WNC Work Updates for March 2008 Board Meeting

Outreach - Update for Commissioners meeting March 2008

Muslim Women's Network

Outreach events:

Partners

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Women's Directory

Violence Against Women Update

1. The Violence Against Women Working Group

The VAW Working Group and Sub-groups met on 16 January 2008.

In the meeting the group discussed:

• Honour based violence

• Q&A on prostitution which is now available on EVAW's website

And received inputs from

• Sarah Morgan from GEO, who now has a regular slot in the meeting

• John Dunworth and Martyn Henderson who both work on Public Service Agreements (PSAs). Jon Dunworth talked specifically on the Home Office PSAs and Martyn talked generally about how equalities had been mainstreamed into the PSAs.

• Caroline Rowe from the Ministry of Justice on the recent consultation on Homicide

Joyce attended the Sexual Violence Policy monitoring sub group and the group found this very useful.

The next meeting is on Wednesday 2 April 2008. The group will discuss:

• Working with devolved regions

• Multi Agency Risk Assessment Forums (MARACs)

• The newly released Home Office Action Plan on Violent Crime

The group will receive inputs from:

• The Forced Marriage Unit - giving an update on their work

• Members of the migration and asylum sub group to discuss trafficking

2. National Service Standards on Domestic and Sexual Violence

The National Service Standards work is still ongoing. The sexual violence group handed over their draft to Women's Aid in late November. A new version has just been circulated, but the sexual violence sector are not happy with it. The draft standards should go out for wider consultation in March 2008, with a final draft to be agreed by early April. The group are running behind their original plan.

3. Violence Against BME women

Following on from the meeting a few members of the group met in the interim to discuss violence against BME women. At the meeting concern was expressed over several issues facing the sector. This included lack of funding and support as well as the closures and funding cuts of many vital services; a Government tendency to focus on `current issues' such as Forced Marriage and Honour Based violence without due regard to these issue's place within the spectrum of violence against women; BME women's sector facing increasing pressure to be part of the cohesion and integration agenda.

As well as writing to Ealing Council on behalf of Southall Black Sisters, the WNC are considering what action they can take to support this sector of women's organisations. A BME women roundtable with both Harriet Harman and Barbara Follet is planned for May 2008 which will include representatives from all sectors as well as the VAW BME sector.

4. Other work

Liz Kelly and Joyce Gould met with Barbara Follet to discuss the Victim's Fund. Barbara was very receptive and engaged in this issue and the broader VAW agenda.

EVAW representatives have also met with Lynn Featherstone, Shadow Equalities Minster for the Liberal Democrats and with representatives from the Conservative party to strengthen understanding of the VAW agenda in opposition parties.

Liz Kelly has written to Jason Stacey, Leader of Ealing Council, to protest at the withdrawal of funding from one of WNC's most active partners, Southall Black Sisters. Ealing Council has since reject their appeal on the funding decision and SBS are considering further action to take.

The WNC are drafting a letter to Jacqui Smith outlining issues facing the VAW sector.

Following Joyce's attendance at the SVPM meeting, the WNC are drafting a letter from Joyce to Dawn Primarolo outlining the importance of the Department of Health in supporting the sexual violence sector. This will include a briefing by CWASU and EVAW on the different but complimentary nature of Sexual Assault Referral Centres and Rape Crisis Centres. A report on the health of the sexual violence sector by the Women's Resource Centre and Rape Crisis is due to be released the week beginning 10 March 2008.

5. Consultations

The WNC has written a letter of support and congratulations to the Crown Prosecution Service on their Violence against Women Strategy. Letters from both Joyce and Liz have been sent to the CPS concerning this.

6. WNC staff have attended the following meetings/conferences:

• Talk on Force Marriage and Honour Based Crimes by West Midlands CPS

7. Minster for Women's Priority Consultation

• The WNC recently sent a letter to Harriet outlining the top issues raised in the consultation and inviting her to meet with relevant Ministers on these issues.

• The draft consultation report is almost finalised and will be sent round for checking by the end of March.

• It now seems likely that Harriet Harman will make a statement on her priorities in June. In light of this the WNC is considering the best time to launch the report.

Migration and Asylum Working Group Update

The last meeting of the Migration & Asylum Sub Group was held on January 23rd 2008 where the Group welcomed Sabin Malik as the new Chair of the Group.

David Howarth, an official from the Lord Goldsmith's Citizenship Review, gave an overview of the review to date and sought input from the group on a number of key concerns that have so far been flagged up by the Review.

Eleonore Kofman gave an update of the newly implemented Points Based System, a 5-tier pathway to migration, replacing the old '80 routes to migration' system and highlighted the gender concerns of this new system.

The Group agreed to contribute to a number of consultations currently being held by the Bail and Immigration Agency that have particular implications for women.

Sabin lead a discussion on the Group's Workplan for 2008. It was decided that the key issues of trafficking for forced labour and the lack of awareness of migration and asylum issues, particularly amongst service providers, would form the cornerstones of the Group's Workplan for 2008.

The next meeting of the Group will be held on 22nd April 2008.

Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW)

Background:

In May 2007, the Government Equalities Office (formerly the Women and Equality Unit) presented the UK Government's 6th Periodic report to the Committee of the United Nations `Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women' (CEDAW). The UK will be examined on this report at the 41st CEDAW Session which takes place in New York from 30 June - 18 July 2008.

CEDAW is a powerful tool that serves the purpose of articulating, advocating, and monitoring women's human rights. The Convention's enforcement is monitored through a reporting system mechanism used to keep an eye on government accountability within the respective country and at the United Nations. The government report is an analysis of their efforts to comply with the Convention. However, their assessments are sometimes incomplete with a tendency to minimise problems and maximise accomplishments. As a result, the CEDAW Committee, recognising the need for an independent, objective assessment, implemented a system of `shadow' reports so that national and international focus can be brought to the most prominent concerns women have. These reports are examined alongside the official country reports by the CEDAW committee.

Update:

The WNC has been working tirelessly since early 2007 to produce a comprehensive UK Shadow Report which covers all areas of discrimination against women and acts as a very useful lobbying document for women in the UK. As part of this process, the draft document has been circulated to WNC partners for input and comments a number of times, with the final deadline for partner input closing on the 14 January 2008. The WNC is now working to include all partner input and to refine and edit this vastly informative document, in time for the final submission to the United Nations on 14 April 2008. The WNC will be sending a number of representatives to New York for the official examination in July, where they will both observe the proceedings of the examination and have a chance to put forward verbal contributions to supplement the information provided in the Shadow report.

The WNC will be sending the final version of the CEDAW Shadow Report to commissioners for the final sign off around the end of March/beginning of April. Due to time constraints, we will be allocating only a short timescale of a maximum of 2 weeks for commissioners to look over and sign off on the report.

CSW 52 - Update for Board Meeting 19 March 2008

The 52nd session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) took place from 25 February - 7 March 2008 at the United Nations in New York.

The lead theme of CSW 52, was

`Financing for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women'

Each year, CSW also has a review theme, which this year was

`Women's equal participation in conflict prevention, management and conflict resolution and in post-conflict peace-building'

The UN also decided to adopt an emerging theme, which this year, this was `gender perspectives on climate change'.

Prior to the start of CSW 52, the WNC jointly-hosted a pre-CSW meeting, which was chaired by Baroness Joyce Gould. The meeting took place on 13 February 2008 at the House of Lords and was aimed at encouraging discussion and dialogue between members of the UK delegation for CSW52, and UK NGOs. These meetings prove particularly useful to those NGO representatives planning to attend CSW for the first time, so that they can learn about the CSW process, the role of WNC and the UK Delegation, as well as meet other more experienced NGO representatives who offer to share their experience with them.

The panel this year consisted of newly appointed Head of Gender Equality Policy at the Government Equalities Office (GEO) and head of the UK Government delegation, Ann Keeling. Barbara Collins from GEO, Alison Kennedy from the Department for International Development (DfID), Victoria Challacombe and Tony Hennessey from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO), Oliver Entwistle from Her Majesty's Treasury (HMT) and representing the NGO sector, was Janet Veitch from the Women's Budget Group (WBG) and Zarin Hainsworth, newly appointed Chair of the United Nations Development Fund for Women UK (UNIFEM). The discussion was useful once again, and the brief presentations from Janet and Zarin proved particularly informative.

At CSW 52, where WNC was represented by Joyce Gould and Daniel Barrow for the first week, we learned that there was greater world-wide NGO representation than in previous years, and greater numbers of UK NGOs, totalling 47.

The WNC's aim at CSW, is to be a focus for those NGOs attending CSW, to be a link to the UK Delegation, providing information both UK NGOs and to the Delegation; and to help facilitate morning and evening meetings of UK NGOs, to share information and experiences.

NGOs also offer to help official Delegation representatives, when difficulty in agreeing text occurs, whether at EU level, or at world-wide level.

The WNC looks to hold a side event at CSW each year and this year, we co-hosted a side-event with the UK Women's Budget Group. Titled `An Economy for Equality', it focused on the lead theme of gender budgeting, and took place on Thursday 28 February. The form of the event was a panel-led discussion, chaired by Joyce Gould, and involved experts on gender budgeting. They were:

Diane Elson - University of Essex and Member of the UN Taskforce on Millennium Development Goals, who gave an overview on gender budgeting, including the budget cycle, useful points of entry for discussions, evaluation and audit.

Janet Veitch - Ex WNC Director and co-Chair of the Women's Budget Group (WBG), who talked about the work of the group in conjunction with HM Treasury and included how the UK WBG operated in relation to HMT, describing its approaches and success so far.

Lucia Perez Fragoso - Equidad de Genero (Gender Equity, Mexico) who talked about her role working with the Mexican Government and how political commitment of the Mayor of Mexico City has had an impact on practices across the city.

The event was a great success with positive feedback on the speakers, who complimented each other well. In particular, it was felt that contributors made what is a complex and sometimes impenetrable issue, easier to understand.

The WNC also supported and promoted side events held by other UK NGOs, at CSW 52. On Wednesday 27 February, Joyce Gould chaired an event hosted by the National Council of Women, titled `The Effects of War on Women and Children', and involved experts from around the world. Also, Joyce Gould chaired another event on Friday 29 February, which was organised Women Against Fundamentalism and for Equality (WAFE), and which focused on the emerging theme of the environment.

At time of producing this note, the full outcomes from the formal negotiations of CSW 52, are still to be confirmed.

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