Women's Views on News |
| Child safety pledge lost in the fog Posted: 25 Apr 2016 02:05 PM PDT
The government is yet to deliver on three major elements of its child sexual exploitation (CSE) strategy more than a year after it was unveiled, it has emerged. Reporting on this failure, the website Children and Youth People Now (CYP Now) said the strategy, which was launched by Prime Minister David Cameron in March 2015, contained a raft of measures to tackle child sexual exploitation in the wake of revelations that 1,400 children in Rotherham had been sexually exploited between 1997 and 2013. Prominent among them, CYP Now reported, were plans to create a national centre for expertise on child abuse, establish a child sexual abuse taskforce, and to launch a consultation on a new offence of "wilful neglect" for professionals working with children and which could result in a jail term of up to five years. The three ideas were cited by the government as being among the "highlights" of the strategy. But as yet not one of them has been launched. Funding for the national centre of expertise in tackling child abuse had been due to be outlined in last autumn's spending review, which was announced in November. But Treasury documents make no mention of the initiative and CYP Now understands it is yet to be launched. The same is the case for the child sexual abuse taskforce, which is intended to support areas struggling to tackle the problem. A similar taskforce in Scotland was launched last April. Home Office minister Karen Bradley, speaking at an NSPCC conference in June 2015, said a public consultation on the wilful neglect law would launch “this year” – but it too is yet to materialise. Labour MP Sarah Champion, shadow minister for preventing abuse and domestic violence, told CYP Now it was "appalling" that a national taskforce for tackling child sexual exploitation is yet to be established. "For the last 18 months I have been raising the urgent need for it," she said. "At the [CSE] summit in March last year I was pleased to see the government make a commitment to establishing such a taskforce. "But they haven't delivered on that pledge, or others to protect victims. "A year on and we still don't have details on the scope, constitution or objective of this taskforce." CYP Now also reported that the Children's Commissioner for England, Anne Longfield, said that the leadership shown by the government and the implementation of its strategy were “critical to tackling child sexual exploitation and abuse”. "We are aware that some scheduling of the activities in the strategy may have changed," she told CYP Now, "but we also believe that the government remains firmly committed to addressing child abuse.” The government is, she continued, currently looking at new approaches to interviewing children who may have been abused following recommendations in the report published last year. To read the government's paper ‘Tackling Child Sexual Exploitation’, click here. Please contact your MP and ask them to ask in Parliament which stage any of these issues have reached and when any of them are due to be launched. Thanks.  |
| Conflict prevention with no disarmament? Posted: 25 Apr 2016 06:30 AM PDT
The Stockholm Declaration on Addressing Fragility and Building Peace in a Changing World was presented recently at a high-level international summit in Stockholm. It focuses on long-term work and the importance of moving from short-term emergency relief to long-term processes and structures, which is key to conflict prevention efforts. And it includes clear references to the Women, Peace and Security agenda, with a focus on women's participation at all levels. The Declaration is part of a broader international framework aimed at strengthening international efforts to prevent conflict and build sustainable peace. The Swedish Minister for International Development and Cooperation, Isabella Lövin, has a leading role in the process as co-chair of the International Dialogue on Peacebuilding and Statebuilding (IDPS). And the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF) joined other peace organisations around the world over the two weeks from 5-18 April 2016 which marked the 2016 Global Days of Action on Military Spending (GDAMS). WILPF Sweden, commenting on the Stockholm Declaration, welcomed the overall focus on conflict prevention as the most effective way to build long-term sustainable peace and that the Declaration clearly points to the need to address the root causes of war and conflict. But WILPF Sweden said it is a flaw that the Declaration does not contain any references to disarmament or arms control despite a number of existing instruments making this link, such as the new sustainable development goals (Agenda 2030) which acknowledge the proliferation of small arms as a threat to inclusive peace. The shift from conflict reaction to conflict prevention requires a reallocation of resources from military spending – which increased in 2015 for the first time since 2011 – to investments in social justice, gender equality, disarmament, anti-corruption, and other critical means of building sustainable peace. The Declaration does not address this critical issue. The summit was held in conjunction with the Stockholm Forum on Security and Development, on 5-6 April. It was organised by the Stockholm Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) and the Swedish Foreign Ministry. The forum brought together political leaders and government officials, UN representatives, academics and civil society representatives from all over the world. WILPF Nigeria's president Joy Onyesoh was on the panel on Agenda 2030, alongside, among others, Isabella Lövin and the UN’s Deputy Secretary-General Jan Eliasson. "During the past year, a number of UN studies suggested that efforts to prevent war must be strengthened," Onyesoh said. "To focus on the root causes of conflicts is the only viable strategy to break the circles of conflict. "From our experience, working on the ground, we saw the indicators for violence in Nigeria were high years ago. "Even though Nigeria isn't in active conflict," she continued, "women's organisations have persistently drawn attention to the need for preventive mechanisms against violence and the creation of enabling environment for women's rights. "The world's attention was drawn to Nigeria first after the kidnappings and thousands of displaced victims became a reality. "This shouldn't be the case. "We should take more preventive actions to build more inclusive societies and save thousands of lives." Both the Stockholm Declaration and Agenda 2030 recognise that existing systems for building peace must be strengthened. And unlike the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), the new Agenda 2030 explicitly includes a goal of building peaceful societies and preventing violence and conflict. The need for preventive efforts is critical in many regions of the world, and increasingly so in Cameroon, Sylvie Ndongmo, president of WILPF Cameroon, pointed out. "Women's rights activist have been drawing attention to the developments in Cameroon and calling for preventive action," Ndongmo said. "Just like our sister section in Nigeria struggled to get attention to their situation, we are now trying to make the world realise that the violence and the risk of conflict increases dramatically in Cameroon. "We must do something now, not in five years," she continued. "We must prevent and teach peace to change the mind-set namely by working with young people and strengthen women's rights, but we have a huge lack of resources." And then on the same day as the Stockholm Declaration was agreed on, SIPRI released their annual world military spending statistics. These showed that military spending in 2015 amounted to nearly USD1,700 billion, the first increase since 2011. This, WILPF pointed out, makes it even more striking that the Stockholm Declaration does not contain any reference to disarmament. Women's peace work in fragile states is very poorly funded. In 2012-13, about USD130 million went to women's equality organisations and institutions in these settings. But both the Stockholm Declaration and the global development goals highlight gender equality and that women's participation in peace building is a critical factor. "We often hear that women's community-based peace work is effective and that more of this work is needed," Sylvie Ndongmo said. "But compare the annual military spending of 1700 billion US dollars, to the money that goes to women's rights organisations' work to prevent conflict and build sustainable communities. "Are the leaders ready to reprioritise?" The seminar acted as a "prepcomm" for the International Peace Bureau's World Congress on military spending, to be held in Berlin from 30 September to 3 October 2016. You can download information about and the draft programme for the Berlin meeting here.  |
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