Why Including Women in UK Policy Making about Violence Against Women and Girls is Key to Accelerate Action in 2025
Each year government, police, statutory services and companies in the private sector use International Women’s Day (8th March) to highlight their commitments to women. As a feminist and researcher, I find IWD challenging. I want to encourage change towards gender equality, but am wary of pink washing where organisations trumpet their celebrations of women but share less information on how change is being actioned.
The current government has pledged to halve violence against women and girls (VAWG) in the next decade while police in England and Wales have created action plans to build women’s trust and confidence in their services. While these promises are encouraging, our data shows there is a long road to travel for women to believe this change will occur.
International Women's Day is a call to action for policy makers and program designers, but also an opportunity for brands to advertise discounts and sales tactics targeting women.
This recent polling found that 67% of women are not confident in the UK government to tackle VAWG in Britain today, 11 percentage points higher than men. This lack of confidence is not limited to politics – only 31% of women feel confident in their local police force to tackle VAWG, well below their male counterparts (with 46% percent confident).
This begs the question of why there is such a yawning gap between what government and police are pledging, and the continued concerns of women in the UK. For starters- the data shows that there has been no change in perceived safety of women: 44% of women are worried about being a victim of a crime, equal with their views last year. While that might feel surprising, when we consider that 1 in 12 UK women are victims of gender-based violence each year, and that there is no concrete evidence to suggest that outcomes for victims are improving, the lack of trust and continued concern feels understandable.
Where do we go from here? Consider the promises that police and government have made this year. The National Police Chiefs’ Council will create a National Centre for VAWG and Public Protection and the UK government will publish their violence against women and girls (VAWG) strategy this summer. Our research shows that including women and girls in these discussions is key as women don’t currently feel heard – more than half of UK women (55%) say they don’t trust police to listen to the views of the public. If the goal of International Women’s Day 2025 is to #accelerateaction, we need to repair the broken trust that women have in government and police tackle to violence against women and girls. If UK policy makers and programme designers want to change the statistics that show women don’t feel heard, then they need to create a seat at the table for women to help turn commitments into change.
