It came as a bit of a shock at our recent Fawcett group meeting when we realised that we hadn’t had a face to face meeting for two years. Several new members, a few large cats and one or two inquisitive toddlers have all joined us on screen during our Zoom sessions, where we’ve admired hairstyles, woolly jumpers, coffee mugs and levels of dexterity with the chat button. But now, the possibility of meeting full sized human beings again is a real treat to look forward to. However, as we make our plans to move back into the three dimensional world, it’s quite satisfying to see how much we’ve managed to achieve through those fuzzy screens and ‘you’re on mute’ moments. Obstacles, including serious illness, home schooling, house moves, massive workloads and dodgy internet connections, have all conspired to get in our way, but persistence and bloody-mindedness have paid off. Here’s a quick roundup of our actions last year. In March, fuelled by optimism and nervous energy, but calmly steered b...

Women's Health Strategy: Call for Evidence The vision for the Women’s Health Strategy is improving the health and wellbeing of women and girls in England. There is strong evidence for a greater focus on women’s health. Do you have individual experience of or professional expertise in women’s health? If so, your contribution to this call for evidence would be very welcome. Your submission, which must not exceed 10 pages, can include personal experiences, data, research, and reports. Views on six core themes which connect different areas of women’s health over their lifetime are sought. The deadline is 11:45pm on 13 June 2021. 1 Women’s voices Are we heard? Are our concerns listened to effectively? Are we treated without regard to gender differences in body size, hormones, life stages? Have your say! 2 Information and education on women’s health How aware are we and health practitioners of conditions that affect women, and the way in which we live our lives, be we homel...

A preface, written in sadness and anger.   The following blog was written to celebrate the success of the mini-festival of March 7 th , when women’s voices came together in a day of activities and a sense of hope. Since then, the appalling events surrounding the disappearance and death of Sarah Everard have begun to emerge. The police response to protesters has been badly mishandled, and calls to change the law are getting louder and louder. Our earlier optimism is being replaced with a grim determination. The growing partnership*(Voices of WomenMK) has a crucial part to play in calling for change. The festival has showed us what women can achieve quickly and effectively when we work together. That collaboration is more important than ever. We are planning our next meeting for March 25 th – see below. Join us. Voices of Women MK: Springing into Partnership! Yes, we did it! The VOWMK mini-festival of March 7 th zoomed onto screens at 1.30 on Sunday afternoon, and zoomed aw...

The newly formed Women’s Partnership of Milton Keynes* is inviting you to join us on Sunday 7 March for a lively mini-festival. We are putting on a stimulating and entertaining afternoon where the entire focus will be on championing women’s voices. Our patchwork of FREE online events is a perfect introduction to the globally celebrated International Women's Day on March 8th. So let us get things started on Sunday 7th March with an array of panel discussions with local artists and activists, films focused on women, topical talks from NHS workers and other professionals, activities from crafts to yoga, podcasts to accompany you on an energising walk, and spaces to simply relax and enjoy yourself. We even have a special story for children being read by a local author, perfect for a Sunday afternoon. Please click on the link for more information about the programme and how to register. We will be recording the afternoon sessions and you will be able to watch the sessions on  You...

Towards International Women’s Day. ‘Marching openly, with smiles …….’ Russia. The end of January 2021. On the news we see Anastasia Vasilyeva defiantly playing Beethoven on her piano as the police come to arrest her for supporting the opposition. Later, on a video post she says, ‘We are marching openly, with smiles. We will not be intimidated.’ Ten days earlier, in Washington at the presidential inauguration, the world watches as Amanda Gorman, 22 years old, raises her arms, smiles, and reads her inauguration poem.  ‘We will not be turned around or interrupted by intimidation’ says the ‘skinny Black girl……who can dream of becoming president, only to find herself reciting for one.’ Calm, resolute, brave young women standing up at the beginning of another uncertain year can surely give us cause for hope and optimism. And when we look back at 2020, we see wave upon wave of other resilient women, hundreds and thousands of them, public and private individuals, finding solutions, n...

After a year’s hard work, we were proud to announce the release last month of our second MK Fawcett Discussion Paper of 2020 entitled ‘Women’s participation in local politics’. The project began over a year ago with the observation of three meetings in the MK Council chamber - the last being in January 2020, just before the lockdown saw all Council meetings transferred online. We wanted to see whether women had an equal opportunity to participate in Council discussion and, if not, why not. This in turn prompted us to seek out all the information we could find on how women came to get elected as councillors in the first place, as well as the roles they were appointed to on Council committees. We quickly realised that we couldn’t get a full picture of the decision-making processes that underly all these outcomes without consulting all the different kinds of people involved at different stages, whether Council officers, councillors or local party members. We made sure that all the key p...

Gender equality in Milton Keynes? We think it’s time to turn up the volume on the conversation, promote the issues and work for system change. We thought you might like to hear about a new partnership approach. Women’s groups in Milton Keynes have been increasingly concerned about the fragile and fragmented nature of available support for specialist services.  The pandemic has now impacted heavily on all women, highlighting disadvantage and exclusion and putting those at risk of violence in even greater danger. A strong infrastructure is needed to provide a safety net where no one is lost. Back in January 2020, several women’s groups worked in partnership at a conference which included survivors of assault and abuse. We heard accounts of women being passed across different services and of being immersed in a male dominated justice system. The need for an infrastructure was clear, and following on from the conference a working group, facilitated by Community Action:MK, has beg...