Women: Representation and Empowerment

Baroness Newlove Excerpts

Monday 7th March 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Newlove (Con)]

My Lords, I am privileged to speak in this debate today. I congratulate the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Gloucester and my noble friend Lady Mone, with whom I totally agree that my noble friend Lady Morris is a wonderful mentor and a dear friend. I am speaker number 21 out of 25, and a lot has been covered, but they are the only statistics I shall cite in my speech, so I will not take too long.

I start with a quotation. As Eleanor Roosevelt once said, “A woman is like a teabag: you can’t tell how strong she is until you put her in hot water”. I totally agree. We know that women are capable of many amazing things. They run businesses, homes and families. Not only have we had a female Prime Minister in the UK, there may be a female President of the United States of America during my lifetime. There has undoubtedly been progress regarding the empowerment and emancipation of women in the past 150 years. I congratulate the Minister on starting this debate, not just because of who she is, but because she is a Mancunian, like me.

Nevertheless, what concerns me is that too many women do not have a voice or have been excluded from much of what is good in our country simply because they have been a victim of crime, which has been covered a lot in the debate. I speak in my role as Victims’ Commissioner for England and Wales, where I have met many women who have been trafficked into this country to work as sexual and domestic slaves. With the dedicated support of the Salvation Army, I was humbled to see how some of these women had turned their lives around. Once they realised that they could open a door to step out, it was truly remarkable, because they had somewhere safe to stay and were able to walk down the street without being recaptured or beaten. These women threw themselves into education and training on offer to them. They wanted nothing more than to earn their own salary, to be safe and to support their families. They just wanted to be loved and respected.

I know that women do not lack skills and abilities, but many lack opportunities. The opportunity to participate in employment, voluntary work, education or some other goal in life is important to help many victims rebuild their lives after experiencing devastating harm and loss. I would include myself in this. Following the murder of my late husband Garry in 2007, and the ordeal of watching my three young daughters appear as witnesses at their father’s trial, I thought that I would never be able to get through another day. We had no income and, at one point, no home and almost no hope, but I had to think about my three daughters and their futures as young women. I had to find a way to provide for them financially, and I was so determined that they would grow up as happy, healthy young women, as their father wanted them to. So, as they say, you gain strength, courage and confidence by experience in which you really stop to stare straight in the face of fear.

In October 2010, I became the Government’s Champion for Active, Safer Communities. Anti-social behaviour has 2.3 million victims. It is a horrendous crime, and we should respect and support victims who go through it in their communities. I was then further honoured to work on a £1 million alcohol fund project to help 20 communities to tackle alcohol-fuelled anti-social behaviour successfully. In 2012, I became the Victims’ Commissioner for England and Wales.

I know that I was more fortunate than many other victims of crime. I have the support of my family, friends and of strangers, but I also suffered—and, sadly, still suffer today—criticism and abuse. If an ordinary woman like me, who is not from a privileged background or an academic genius can make a useful contribution to society, just think what other potential is being missed in those women and girls who do not have such an opportunity. It is one of the saddest parts of my job to see how the skills and abilities of women who have been victims of crime are so often underdeveloped or ignored, or usurped by the crime that they have suffered.

We know nowadays that many women—and men—have suffered years of physical, sexual and emotional abuse by those who should have protected them. I have met some of these victims, many of whom dropped out of school, entered into abusive relationships, turn to drugs and alcohol and, sadly, ended up in prison. They had a complex array of problems, and the services that they needed either were not there for them, could not cope with their sometimes challenging behaviour, or were available to them for only a relatively short time. We are learning so much about the nature and prevalence of child abuse, and the independent inquiry conducted by Justice Goddard is likely to give voice to even more.

What seems to be lacking, certainly for the women that I have met, is a long-term, suitably co-ordinated package of support. That means with employment, finances and accommodation as well as help to deal with the psychological, physical and emotional impact of a crime—it never leaves you, but you try to cope the best you can. Unless this support package can be put in place, women may have won the vote, but they will have lost their voice and the opportunity. Although I welcome International Women’s Day as a chance to celebrate the economic, cultural and political achievement of every woman in the world, I want us to ensure that we help all women to achieve their potential. So much has been achieved, but we must never allow ourselves to become complacent.

Suffrage for women in the UK was achieved a long time ago. Suffering, for women who are victims of crime, sadly, continues.