Woman's Place UK

Violence against women and sex discrimination still exist. Women need reserved places, separate spaces and distinct services.

WEBINAR: A Woman’s Place UK is fighting for a woman’s right to choose

Webinar

6th July 2023

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An open letter to Edinburgh University

We welcome Professor Peter Mathieson's recent statement in response to the concerning events that...

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An open letter to Edinburgh University

WPUK Mythbusters – A response to the IRR and others

There have been several articles and comments published recently, including one by the Institute...

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The Political Erasure of Sex

We are delighted to be supporting this important new work by Jane Clare Jones....

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Our manifesto

Woman’s Place UK is a group of women from a range of backgrounds who are united by our belief that women’s hard-won rights must be defended.

Women face entrenched and endemic structural inequality. This is reflected, for example, in the high levels of sexual harassment and violence against women and girls, the 'gender' pay gap, and discrimination at work.

This is why sex is a protected characteristic in the Equality Act 2010. We believe it must be defended.

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Vulnerable women, crisis pregnancies and the criminal justice system. We invite you to join the conversation with Dr Emma Milne, expert and campaigner on women's reproductive rights, and Dr Shonagh Dillon. At Woman's Place UK, we believe that The Offences Against the Person Act 1861 must be reformed: -Sections 58 and 59 of the Offences Against the Person Act 1861 are repealed to remove abortion from the criminal law. -Section 60 of the Offences Against the Person Act 1861 is repealed to remove the offence of concealment of birth. Allowing women and girl's bodies to be subject to outdated and restrictive laws places unnecessary and harmful barriers to accessing safe and timely healthcare. This webinar will ask some big questions. Why are women's reproductive functions and our reproductive rights subject to criminal law? What does it mean for our current and future abortion rights? Why is 'concealment of a pregnancy' a criminal offence and what does this mean for the most vulnerable women? What is a 'crisis pregnancy'? What is foetal protectionism? Dr Emma Milne is Associate Professor in Criminal Law and Criminal Justice at Durham University. Her research focuses on criminal law and criminal justice responses to infant killing and foetal harm. The wider context of Emma’s work is social controls and regulations of all women, notably in relation to pregnancy, sex, and motherhood. Find out more about Emma’s research and receive updates about the campaign to change the law. Read her book, 'Criminal Justice Responses to Maternal Filicide: Judging the Failed Mother'. Dr Shonagh Dillon is the CEO at Aurora New Dawn, a domestic abuse, sexual violence and stalking charity supporting victim/survivors. Shonagh has worked in the male violence against women movement for nearly 3 decades. A Director of Woman's Place UK. She writes for The Critic. Woman's Place UK have organised 31 public meetings, 11 webinars and two conferences. These events have been hugely popular with over 15,000 tickets booked. We were winner of the Emma Humphreys Memorial Award 2018. Kiri Tunks, one of our founders, has been awarded the NEU’s Annie Higdon Award. Take action Please support the BPAS campaign & email your MP to ask them to support legal reform NOW #TimeToAct #WPUKReproductiveRights #CrisisPregnancies We need to talk about a small but incredibly vulnerable group of women who are prosecuted and imprisoned under archaic criminal offences such as concealment of birth and procuring a miscarriage. Research by Dr Emma Milne demonstrates these women experience "crisis pregnancies" and are living in cycles of violence and abuse with limited social support. Some experienced multiple pregnancies where they were unable to recognise and/or accept that they were pregnant and so seek medical care. In Britain, criminal law stops women having a right to abortion and abortion at any stage of gestation is illegal if not conducted in limited circumstances. Cases resulting in the criminalisation of women illustrate a drive toward foetal protectionism, and use of the criminal law to punish pregnant women who fail to act within the narrow confines of societal expectation.
Chair: Lucy Masoud is a barrister, feminist campaigner, a former firefighter and a Director of Woman’s Place UK. As a firefighter Lucy campaigned against mixed sex changing rooms on fire stations, and was also heavily involved in the fight for justice for the survivors of the Grenfell Tower fire. Lucy is currently a family barrister who specialises in representing female victims of domestic violence. @luluchops1<br /><br />'Today is 3yrs since the The Labour Women's Declaration's #ExpelMe Rally here at Maxilla. A rally held as a response to senior Labour MPs signing a pledge threatening to expel any members who supported Woman's Place UK or LGBAlliance'.<br /><br />Woman’s Place UK is the winner of the Emma Humphreys Memorial Group Prize 2018. WPUK is a grassroots feminist campaign, formed by a group of women in the labour and trade union movement to uphold women’s sex-based rights under the Equality Act 2010. @Womans_Place_UK
'On my desk was a suffragette ribbon, wrapped up like a wrist band, and this woman whispered to me, 'keep going, we see & we hear & we are behind you'. Onjali Rauf MBE is a best-selling British author and the founder of the NGO Making Herstory a womens’ rights organisation tackling the abuse and trafficking of women. She is a Sunday Times bestselling children’s author. In 2018, she published her first children’s book, The Boy at the Back of the Class which went on to win the Waterstones and Blue Peter Book Awards, and in 2019, published The Star Outside My Window, a story highlighting the impact of domestic violence upon children. @OnjaliRauf