CALLING OUR ALLIANCE – OUR MEMBERS AND YOUR MEMBERS, YOUR FRIENDS AND RELATIONS
NAWO needs your help! Women’s Rights are
being disregarded and undermined in many parts of the world. Here in the UK women are suffering disproportionately from the
cuts and we need to protect yet again our right to reproductive choice and health. NAWO seeks to provide an essential Collective
Voice.
We know you are being inundated with requests for help and that things are tight but we hope you will be
able to respond to this appeal. PLEASE send us as much as you can (every little helps)!
We urgently require a fully
functioning web site and we also need job security for our co-ordinator without whom we could not run an office nor manage
a team of great interns. In other words, without these two vital resources, we would be a great deal less effective than you
need us to be and than we seek to be. Indeed current research published by the WRC and reported below demonstrates the considerable
return on investment made by women’s organisations to women’s well-being while also benefitting the state.
As you know, for the past year we have been trying to re-design our website. Unfortunately, due to lack of funding,
we have been unable to complete the process despite much voluntary input. Having a good website is crucial to the development
and exposure of NAWO and if we are to meet the needs of our members working for women’s human rights, and to continue
our presence, it is imperative that our social media tools reflect what we are doing and help us to develop in the future.
We very much appreciate how hard it is for everyone right now in the
current climate, but it is at times like these that a collective voice is so important. We look to our Alliance to help with
this issue and ask you all to donate both to the development of the website and to our costs, with as little or as much as
you can give. Our target is £1000 for the web site and another £10,000 towards our coordinator. With the help
of you who are our Alliance, we surely can achieve this and look forward to reaching the first £1,000!
Any amount of money, no matter how modest, makes a difference to our
work. We will be running other fund-raising events in the New Year and of course seeking grants. Meanwhile, If you can bring
in one new member – that doubles your income to us in one fell swoop and makes our collective voice more meaningful!
We offer a choice of easy ways to give:
· Paying by directly by bank
transfer: Account Number: 31457241 Sort Code: 40-22-26
· Sending a cheque to: NAWO @ WRC, Ground Floor East, 33 -41 Dallington Street, London EC1V 0BB
·
Or contacting us at admin@nawo.org.uk for details of other
ways to give
Please do keep NAWO going and respond as generously as you can.
Thank you so much
Annette (Lawson)
Chair
NAWO's
AGM and Rountable
At the invitation of Lord Beecham, 32 members organisations and individuals gathered
together in the House of Lords on the 8th September for our AGM, followed by a roundtable discussion titled ‘Strengthening
Women’s Voices in Parliament’.
After
the AGM and a welcome from Lord Beecham, Helene Reardon-Bond (GEO) started off the roundtable by discussing
the government’s current strategies for engaging with women and where they are now in relation to the consolation. She
reported that some women’s organisations were still sending in feedback which has been submitted to Ministers, with
the findings aiming to be published in the autumn.
NAWO’s partners were in
agreement that women wanted to know what the Government is doing. It was expressed to Helen Reardon- Bond that the government
is good at building platforms but not good at delivery and that with the abolition of WNC there is a need for a consortium
for women.
Liz Law (NIWEP) then presented the current
situation in relation to the inequalities that exist. Discussing economic insecurities and the lack of women in the decision-making
process and she compared this to the work she has undertaken in Timor Leste and Liberia, recommending models the UK could
adopt. In particular she presented the idea of gender budgeting thus mainstreaming positive action of gender equality by allocating
finance for women’s equality.
Vivienne Hayes (Chief Exec of the WRC) ended the discussion
reporting that the abolition of the WNC left a chasm. Expressing how crucial the women’s sector is she noted that the
expertise of women is however not recognised nor valued. Facing a triple analysis, Viv warned that we cannot be represented
by one woman- race, sexism, class, age must be included. Ending her discussion with a plea, Viv urged the women’s sector
to come together and present to the GEO women’s invaluable expertise– the women’s sector cannot rely on
1 woman.
A vibrant and energetic question and answer session followed after the
key note speakers who would have no doubt overrun if time had allowed.
NAWO would like
to thank our speakers, Vivienne Hayes, Liz Law, Helene Reardon-Bond and Lord Beecham, for providing us with such a vibrant
and lively discussion. A huge thank you to all who attended, thank you for making it such a fantastic and memorable day. We
hope to see you next year!
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For International Women’s Day, NAWO in collaboration
with Europe House are holding a FREE event 'A Women’s Place is Europe'
This event, which includes a strong line up of female speakers,
will discuss with an audience what Europe has done, is doing or should be doing to improve gender equality- particularly in
the work place and on the issue of equal pay - as we approach the 101st anniversary of International Women's Day.
For
more information click on the link below.
A Women's Place is Europe event flash
Launching the ‘August 12th Campaign’: The Anniversary of U.S Signing
of the 1949 Geneva Convention
NAWO are writing to President Obama to urge him to reaffirm United States support
for the Geneva Conventions. This campaign has been launched to demand that he removes blanket abortion prohibitions on US
humanitarian aid to girls and women raped in armed conflict.
We are doing this alongside the Global Justice Centre and a
consortium of over 3,000 legal, human rights, humanitarian, public health, and other organisations. The consortium represents
individuals from Africa, Europe, Latin America, Canada and the US.
Norway became the first country to formally
recomend the removal of the blanket abortion restrictions on 5th November, 2010, citing a Global Justice Centre report on
the Human Rights Council of the United Nations.
On 18th March,
2011, the US responded that it could not do so due to ‘currently applicable restrictions’. As a matter of law,
President Obama has the power and duty to act on this.
The letters to President Obama clearly communicate the global outrage over
the fact that the most vulnerable of war victims - girls and women impregnated by rape as a weapon of war - are being denied,
by the very organisation empowered to help them, the comprehensive and non-discriminate medical care required by international
law.
We
hope that President Obama’s response shows his commitment to US compliance with the Geneva Conventions and that he will
lift the abortion restrictions, thus ensuring that the U.S will not continue to magnify the suffering of girls and women raped
in conflict.
To get involved with the Global Justice Centre’s Campaign write your own letter to President Obama asking him
to issue an executive order lifting U.S. abortion restrictions on humanitarian aid for girls and women raped in armed conflict.
For more information on the campaign and details of what to include in the letter click here
To
read NAWO’s letter to President Obama click here
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NAWO @ WRC • Ground Floor East 33-41 Dallington Street • London, EC1V 0BB • phone: +44(0)207 324 3045• email: 