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Winners 2011
Individual Award: Ann Moulds
In March 2009, Ann Moulds waived her anonymity and spoke out publically about her terrible experience of being the victim of a long and horrendous stalking campaign. For over two and a half years, a sadistic sexual predator waged a campaign of terror on her life and everything she had worked hard for was slowly destroyed.
In order to gain a sense of safety, Ann was forced to relocate over 80 miles away. In doing so, she lost her business, her home, her friends and her family. Her case was classed as one of the worst recorded in Scottish History.
On 31st March 2009, Ann launched Action Scotland Against Stalking and spearheaded a media campaign to raise awareness of stalking to the general public and criminal justice agencies involved, to inform of the serious impact stalking has on its victims and to campaign for legislative change to recognise stalking as a crime in Scotland. Her efforts paid off and 13th of December 2010, stalking became a criminal offence in Scotland.
In her role to raise awareness of the crime, Ann is also developing training packages to be delivered to police officers and other criminal justice professionals how to address stalking from a criminal justice perspective, while providing an appropriate response and support for the victims involved.
In June 2011, Ann launched the UK’s first national Stalking Group. It is the first of its kind in the UK and is comprised of key representatives from government organisations and agencies across Scotland.
A remarkable woman, she has refused to let the years of threat and torment ruin her life. She is actively raising awareness of violence against women and her work has ensured that future victims of stalking will not suffer the same unawareness and lack of efficient response as she did.
Group Award: Smile, You're Beautiful (PEEK Project)
"Smile, You're beautiful" is a peer education group offered through the PEEK Project based in the East End of Glasgow. The peer education group is made up of three local young women who prioritised sexualisation, sexual exploitation and trafficking as the issues they wanted to educate other young women about. They completed confidence building sessions along with some skills training. They then identified other external agencies whom they could invite in to inform them about the issues. As a result of this, they developed and led peer education sessions to raise awareness of some areas of violence against women.
Smile You're Beautiful Facebook PageLin Groves Special Award: Leyla Hussein
Leyla underwent FGM (female genital mutilation) at the age of seven -- an act that changed her life -- and as an adult she has ceaselessly campaigned to ensure that other young girls do not suffer the same fate. She has spent the last nine years working and fighting for the right of girls and young women within the FGM practising communities, putting her life and family at risk with the mission to ensure girls are safe. Her motto is: "To save one girl".
International Award: The Feminist Dalit Organisation
The Feminist Dalit Organisation (FEDO) was established in 1994 by a group of Dalit (low caste) women in Nepal to fight caste and gender discrimination and build a fair and equal society. FEDO promotes the rights of Dalit women and works on issues including health and sanitation, food security, political empowerment and access to justice as well as working to end violence against women and girls across Nepal. Womankind is nominating FEDO for the Emma Humphreys Prize as we believe their participatory approach to ending violence against women and commitment to increasing community ownership of projects is impressive and effective. Their programmes provide Dalit women with the awareness and empowerment they need to improve their lives and the women themselves influence and inform FEDO’s strategy and create change at the grassroots level.
Other Nominees 2011
This is what their nominators had to say about the other 2011 nominees:
Individuals
Cath Elliott - Cath is a feminist campaigner, writer and trade unionist. Cath writes for Comment is Free and her own blog Too Much to Say for Myself where the focus is feminism and the endemic problem of violence against women. Cath has been instrumental in UNISON developing its policy on trafficking and prostitution; domestic violence and many other women’s issues. She is currently one of the vice chairs of UNISON national women’s committee. Cath has been a member of the Eastern Region Women's Committee for a number of years holding the Chairs position for six years. Cath is now also the secretary trustee of the new Rape Crisis service in Suffolk and in the summer of 2011 has undertaken accredited training in delivering sexual violence training for rape crisis..
Leigh Forster - Leigh Forster is a feminist activist who has campaigned tirelessly in the local community (South Bristol) to provide services for those affected by domestic violence. Alongside direct support she has worked to change attitudes to violence and abuse through direct community work and education. This has included addressing the ways in which violence and abuse impact on all groups in society. Going above and beyond her role as a manager for WISH, Leigh has succeeded in challenging barriers to effective service provision by providing services which are needed by local women and children within their communities.
Aisha Gill - Aisha Gill is an activist and researcher of considerable standing in the field of violence against women, with particular reference to black, minority ethnic and refugee (BMER) women. She works locally, nationally and internationally on these issues, including on forced marriage, FGM, sexual violence and 'honour'-based violence. She has an international and national reputation for supporting survivors of violence and for campaigning and producing activist research for BMER women. She is currently a Senior Research Fellow at Roehampton University and also an active member of a wide range of activist and campaigning women's groups across London and elsewhere. She is part of international networks and is currently working on 'honour'-based violence in London, Iraqi Kurdistan and India. All of her work stems from an activist base and a strong commitment to work together with survivors of violence, and is aimed towards combating violence against women.
Colleen McCrystal - Colleen McCrystal is a volunteer for The Haven Wolverhampton, a registered charity supporting women and children experiencing domestic violence. Colleen uses her own experiences of abuse to raise awareness of a crime which kills two women every week in the UK, through public speaking, radio broadcasts and awareness raising events.
Rebecca Mott - Rebecca is a tireless campaigner against the suffering of women in pornography and prostitution. She does this at enormous personal cost because as a survivor of prostitution and familial sexual abuse herself it means perpetual flashbacks and recurring trauma. This has never stopped Rebecca taking her campaign to the heart of enemy territory. She has put herself forward to events and spoken and participated in forums filled with people who deny the reality she has experienced and accuse her of lies, distortion and insanity. She does it on her own, full time, and in a way, through her writing and speaking, which powerfully affects everyone she meets.
Helen Roytoff - Helen Roytoff, author of She Opened her Mouth But the Scream Was Silent was raped at knifepoint in her twenties. Despite being able to identify her rapist to the police, he was never prosecuted for her rape. 20 years later she was informed by the police that he was about to be tried for a series of brutal killings. She attended court and bore witness to the stories of the women who did not survive. Although Helen had spent much of the last 20 years dealing with the effects of the attack, attending the trial and bearing witness to the stories of those who did not survive forced her to accept that she was far from healed of her ordeal and indeed still suffering from PTSD. This led her to write her book, which deals with the causes, the effects and society’s attitudes to violence as well as her own path to healing.
Pippa Simpson - Many years ago, after experiencing horrific DV, Pippa came to our refuge. Until treatment, she suffered post traumatic stress. Nevertheless she became a volunteer, gravitated to a course on DV at college, and eventually became a member of the staff. She is an expert on immigration and housing issues and eventually she became a manager. Over the hard times of the past few years she had unfortunately been made redundant, not once, but three times. Each time she has turned up for work the next day and worked on despite the heavy toll it has taken on her finances. She was offered jobs but turned them down in loyalty to the women she knows need help.
Jo Wood - Jo Wood has been supporting women affected by sexual violence for many years. She has actively campaigned for more support for women and has written her own account of abuse that she was subjected to.
Organisations
Million Women Rise Coalition - The Million Women Rise (MWR) Coalition is a diverse group of individual women and women representatives from the Voluntary and Community Sector who are united by our outrage at the continued, daily, hourly, minute by minute individual and institutionalised male violence enacted against women worldwide. MWR's key activity is the organisation of an annual, women-only, march and rally against violence against women and in celebration of International Women's Day. MWR is unique as it highlights and promotes the involvement and activism of a wide diversity of women with a particular focus on Black women and is led by Black women. MWR believes that to end violence against women, a critical mass of a diversity of women is crucial, as are the international links formed with women's organisations and coalitions.
Open Clasp Theatre Company - The company exists to empower women, especially the most disempowered, in the North East of England and uses theatre and drama to do this. All of the company's projects have raised awareness and promoted positive change in relation to violence against women. Open Clasp works directly with female survivors of domestic and sexual violence, providing safe, accessible drama workshops which bring women together to support each other, value themselves and others and to inform touring productions which raise awareness and challenge attitudes of audiences throughout the North East and further afield.
SEEDS - I first came across SEEDS in 2010 when on a search for groups who demonstrate innovative ways that survivors work towards ending violence against women and girls. What I loved about SEEDS was the simplicity of their aim: to improve services by learning from survivors experiences. SEEDS members are involved in training, raising awareness, giving presentations, participating in consultation events and conducting research amongst survivors. A truly empowering way to ensure survivor's voices are heard in our sector!