Day 2
Women's Resource Centre
Submitted by jill on Thu, 11/22/2007 - 15:19.
Women's Resource Centre supports women's organisations to be more effective and sustainable. We provide training, information, resources and one-to-one support on a range of organisational development issues. We also lobby decision makers on behalf of the women's not-for-profit sector for improved representation and funding.
Our member organisations work in a wide range of fields delivering services to, and campaigning on behalf of, some of the most marginalised communities of women. Within the women's sector, a significant proportion of organisations are working to stop violence against women.
In 2006, WRC launched the 'why women?' campaign to highlight the worsening funding crisis in the women's sector, resulting in many women's organisations closing or reducing their vital (and often lifesaving) services.
Women’s organisations are at risk, not because they are no longer needed, but because of the popular myth amongst decision makers and others that women now have equality. Despite the advances in equality for women, there is overwhelming evidence that there is still a long way to go. Women continue to face systematic inequality, disadvantage, discrimination and violence because of their gender.
The ‘why women?’ campaign is calling on the government to put gender back on the agenda and publicly recognise the essential services and expertise the women’s sector provides to address this. We are lobbying funders and decision makers on funding to women’s organisations, representation in decision making processes and the needs for ‘by women, for women-only’ services.
Working to stop violence against women and supporting survivors of men’s violence is integral to what many women’s organisations do. Despite the ongoing and clear need for this work, women’s organisations working in this field continue to be undervalued and under-resourced. As part of the ‘why women’ campaign, WRC is supporting two important violence against women campaigns – ‘The Crisis in Rape Crisis’ and the ‘No Recourse to Public Funds’ campaigns.
The ‘no recourse to public funds’ rule forces minority women without secure immigration status and who are subjected to domestic violence to make a stark choice – stay in the violence relationship or risk homelessness and dire poverty. Women’s refuges are often unable to accommodate women with no recourse to public funds because they cannot afford to lose out on rental income and do not have the funds to provide living costs.
We believe this policy is inhumane and untenable for the individual women involved. In addition, women’s refuges should not be put in the intolerable situation of having to choose between housing a woman with no recourse or the sustainability of their organisation. We are calling on the government to rethink its position and ensure that any woman, regardless of her immigration status, has the right to safety and protection from domestic violence.
To find out more about the ‘why women?’ campaign and what you can do to support it, visit www.whywomen.org.uk. For a copy of the DVD, email whywomen [at] wrc.org.uk and visit our Facebook page at www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2451312346.
As part of the 'why women?' campaign, we made a short (20 minute) film about women’s organisations and why they are needed.
Despite having no budget and no experience of making films, we begged and borrowed equipment, learnt on the job with the help of guides and the internet and called in favours from friends and friends of friends to help us create what has become a really important resource in the campaign. We interviewed survivors of violence talking about what their lives might have been like if it wasn’t for the support they received from women’s organisations and workers in women’s organisation talking about the day-to-day impacts caused by being acutely under-funded. It has enabled us to reach audiences currently not engaged with the campaign.
We also have a presence on Facebook – a medium increasingly used by women’s organisations and women activists to organise and mobilise.
In publicising and organising the ‘No Recourse to Public Funds’ Day of Action on 23 April 2008, ICTs – email, website, social networking sites – were critical to the success of the protest and public meeting.
In partnership with Rape Crisis (England and Wales), WRC produced an in-depth report on the state of the Rape Crisis sector in England and Wales. The number of Rape Crisis centres has almost halved since 1984 and the sector, en masse, is at crisis point. We are calling on the government to develop, with Rape Crisis (England and Wales), and implement a sustainable funding strategy for centres as a matter of urgency.
In March 2008, we launched ground breaking research on the state of the rape crisis sector. For the first time, we had a comprehensive picture on finances, staffing, service users and service provision across affiliated centres in England and Wales. Gathering the data, especially since it was so detailed, was an enormous task for both us and the centres we surveyed. Data from the centres was gathered using Survey Monkey – an online survey facility. We often use Survey Monkey – it’s quick to set up a survey, user friendly and cheap. However, for more complicated research, such as the Rape Crisis survey, it wasn’t able to meet all of our needs and when we exported the data to excel, there was considerable work in ‘cleaning up’ the information to make it usable. We are currently looking for an affordable survey package which can meet our needs.
For more information about all of these campaigns, and to download resources and reports, visit www.wrc.org.uk.
Women’s Resource Centre
Ground Floor East
33-41 Dallington Street
London EC1V 0BB
info [at] wrc.org.uk
020 7324 3030
