bigger picture – as well as honouring individual stories, this recommendation is asking that ‘gender is both integrated into each of the themes as well as identified as a specific theme for investigation’. Equality and Diversity: Value gender expertise and lived experience – the report recommends that ‘As a matter of priority, a specific group responsible for overseeing the integration of gender in to dealing with the past should be established. ‘Mechanisms for dealing with the past cannot be staffed and led in ways that reinforce existing gender and other inequalities’ it points out. Local and Global Learning: Craft bottom-up local responses that draw on international good practice – ‘Local appropriate processes to deal with the past must draw on international learning, together with the substantial local resources and knowledge within the community and existing victims organisations’. Two case studies covering murders on both sides of the religious/political divide are also included in the Gender Principles Report and highlight how the needs and circumstances of women caught up in the Troubles were – and are being – completely ignored. The years since the 1998 Good Friday / Belfast Agreement have seen the Northern Ireland Assembly come close to collapse on many occasions, and substantial part of the negotiations around these close calls have been about dealing with the past. Time and time again women have asserted their need to be included in these processes and time and time again they have been let down. And there is nothing in the most recent Stormont House Agreement to suggest we are any closer to women being allowed full and equal participation. Women's rights are simply not on the agenda. And women who have suffered as a consequence of the Troubles will continue to be failed unless their unique circumstances and needs as women and as victims are taken into consideration and a gendered lens is used to deal with the past.  |
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