The Drive Partnership’s Post

To mark #BlackHistoryMonth 2024, we’re celebrating the non-stop work of changemakers from Black, African, Caribbean and Mixed Heritage communities within the domestic abuse sector. The theme for this this year is ‘Reclaiming Narratives’ - a matter of vital importance when it comes to the intersecting issues of racial discrimination and domestic abuse. Through the interview series, we discuss reclaiming and changing narratives with important work that aligns with the key asks of the Respect UK Manifesto. This week, we had the pleasure of speaking to social entrepreneur, activist, and VAWG campaigner, Annie Gibbs, who founded the UK based by-and-for organisation Amour Destiné. In this interview, we hear from Annie on the importance of reclaiming narratives across the domestic abuse sector and breaking down systemic barriers to funding and resources for the vital work of specialist by-and-for organisations. Read Annie’s powerful interview here: https://lnkd.in/efXBk_Dt

The theme for Black History Month 2024 is #ReclaimingNarratives. Alongside our colleagues at Respect UK, we're so pleased to be sharing and celebrating the work of changemakers from Black, African, Caribbean and Mixed Heritage communities within the domestic abuse sector. This week, our colleagues had the amazing opportunity to speak to Selma Taha, Executive Director of Southall Black Sisters. Selma has over a decade of experience working to reduce and eliminate all forms of violence against women and girls. She has been a manager of advocacy and support services at the nia project, Advance Victim Support. Our colleagues spoke with Selma about some of the key asks within the Respect Manifesto, and what that would look like for Selma: ''A justice system can only work when it works for everyone, because, you know, none of us will be free until all of us are free. So, we must have a system in place that is workable and is workable for everyone, not just workable for the majority. '' Read Selma's full blog here: https://lnkd.in/eH2q7Y9c #BlackHistoryMonth #ReclaimingNarratives #MakeJusticeWork Black History Month UK

An important report from University of Essex on the proposed domestic abuse and stalking offender register by Dr Katerina Hadjimatheou and Rasha Hamid highlights how data-driven thinking is essential to developing effective measures to tackle #DomesticAbuse. Read more about the report here: https://lnkd.in/expCTu43   The recommendations in this report chime with The Drive Partnership and Respect UK's calls for prioritising data and evidence-based responses to perpetrators in our Call for Further Action https://lnkd.in/eWuY2aNz and Respect's Manifesto https://lnkd.in/dSVgKxav.   We look forward to hearing more about this report from Dr Katerina Hadjimatheou tomorrow on the Action on Perpetrators Network call. If you would like to find out more and join the Action on Perpetrators Network, please email info@drivepartnership.org.uk to be added.

The Drive Partnership is pleased to be attending the Labour Party Conference alongside our partners, Respect UK and SafeLives. We welcomed Labour's commitments to use “every government tool available to target perpetrators and address the root causes of abuse and violence”, which will be vital to its mission to halve Violence Against Women and Girls within a decade, and we're looking forward to hearing more about the Government's plans to achieve this throughout the conference. #Lab24 #VAWG

The Drive Partnership is pleased to be working with the Home Office and wider delivery partners to support the implementation of the new Domestic Abuse Protection Order (DAPO) positive requirement pilots, and we look forward to working with the Government throughout the pilot to ensure the development of a safe, effective and victim-centred model that will reduce the risk that perpetrators pose.    Kyla Kirkpatrick, Director of the Drive Partnership, said: "Only by transforming our response to perpetrators of domestic abuse and stopping abuse in its tracks will we get close to halving VAWG in a decade, and the DAPO initiative has the potential to be part of that transformation. We are committed to ensuring the development of a safe and victim-centred model that can help to make that happen, and we welcome the Government's decisive steps towards improving responses to perpetrators and increasing the safety of adult and child victim-survivors."

This week we're at the Cranstoun Social Justice Conference. The theme for 2024 is Innovation and Collaboration and the focus will be across five areas; harm reduction & drug policy, domestic abuse, criminal justice, housing & homelessness & children & young people’s services. More information here: https://lnkd.in/ermXtqMq