There have been so many instances in the last three years when I have sat down compelled out of absolute rage to use my words to get some justice, to bring attention to wrongs and to beg for help. Tonight, on the eve of the Angiolini Review into the murder of Sarah Everard, I get to bring some attention to an organisation getting it right, Rosa for Women, a grant making foundation.
In the current economic climate, it is the small charities that Rosa supports that are fighting for funding and to continue operating. The Stand With Us fund is to future proof those organisations and help the women most underserved in society. For Sarah Everard, for Sabina Nessa, for Zara Aleena, for Bibaa and Nicole and for all those victims whose names we will never know; I will continue to serve with Rosa to deliver funds that save women’s lives. Please stand with me. Stand With Us and contribute to the Stand With Us fund.
This is an abridged version of how I learned about and became one of Rosa’s biggest fans. In 2021, because I ran an events agency and had a contacts book filled with female journalists from my time at Stylist Magazine, when Sarah Everard’s body was tragically found I tweeted to announce I would hold a vigil honouring her. I was quickly introduced to local women who were doing the same and on the Wednesday night March 10th, Reclaim These Streets was born. We planned to hold a moment of silence for Sarah and all women whose lives had been impacted by male violence against us on March 13th on Clapham Common.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/sarah-everard-reclaim-these-streets-b2033778.html
On March 11th, the Metropolitan Police informed us that we would be contravening the Public Health Act and that as organisers we would be fined £10,000 and prosecuted under the serious crimes act. Later on March 11th, we assembled a team of the best Human Rights legal advocates in the world (I am very biased) and crowdfunded £37,000 in forty five minutes to take the Met to the High Court for our human right to assemble.
We went to High Court on the 12th and continued to be threatened and despite the Judge’s instruction that the police needed to give us the parameters to hold the Sarah Everard Vigil and we had to follow them- whilst we were in negotiations with them, they sent out a press release saying our vigil would be illegal.
Because of the antagonistic actions of the Met, and the threats against us individually, we decided rather than pay what would be £320,000 in fines for the London vigil and 31 satellite vigils; we would rather pivot and raise that money for actual women and girls that suffered violence at the hands of men.
We would go on to raise £525,000 on the weekend of March 13th. We would also watch in horror as the women that assembled at the Clapham Bandstand to exercise their human right to protest were manhandled by officers at a protest about an officer murdering a young woman.
That Monday we were in shock and horrified at what had transpired on Saturday night and villianised by the Met. “Look what you made us do” was the rhetoric from officers that preceded me on the 70 interviews I did that weekend.
Our Reclaim These Streets team, most of which had never met in person because of covid restrictions had to figure out where the amazing amount of money that the public had donated should go to have the maximum impact on women’s lives. During the week after the vigil, women’s organisations that did frontline work kept telling us about Rosa. We met with Rebecca Gill and her team with a million questions— we had never had any intention of raising money, so needed tons of guidance on what happened next.
One of the stories we heard was about a weekly cooking class where refugee women were given the time and space to trust an organisation and share their stories of domestic violence. Stories that never would have been told if it was a refuge shelter that explicitly said it was to protect women from violence against men. That insight, that hands on knowledge of the organisations they work with and that passion for actually helping women convinced Reclaim These Streets that Rosa would be our partner.
Someone I met through Reclaim and hugely admire, Ludo Orlando, and I spent the next two years learning from leaders of the women’s sector from all over the country while we established the criteria for organisations to receive the grants and then ultimately being part of the larger team that actually distributed the funds. Rosa’s team answered thousands of questions, I for one, had never seen a grant application. But the assembled team had hundreds of years of running women’s organisations in the UK. They knew what to look for on running costs pages and we wanted to focus on future proofing organisations that might not exist without the fund.
It was a huge amount of work, but the day we (and the committee of female leaders from all over the UK) gave out £600,000 was one of the proudest days of my life. Rosa also ensured private donors paid the overhead costs to run the fund and distribute it so that every penny that the public donated the weekend of the vigil and the year after went to save women’s lives effected by male violence.
We did what we promised the weekend of the vigil. Side note: we ended up winning the judicial review of the Metropolitan Police’s handling of the vigil. They were found to have violated our human rights in their policing of the vigil.
Last summer, on Rosa’s 15th Birthday, I got to meet some of the organisations that benefited from your donations and hear first hand what a difference it made to their lives and the women they can help because of that money. I have been to a ton of fundraising events, but never before have I felt the ground and my heart swell when hearing some of the groups that Rosa supports speak.
Romy from Rape and Sexual Abuse Service Highland spoke about the vast area that they cover and showed me pictures of training taking place that day that will allow her team to provide accessible services. Dee from Fair Treatment for the Women of Wales, spoke about the group being for her as a woman with a disability and how they created policy change that will benefit all women in Wales for the next ten years. And heard stories, especially from a young woman who is a trustee and from Sister System who along with their leader Okela works with girls and young women in care to bridge the gap between their experience in care and ensure they have support and work with them to escape generational cycles of violence and economic dependency. They not only get their girls trained for employment purposes but those girls come back and mentor other young women in care and pull them up along side of other “sisters” in the organisation to thrive.
Every woman that spoke was not only an inspiration, but they are the embodiment of taking your situation, using every possible angle to survive and prosper despite the hurdles but then— not doing a victory lap. Instead, running back to care for, to support, to cheerlead and give their own time and money to champion the other women facing the same hardships.
When I tell you it was a beautiful night, I can’t even begin to describe how it felt to have a small part in the success and the celebration. I wrote this for you, but I am also writing it for me, to have it to read when the work feels too bleak.
Tonight, while I am waiting to read horrific details of the Angiolini Review and reflect on the murder that made me become an activist; I want to celebrate the other activists whose work is funded by Rosa.
To have it to remind myself of the success and how much more there is to do. Or how much my voice can help raise up other women, how many more women and men I can introduce to Rosa and how absolutely crucial the funding is for the organisations they help.
I have offered to help with media training or amplifying messages or anything else I can do to champion this phenomenal organisation led by phenomenal women— and the organisations that they work with. I am proud they count me among their own and so grateful that you, the public trusted us to make every penny count. To make sure that your donation mattered and will continue to matter.
If you can, please donate to Rosa. If you want more information, please get in touch, they are a hugely talented and diverse team. Thank you Rosa and thank you to the recipients of the grants that are doing the real work day in and day out. We live to fight another day for Sarah Everard. For Zara Aleena. For Bibba Henry and Nicole Smallman. For Sabina Nessa. For all of us and all of you who would benefit from a world with male violence against women eradicated, especially in the institutions that we are meant to trust when we are at our most vulnerable.