Reflections on the Women's Aid 2024 conference

(Pictured from l to r - Lisa Baker, Melanie Brown, Ashleigh Saville).

Ashleigh Saville, Development Manager, shares her thoughts and reflections after attending her first ever national Women’s Aid conference.

This year I went to my first ever Women’s Aid national conference, and what a special one to attend for the first time. As well as it being Manchester Women’s Aid 50th anniversary this year, it’s also Women’s Aid half a century celebration too. 

Going into the conference, I was excited at the prospect of meeting women in similar roles to mine and sharing ways of dealing with issues the sector is facing while learning about other organisations like ours and meeting like-minded, passionate women. I certainly did achieve this and came away feeling inspired and motivated.

There were many stories shared by audience and panel members - an important reminder of our crucial work.

The most impactful moment was hearing Yasmin Jawed, mother of Fawzia Jawed, speak about her daughter’s murder in September 2021.

For those unfamiliar with the story, Fawzia experienced years of so-called honour-based abuse and domestic abuse from her husband and his parents. She had planned to leave him after a holiday to Edinburgh, but sadly while on this trip, he pushed her 50ft off the popular beauty spot Arthur’s Seat and she died. The first thing he did after it happened was call his father, not 999. He was sentenced to 20 years in prison, but his parents still walk free to this day. 

I also attended workshops on how to use freedom of information requests to strengthen our work and a session on Operation Soteria, which brings together police forces with academics and policy leads to use evidence and new insight to enable forces to transform their response to rape and serious sexual offences.

We heard international perspectives on feminism and the women’s movement, and about the work of vital UK based organisations such as Karma Nirvana and Latin American Women’s Rights Service. A few laughs (and tears) were had from a fireside chat between Farah Nazeer, CEO of Women’s Aid, and Melanie Brown, Women’s Aid patron. 

However, I couldn’t help but notice a recurring theme throughout both days - the recent Labour victory in the general election, and their pledge to halve violence against women and girls (VAWG) in a decade. More specifically, how no plans have been announced for how they are going to tackle this (yet). 

As a sector, we are crying out for more secure, long-term funding. No plans to cut VAWG in half can be achieved without working with our services, who do crucial work every day with survivors of domestic and sexual violence to make them safe and reduce risk.

This was acknowledged by Jess Phillips MP, recently appointed Minister for Safeguarding and Violence against Women and Girls Minister in the Home Office. Jess has worked in our sector, managing refuges and supporting survivors of domestic abuse. She has campaigned on these issues since becoming a Member of Parliament in 2015. 

Her speech gave hope that we have someone in government, who understands our sector and the challenges we face, as well as the scale of the problem. She promised to be honest with us and encouraged us all to keep holding her and the government to account over their actions.

Hope and optimism have been carrying our sector forward for the last fifty years. What we need now is action. While we all go back to our day jobs, one eye must be kept firmly on the new Labour Government to ensure their bold promise is not just words but a clear deliverable action plan which prioritises and invests in an effective VAWG sector. 

As Women’s Aid ‘Investing to Save’ report shows, “for every pound invested in domestic abuse support services, we will see a saving to the public purse of at least £9.”