Lots has happened to us since the start of the pandemic, including our eviction from the building we’ve called home for the past seven years. At the moment we support 485 women and their children. Many face gender-based violence and harmful cultural practices like female genital mutilation (FGM), as well as poor health, low self-esteem, and poor communication skills. Most face racism and discrimination on a daily basis.
Women from different cultures often find it hard to access the services available to them. If they do know of these services, they don’t tend to trust them because of previous unfair treatment. As a result, they keep themselves to themselves and start living in a silent world. They don’t express their suffering and so live with these issues that then affect their entire life.
Some of the women have been abused by people who don’t understand their culture. They’re considered different by society, so it’s hard for them to be acceptable in the society. They need their own black and ethnic minority organisation where they can be understood properly. That’s what we’ve been trying to do. We’ve listened and helped them with limited funding since we started in 2012. We run free ESOL with life skills classes, sewing and cooking, employability (CV writing, job search skills, interview skills) confidence-building, one-to-one and group support, human rights awareness sessions, and yoga and Zumba. We also guide women in areas in sexual health and poor hygiene.
Before the pandemic, we’d fill double-decker buses taking women on trips to the seaside. Together, we talk about their problems and share their anxieties in a safe space. They’d always go home happy and smiling. The pandemic has worsened the living situations of most of the women and children we work with. We’ve become more of a lifeline than ever because we give women a space to heal from their experiences surrounded by others who understand.
That’s why specialist services for BAME women are so vital. Mainstream organisations can’t always offer the culturally appropriate support these women need, so their needs often go unmet.
Since we were evicted at the end of October, we’ve been campaigning to put pressure on Hull City Council to help us find a permanent safe space. Without one, we will struggle to continue operating. The council still isn’t listening to our needs and we don’t know where to turn. There are plenty of disused buildings in the area, yet they’re asking we pay £15,000 to stay for a year in a disused building. The BBC also came to report on the situation and highlighted that the council has no strategy to support BAME women in Hull. Other media such as Hull Daily Mail and BBC Humberside Radio also highlighted the importance of our organisation as a lifeline service for BAME women.
It feels like no-one in Hull wants to help us. We’ve always been ignored because people think the women we help ‘don’t have any problems’, that they’re all on benefits and living happily and independently. This couldn’t be further from the truth. Women face issues including overcrowded housing, antisocial behaviour, children being abused inside and outside of school, environmental health issues, immigration issues and more.
Women we support are often not allowed to go out without permission from a male household member, who usually also controls the family income. At every stage of her life, she has been given the impression that she’s of no use and knows nothing. So she completely loses her confidence and becomes invisible in mainstream society. Some women build enough confidence to get a job in the labor market. But then they often experience bullying and harassment on a daily basis, so they find it hard to maintain the job.
“According to one of our Somalian clients; when the job centre sends us to workplaces, as soon they see our faces, they tell us to go. They say ‘we don’t need anyone for work.’”
Another significant issue that women come to us for help with is the effects of FGM. Its impact on their mental and physical health is huge. FGM is a cultural belief around controlling and regulating female sexuality. It leads to issues with women’s health, such as urine infections, painful sexual intercourse, fertility issues and having painful periods. Hull Sisters is the only place in Hull where women can come to discuss these problems as it is taboo in their religions.
It’s vital women have this space to discuss sexual health away from male relatives. In an interview with Hull Live, our clinical psychologist summed it up well when she explained how the men in the families “won’t let [women] go if they know we are teaching them they have power over their own bodies – they would abandon them. These men have been taught that they have control over their women’s sexuality.”
“They are passing this mental health to their children, so now we’re trying to educate them that no, this is not right – you have rights and you have power, you are the boss of your body. We want to change this for the next generation.”
Hull Sisters is a non-profit organisation dedicated to supporting Black and minority ethnic women who are dealing with human rights issues – including violence and abuse, racism and discrimination, immigration, FGM, trafficking, low skill, poor communication, poverty and poor health.
Follow Hull Sisters on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, and donate to their GoFundMe to help them get a new building.