March 2010
Eaves' Sojourner project extended
We're pleased to say the
Sojourner Project, run by Eaves and funded by the Home Office to assist
women with no recourse to public funds, has been extended until the end
of 10 August.
The project, for women who entered the UK on a
spousal visa and are eligible to apply for Indefinite Leave to Remain
(ILR) under the Domestic Violence Rule, will now take referrals up until
2 July.
If you have any queries on the issue, please contact the Sojourner duty manager on 0207 840 7147 or sojourner@eaveshousing.co.uk
London hustings - thankyou to all!
We're
pleased to say Wednesday's London local elections hustings, hosted by
the Women's Resource Centre, HEAR Network and the Voluntary Sector
Forum, was a great success!
We would like to thank all the
councillors who took part in the event - Cllr Nilgun Canver, Labour,
Cllr Lynn Hillan, Conservative, Cllr Stephen Knight, Liberal Democrat
and Cllr Ute Michel, Green Party, for sparing the time to attend.
Thankyou
also to Emma Scott, director of Rights of Women, who chaired the event,
Tim Brogden from the Voluntary Sector Forum and, of course, a huge
thanks to all those who attended and submitted questions.
We hope to hold more such events in the future so if you have any thoughts or suggestions do let us know: info@wrc.org.uk.
WHEC consortium partners with Health Dept
The Women's Health and Equality Consortium (WHEC), led by
YWCA England and Wales, is to become a third sector strategic partner of the
Department of Health.
The consortium, which includes the
Women's Resource Centre and others such as
Maternity Action,
FORWARD UK and
Rape Crisis England and Wales,
will work with the government, third sector women's organsations and
other health partners to contribute to health policy on appropriate and
accessible services.
WHEC, which has been operating for about a
year, was set up to strengthen the women's health and care sector by
tackling health inequalities. Lorraine Dongo, the consortium's manager,
said they were "delighted" by the news.
'Key points' still need to be addressed - WRC responds to govt consultation on commissioning of local
services to address violence against women, girls
The
Women's Resource Centre has responded to the UK government's
consultation on mainstreaming the commissioning of local services to
address violence against women and girls, which you can read here:
FINAL WRC Response to Commissioning VAW March 2010 (4).doc (515.00KB) .
While
the guidance is very good, there are still some key points to address
to ensure that the independent, specialist VAWG sector is supported by
local commissioners.
The consultation is open until 15 March, so there is still time for organisations to respond. The original consultation is
here.
WRC partners with NSPCC, Children England to support Safe Network
The
Women's Resource Centre has partnered with the NSPCC and Children
England to provide support and advice to its Safe Network programme,
which works to assist the third sector in having effective child
protection and safety measures in place.
The WRC will provide
advice on promoting the greater involvement of the women's voluntary
sector in safeguarding activities at local and national levels across
the WRC's network of organisations and those who work with women and
girls.
The Safe Network was launched on 5 June last year to offer
information, training, materials and tailored advice that volunteers,
parents and organisations need to provide safe environments for children
and young people.
Click
here to learn more about Safe Network.
Your help needed! WRC begins survey on power and importance of women's sector
The
Women's Resource Centre has launched a quick and simple survey to
demonstrate the power and inmportance of the women's sector - and we
need your help!
We are planning to produce a report, based on the
information we collect, which we shall use to demonstrate to the
government the continuing need for women's organisations, especially in
light of the recession.
But we cannot do this alone, so please
tell us about your work, so that we can present the best argument. It
takes 15 minutes and you can complete the survey by clicking
here Best
of all, by completing the survey you enter our prize draw and can win
up to £100 for your organisation of one of your choice! So after you've
finished the survey, please pass it to your colleagues and other
organisations.
WRC launches greeting card for International Women's Day
10 February 2010
The Women's Resource Centre has created a beautiful greeting card to buy in honour of International Women's Day on March 8th.
Profits
from the sale of the card (pictured above) contribute to supporting
women's organisations many of whom provide life-saving services to some
of the most marginalised women in our communities. And if you buy 10 you
get one free!
Read more and buyWomen's organisations funded to work on FGM
12 December 2009
Last
week, three funders announced the names of the projects they will be
funding under their special FGM initiative. The initiative will fund
community based, preventive work to safeguard children from the practice
of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM).
Read more...Beautiful Star album supports women's charities
23 November 2009
Wears the Trousers magazine
(which highlights women in the music industry) has put together a
tribute album to the influential folk artist, Odetta Holmes. All the
profits from the album will be split between the
Fawcett Society and the Women's Resource Centre. It is now available for pre-order in advance of its release on 30 November 2009.
Read more...Women's organisations shocked by surprise withdrawal of funding
17 November 2009
Charities
across the country have been angered by the Government's surprise
decision to cancel its Campaigning Research programme, after the grants
had already been awarded. We spoke to three women's organisations about
the impact it has had on their work.
Read our statement...New government 'no recourse' scheme does not go far enough
12 November 2009
Today,
the UK government announced a pilot scheme for women experiencing
domestic violence but who cannot access safe housing and support due to
their insecure immigration status.
The scheme will provide
funding for a woman with ‘no recourse to public funds’ in a refuge for
up to 40 days pending an application to remain in the UK under the
Domestic Violence Rule.
Read more...New online network for the women's sector
22 October 2009
WRC has just launched the Women's Cafe, an online network for the women's voluntary and community sector.
Read more...WRC membership now free for small groups
22 October 2009
As
of 1 November 2009, membership of the Women's Resource Centre will be
free for organisations with annual incomes under £100,000. Earlier this
year our members identified funding as the biggest challenge they face
and of those who did not renew their membership with WRC, 30% stated
that it was due to lack of funds. So we thought we'd do our bit to help
out.
Read more...
Take action on no recourse
2 October 2009
On
Wednesday 4 November, WRC is supporting a mass lobby of parliament that
will bring hundreds of activists together to urge the UK government to
protect all women from violence and abuse in the UK.
Read more...New UN Agency for Women
15 September 2009
Yesterday, the UN General Assembly supported a resolution on the creation of a powerful new UN “agency for women”.
Despite
many important developments for women, Governments have failed to
implement the commitments to women’s rights they have made in the CEDAW
Convention, Beijing Platform for Action, the Millennium Development
Goals and other human rights agreements.
A new agency will
improve the UN’s coordination and efforts to fund and promote gender
equality, and has the potential to end the ‘suffocating patriarchy’
within the UN.
Read more here New funding for Rape Crisis Centres
5 August 2009
The government today announced £3million funding to support victims of rape and sexual violence.
The
money will fund Rape Crisis Centres and other organisations supporting
victims of rape and sexual violence, as well as funding 15 existing and 8
new Sexual Assault Referral Centres (SARCs) and 43 Independent Sexual
Violence Advisers (ISVAs) to offer practical support for victims of
sexual violence.
Read more...How can we support women and girls affected by gang violence and serious youth offending?
23 July 2009
WRC,
in partnership with Race On the Agenda (ROTA) is looking at the
services available to support women and girls affected by gang violence
and serious youth offending. The needs of such women and girls have
largely been ignored until now.
Women's body image projects are happy recipients of Rosa's first grants
10 June 2009
Rosa, the UK fund for women and girls, announced yesterday that their first round of grants will go to the
Powerhouse,
Mimbre and
Feminist Webs for their work with women and girls on body image.
New third sector minister is patron of Basildon Women's Aid
8 June 2009
Angela
Smith, MP for Basildon, has been confirmed as the new Minister for the
Third Sector. She replaces Kevin Brennan, who has moved on to the new
Department for Business, Innovation and Skills. Angela Smith is a patron
of
Basildon Women's Aid, and we hope her appointment will be good news for the women's sector. See Angela Smith's
website.
Women's health consortium seeks manager
26 May 2009
WRC has been supporting a new partnership of women's organisations tackling women’s health and social inequalities.
The Women's Health & Equality Consortium is now looking to employ a manager.
Read more...Measuring the value of the women's sector
5 May 2009
WRC
is looking for 5 women's organisations to take part in a new project
measuring the impact of the work of the women's sector. If you want to
demonstrate the economic, social and environmental impacts of your work
to funders, supporters and policymakers,
read on...Equality Bill published
28 April 2009
Yesterday
the government published the Equality Bill. You can download the bill
in various formats from the Government Equalities Office
website.
The Bill aims to narrow the gap between rich and poor; outlaw age
discrimination; significantly strengthen Britain’s anti-discrimination
legislation; and will require businesses to report on gender pay.
WRC will be producing a briefing for women's organisations. If there's anything else you'd find useful,
get in touch.
Launch of 3rd 'why women?' report
23 March 2009
WRC have launched their latest report in the
why women? campaign. The report,
Not just bread, but roses, too
maps women’s organisations across all of the English regions. We’ve
looked at the areas organisations work in, the equalities strands they
focus on and have tracked income and expenditure data for 2004 to 2007.
One of the key findings is that 1 in 5 women's organisations became
inactive during 2004-7.
You can
download the report to read about the research and its key findings in full.
Home Office launches nationwide violence against women consultation
12 March 2009
The
Home Office is encouraging a national debate on how to prevent violence
against women, how to protect women and children experiencing violence
and how to convince women to report it.
EHRC threatens legal action over lack of services for female victims of violence
30 January 2009
The
Equality and Human Rights Commission
(EHRC) today announced it will target over 100 local authorities with
the threat of legal action over their failure to provide specialised
services for women who have experienced violence.
The threat of legal action comes as a new report,
Map of Gaps II,
published today by the EHRC and the End Violence Against Women
coalition (EVAW), reveals a major funding gap for services that help
women escape violence and abuse.
Read more on the EVAW website or go to
www.mapofgaps.org to see how your area is affected.
WRC Policy Forum member wins award
29 January 2009
Yeukai Taruvinga has just won the
Campaigner of the Year award. Yeukai is the Chair of
Women Asylum Seekers Together (WAST) London and sits on WRC’s Policy Forum.
Yeukai,
a refused asylum seeker who has been previously detained, has been
volunteering and campaigning tirelessly around the issues of destitution
and permission to work. Yeukai wrote about her
experiences seeking asylum in Britain from Zimbabwe in The Guardian on 20 December 2008. Heartfelt congratulations to Yeukai!
Oral histories of the Black Women's Movement
5 January 2009
Black Cultural Archives is collecting oral histories of women involved in and inspired by the Black Women's Movement in Britain. They are
recruiting volunteers
to carry out interviews and transcribe them. For further information
please contact Mia Morris, Oral History Project Co-ordinator, on 020
7582 8516
mia@bcaheritage.org.uk or visit the project blog
http://heartoftherace.blogspot.com.
Rosa announces theme for first grants
22 December 2008
Rosa,
the new UK women's fund, announced today that their first set of grants
will focus on projects supporting women and girls to develop a positive
body image. £25,000 will be available and more details will be
available in February.
Read Rosa's latest update.
New training to make women's organisations more financially resilient
1 December 2008
WRC
will be running a series of free training sessions for women's
organisations in London. The sessions will provide organisations with
the skills and knowledge to diversify their income streams, build
effective relationships with funders and develop partnerships. The first
session -
Introduction to developing a sustainable funding mix - is on 10 December. For more details see the full
training calendar.
New guide: how to influence local agendas
26 November 2008
Can't tell your LSP from your LAA? WRC has produced a
new guide
to help women's organisations influence local agendas. Decision making
powers are increasingly being devolved to local areas. Women's
organisations must engage with the local agenda to ensure their issues
and services (and funding for them) are taken into account.
Winners of 2008 Emma Humphries Memorial Prize announced
31 October 2008
Fabulous
women campaigners received awards at the annual Emma Humphries Memorial
Prize ceremony. Sabrina Qureshi, treasurer of Women and Girls Network
and one of the driving forces behind this year's Million Women Rise
march, won the individual award. Women Asylum Seekers Together
(Manchester) won the group award, and Southall Black Sisters received a
special award.
New support for London's violence against women sector
8 October 2008
The Women’s Resource Centre (WRC) is pleased to announce the success of our joint bid with
Women & Girls Network for
London Councils
funding. Together we have been awarded £150,000 per year for four years
to deliver support to London-based organisations working in the field
of violence against women. Women & Girls Network will be delivering
most of the services, which will include accredited training and events
for frontline workers in violence against women services. WRC will
provide some training and one-to-one support on organisational
development issues (e.g. monitoring and evaluation).
The project will launch in early 2009. For more information contact Supriya on 020 7324 3038 or
supriya@wrc.org.uk.
Crisis for specialist women's refuges
16 September 2008
Specialist
refuges for minority ethnic women are closing because of the
government's funding and commissioning policies, claims Imkaan, a
second tier organisation for Asian women's refuges.
Vivienne Hayes appointed WNC Commissioner
11 September 2008
The views of women and women’s organisations were given a significant
boost today as Harriet Harman, Minister for Women and Equality,
announced ten new Commissioners who will join the board of the Women’s
National Commission (WNC), including WRC Chief Executive, Vivienne Hayes.
Ministers for Women report on their progress over the past year
27 August 2008
In July 2007 the Minister for Women and Equality, Harriet Harman, set
out the government’s priorities for women. They are: supporting
families, tackling violence against women; and increasing the
representation of Black, Asian and minority ethnic women. Their new
report charts their progress and maps out some plans for future work.
Gordon Brown must end the crisis in Rape Crisis
1 August 2008
An
open letter has been sent to Gordon Brown today, demanding that he take
urgent action to secure the future of Rape Crisis centres. Signatories
include Theresa May MP, Lynne Featherstone MP, Shami Chakrabarti and
Polly Toynbee.
United Nations urges UK government action on the 'crisis in Rape Crisis'
1 August 2008
The United Nations has urged the Government to do
more to meet the needs of women who have been raped or sexually
assaulted. The Committee for the Elimination of Discrimination Against
Women (CEDAW) has called on the Government to increase and sustain its
funding to women’s organisations; assess the impact of commissioning on
women’s groups; protect women-only services; and increase services for
victims of violence against women.
Southall Black Sisters celebrate High Court victory
21 July 2008
In
dramatic scenes at the High Court on Friday, Ealing Council admitted
defeat, leaving Southall Black Sisters celebrating. Southall Black
Sisters have been locked in a struggle against Ealing Council over its
decision to withdraw funding for their domestic violence services for
black and minority ethnic women.
Blueprint for integrated violence against women strategy published
4 July 2008
A
fractured response to violence against women (VAW) in most of the UK is
failing women, says a new report by the End Violence Against Women
coalition (EVAW, of which WRC is a member). As YouGov polling shows
that 8 in 10 people support cross-government action to end VAW, EVAW
sets out its blueprint for action,
Realising Rights, Fulfilling Obligations.
www.endviolenceagainstwomen.org.uk
Women's sector in Queen's honours list
17 June 2008
We
were delighted to see some key figures from the women's sector honoured
in this year's Queen's birthday honours list. Congratulations to Dinah
Cox (OBE, Executive Director of
Rosa), Katherine Rake (OBE, Director of
Fawcett), Sheila Coates (MBE,
South Essex Rape & Incest Crisis Centre), Naana Otoo-Oyortey (MBE, Director of
FORWARD) and Shaista Gohir (MBE, Director of the Muslim Women's Network), and all the other hardworking women who received honours.
Read full Birthday Honours List 2008New women's fund launched
10 June 2008
Rosa,
a new UK-wide fund devoted exclusively to championing and investing in
charities working with women and girls, launched on 10 June. Rosa will
begin making grants in 2009 and will be based initially in the Women's
Resource Centre's offices in London.
Read the full press release here...Take action to support Rape Crisis centres
17 March 2008
While
it’s great news that the government has recently announced emergency
funding of £1m for Rape Crisis centres, this is only enough to stop the
imminent closure of centres at immediate risk. Now is the time to keep
the pressure on, to ask for sustainable funding for the future, to
safeguard these vital services, and meet the needs of women survivors.
Find out what you can do to support Rape Crisis centres