International Women�s Day

Leigh Ingham Excerpts

Thursday 6th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Leigh Ingham (Stafford) (Lab)]

I also thank my hon. Friend the Member for Brent East (Dawn Butler), who is an incredible activist for women. I cannot express what an honour it is to speak in today�s debate. My number is 567, and it is the honour of my life to have it.

This year�s theme, �Accelerate Action�, could not be more relevant. My constituency of Stafford, Eccleshall and the villages has a proud history of women taking action against misogyny and inequality, and today I want to honour that legacy while also shining a light on the challenges we still face. One of the most remarkable women from Stafford�s history is Alice Hawkins, a suffragette who worked in the Stafford shoe industry before moving to Leicester, where she became a key figure in the fight for women�s right to vote. Alice lived on Red Lion Street, and her activism reminds us that change happens when ordinary working-class women take extraordinary action. We owe it to Alice and the generations before us to continue that fight for equality today.

However, while there is much to be proud of, there are also areas in which we must act with urgency. The statistics on violence against women and girls are shocking �women are three times more likely to be killed by a partner than by not wearing a seatbelt. That is the reality we are dealing with, and in Staffordshire, the situation is dire. In the past five years, Staffordshire Women�s Aid, which is based in my constituency, has seen a 361% increase in referrals to its sexual violence services and an 851% increase in referrals to its specialist counselling services. Despite working in the women and girls sector for years, when I heard those figures, I was devastated. Violence against women and girls is happening in every corner of this country, and I firmly believe that it is a national emergency.

In my own casework, I continue to see women, many with children, who are forced to flee their homes and start over again because of domestic abuse. Time and again, it is the women and children who have to uproot their lives, while the perpetrators face far fewer consequences. When I stood for election last year, I was so proud to be a member of a party that has promised to halve violence against women and girls in the next decade, but we must go further. I thank the Minister, who notified me in advance that she will later be referring to my constituent, Rebecca Simkin, who was murdered in July last year. I will be following the debate closely, and I express how grateful I am to the Minister, both as a Member of Parliament and as a woman, for her tireless work in this space. Speaking as someone from this space, she is a very inspiring woman.

Whether it is Alice Hawkins�s fight for the vote or women in my constituency striving for equality today, our mission remains the same: to build a society where women can live free from fear and reach their full potential.