Chat with us, powered by LiveChat

#NoMoreCSEFilms - Campaign by Jessica Eaton - Great News!

I am writing to you because you signed your name or supported the #nomoreCSEfilms campaign, signed up to receive updates on my campaigns and work – or you contributed to the ‘Can I tell you what it feels like?’ report in January 2018 which was the first ever report to document the harm caused by showing sexually violent materials to children as an ‘educational’ or ‘preventative’ method.

I am very pleased (and quite emotional) to write to you all to say that we succeeded. After a year of campaigning, I have now received letters and calls from national charities, police authorities, regulatory bodies and the UN Cybercrime department to confirm that they are all withdrawing the use of CSE films. A number of national organisations and police authorities are preparing to release statements or new policies to stop the use of CSE films with children in the UK. These statements and policies will begin to emerge into public over the next few weeks and months. What I can be sure of, is that everyone from those bodies and organisations have agreed that we need to leave the CSE films behind and move to trauma informed and evidence based working.

I cannot thank you enough for your signature, your interest, your support and your letters. A special thank you to the young people and adults who were harmed by the use of CSE films who told me their stories – and thank you to the parents who wrote to me about the harm of their children.

We have done something very important here. We have changed an entire culture in the field of social care and policing, in which it was assumed that showing children films of other children being abused, could actually protect them from sex offenders. We have stopped children from being retraumatised in their school classrooms and assembly halls.

Thank you so much. You helped change practice for real children. This is activism.

Best Wishes,

Jessica Eaton

Founder

Email: Jessica@victimfocus.org.uk

Call: 07771462616

Website: www.victimfocus.org.uk

Facebook: www.facebook.com/jessicaforenpsych/

Tweet: @JessicaE13Eaton and @victimfocus

 

OPEN ACCESS SESSIONS

DROP-IN

If you are looking for friendly, free and confidential advice or support around domestic abuse, or are working with someone who needs specialist support, please come along to our Drop-In Sessions at our women-only safe space.

Where: Our Open Access Sessions are held at The Listening Post, 22 Marlborough Road, Coventry CV2 4EP

When: every Monday and Wednesday from 10am - 2pm - no referral or appointment needed, JUST DROP-IN!

For more information, please call:

02476 444 077 or

email: info@coventryhaven.co.uk

We hope to see you soon!

FGM Event - Collaborative Working

Tally Ho Birmingham Police Centre

What a great event held 12th February at The tally HO. Great to see how we are all the agencies, health, police,  social care and the voluntary sector wanting to work together to ensure safe practices and safe opportunities for women to talk and disclose. Also to see the importance that building the trust within these communities to enable delivery of knowledge and information surrounding the impact on health and child birth and also the mental health issues that can be linked to FGM.

Important to hear the Theory of Change and the social impact and return on investment from Sophie McHale and the conclusion of her 18 months work on the project, alongside our own Rachel delivering with one of the FGM Champions Ashleigh, and how they are embracing the many different affected communities. This is not just an African issue.

Always great to hear Birmigham and Solihull Women's Aid plus the details of the new project in health for GP's. 

Well done to all involved!

WHAT IS "GASLIGHTING"?

So what actually is Gaslighting??

  • Gaslighting is a form of psychological manipulation and abuse that makes people question their own memory, perception, and sanity
  • The term comes from a 1938 stage play Gas Light in which a husband attempts to convince his wife and others that she is insane - when he dims the gas lights, he insists she's imagining it
  • There are three stages to gaslighting in a relationship: idealisation, devaluation and discard
  • In the idealisation stage the victim is whisked off their feet as the gaslighter projects an image of themselves as the perfect mate
  • The devaluation stage hits hard: the victim goes from being adored to being incapable of doing anything right, but having tasted the ideal they are desperate to put things right
  • Then comes the discard stage where the victim is dropped, ready for the next one - this often happens simultaneously with the idealisation, or grooming, of the next victim

INTRODUCING 'YOUR VOICE'

As a Service User, past or present, you have a unique perspective into the delivery of our services and we would like to invite you to get involved on an ongoing basis to shape the services that we provide.

We value your involvement and would love to hear your feedback on:

  • how we operate
  • answering surveys
  • any campaigns and lobbying
  • events and activities  

If you are interested in becoming a part of the decision making within our organisation, please register your interest to the following email address: 

comms@coventryhaven.co.uk

Or call 02476 444 077 or write to 30 Hen Lane, Coventry CV6 4LB.

We look forward to hearing 'Your Voice'.

If 'Brexit means Brexit', what impact will that have on women?

Throughout the campaign, the leave side diverted their discontent to a scapegoat of immigration and fuelled xenophobia. While there is consensus that the result is linked to inequality, the impact of migration on inequality is contested.

The Womens Budget Group recent Policy Brief shows that inequality in the UK increased not because of migration, i.e. the mobility of labour, but because of the increased fallback options of capital related to increased capital mobility in the form of FDI and financialisation; declining fallback options of labour related to the decline in collective bargaining power, deregulation of the labour market, zero hours contracts and false self-employed contracts, austerity, housing crisis and rising household debt, which in turn is linked to financialisation and inequality.

The quick conclusions related to the impact of immigration on inequality, without adequately decomposing the impact of all other factors, misses the point that correlation is not causation.

The real solution to inequality requires regulating finance and the corporate governance of corporations, taming capital mobility, increasing public investment in social infrastructure and housing, regulating the labour market and improving the legislation to increase the voice of trade unions and collective bargaining coverage.

 

Gender Impact of the Budget 2017

WBG publishes its full gender impact assessment of the Spring Budget 2017

The Women’s Budget Group today published its comprehensive gender impact assessment of the 2017 Spring Budget.

Key findings are as follows:

  • The most significant fiscal announcement, to increase Class 4 National Insurance Contributions for self-employed workers from 9% to 11%, was reversed less than a week after the Budget. Analysis carried out by the WBG shows that, combined with the abolition of Class 2 contributions, this would have raised additional revenue in a progressive way and redistributed from men to women, while the average impact on individual incomes would be limited, even in the richer households. Of the total amount raised by the two measures, women would have contributed just under a quarter.
  • The £2 billion over three years announced for social care is welcome, but falls far short of what is needed to address the on-going crisis in social care. The announcement of a Green Paper on social care funding postpones the implementation of sustainable solutions already set out over the last 11 years in two major reports. Women are disproportionately affected by the care crisis. Not only are the majority of those in need of care women, but so too are the majority of those providing paid and unpaid care.
  • Women and those on low incomes continue to shoulder by far the greatest burden of tax and benefit changes and cuts to public spending since 2010, with black and Asian women facing a triple disadvantage (see Figure 1, Appendix). Changes due to take effect in April 2017 will continue this trend.
  • The Chancellor again chose not to make any significant new investment in health and education services. This is despite creating additional ‘headroom’ by relaxing the government’s self-imposed fiscal rule at the Autumn Statement 2016. It is hard to justify keeping this headroom as a precaution for a future downturn when spending now on public services could instead shore up the economy by creating jobs and stimulating demand.
  • The Treasury and Chancellor failed to provide an adequate assessment of how the Budget impacts on different groups. Such analysis must be an essential component of the decision-making process when setting policies that aim to build a country that ‘works for everyone’.

 

Donate