International Women’s Day

Baroness O'Loan Excerpts

Thursday 7th March 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness O'Loan]

My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, for her introduction to this debate on International Women’s Day. I also pay tribute to the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Coventry for his fine maiden speech and look forward to the erudition, eloquence and compassion that he will bring to debates in this Chamber.

The UN theme for International Women’s Day is, “A promise is a promise: time for action to end violence against women”. Women come to their experience of violence through many routes. Predominantly, they will be victims, either of domestic or war-zone violence. In places such as Northern Ireland, where the Troubles have dominated our lives for so long, that still takes a toll on those who suffered: on the relatives of the dead, the maimed and the families of the disappeared. There will also be those women who decide to take an active part in conflict as combatants: up to 40% of some groups are female. Those women combatants may ultimately be peacemakers. No matter what role they play or position they hold in relation to the conflict, the range of potential effects of violence is similar. It is important to acknowledge that, to acknowledge that violence has so many facets, and to identify what must be done to address them.

I want to address some of those facets. First, there is physical and sexual abuse, and the lack of mechanisms, structures and the necessary determination to prosecute such crimes. Reparations for rape, real property theft and lost educational opportunities when children are taken for camp slaves have to be dealt with quickly and effectively. In many conflicts, the warlords openly acknowledge that they will rape whole villages as a clear statement of the threat that they represent and to force people into compliance. We have seen the abduction of children from their families to be used as child soldiers, including girls. In some conflicts, tens of thousands—some 50% of all child soldiers—are girls. We probably all know the pressures to which children are subject in organisations such as the Lord’s Resistance Army: pressures to murder members of their family and each other as the combatants seek to take total control of them. We have seen the abduction of women and girls to be used as camp slaves.

Each state has a responsibility—as does the international community—to put an end to impunity and to prosecute those responsible for such crimes. That does not happen very often. The consequential exposure to sexually transmitted infection and trauma-related illness give rise to huge medical and PTSD treatment needs That can have an enormous impact on people’s ability to deal with the ordinary challenges of life. They will have higher levels of mental and physical illness, injury and suicide. That is what we have experienced in Northern Ireland.

Displacement from and the loss of their homes is a major problem. These women often end up in IDP and refugee camps for years. Even when the conflict has been resolved to the extent that it is possible for them to go home, they may be reluctant to do so even where there is funding available for them because they have access to health services, education and maybe some protection and security. It has often seemed so terrible yet so understandable to me that they can prefer living in UNHCR tents for years, without electricity or running water, to going home where the impact of the destruction of a local community in terms of unsettled scores, suspicion and resentment may linger for years and where people see the perpetrators of violence walking the streets and even in government, occupying influential and highly paid jobs.

That is part of the price of peace. It can be very hard for those who still seek reparations and the recovery of the disappeared. In Northern Ireland we still have seven families grieving people who were abducted and murdered, and whose bodies lie in unmarked graves that may never be found. For each family this is a daily agony as it remembers the young man or boy who went out one day and never came back.

In conflicted societies one of the biggest barriers to equality for women is often the existence of traditional laws and justice procedures. Women are often not allowed to own property. That will have to change and be a priority in each conflict zone. Where huge numbers of men have died the widows and children risk homelessness and destitution unless change is made. Returning combatants, often traumatised themselves, often bring higher levels of domestic violence.

Issues around demobilisation, decommissioning and resettlement must be dealt with. Women have to fight for their share of funds, as money is normally paid principally to men, who have had front-line posts, leaving a disproportionate amount of the very scarce funds that are available in the hands of men only. There is also the new phenomenon of the vulnerability of some women to fundamentalism and the honour that is perceived as coming to families when one of their number becomes a suicide bomber.

Loss of the opportunity to be educated, because of war, because teachers go to war, or because it is not safe to go to school, impacts on women’s ability to participate in society at all levels. Often they cannot drive, even where motorbikes are about. That means that their capacity to engage in commercial initiatives is limited. Women need, above all, security so that they can access water, food and fuel. In countries where there has been conflict and in others where there is great poverty women will suffer not only violence but all the problems associated with the daily trek for water and fuel, and with the grind to grow food. In those circumstances men may resist attempts to bring water to the community, because their women will then have free time which they may not use as the men would wish.

In times of violence there is also difficulty for women in accessing health and other services, because of costs of travel, time, and the fear and insecurity around travel. Often there is no hospital because of a war, or they cannot afford the fare, they have no access to transport and they are afraid. When you are about to have a baby this can be a time of great need. I lived in Kenya when I was expecting my third child. The rains were coming. It was a 40-kilometre drive up a dirt road to the nearest mission hospital that had no electricity or running water. Yet we knew that we had to go before the rains came. I had that option. The other women in the community did not, because they had no access to a car.

The international community must urgently address the needs of the “UN babies”, born as a consequence of a relationship, prostitution or rape involving UN personnel. These babies may be rejected by their fathers and the societies in which their mothers live simply because they are visibly of a race different from the community in which they live.

These things will involve not just policy change, and planning, training and development, but also changing the hearts and minds of many of those who were the perpetrators of violence and who have lived often for years in abnormal circumstances. There will inevitably be unsettled scores, old hatreds, and a desire for punishment and vengeance that may well have the capacity to destroy an embryonic state. Old combatants will have to come to terms with living at peace with each other. It will take time and energy. Many women have great skills that can be utilised for the benefit of an emerging nation in those matters that require mediation, such as prisoner release, disarmament, resettlement and reintegration.

Gender-responsive policy-making can be life-changing. Gender-responsive changes in the mandates, practices and cultures of states and international institutions are occurring. On International Women’s Day we applaud the courage and determination of women who have emerged to take their rightful place in local and national politics across the world. We meet many of them at Westminster as they travel here to learn more of our practices and procedures, and to be affirmed and encouraged in their role as parliamentarians in situations infinitely more complex and dangerous than those in which we operate. Those women will bring the gender perspective to the debates and law-making of those assemblies, so that each society and state can function to maximum effect, benefiting from the talents of all its members.