With White Ribbon Day on Monday 25th November, we wanted to catch up with Spencer Clarke from Chelmsford City Council on the Make Space for Girls project and the headway they’re making in ensuring women and girls feel safe.
Spencer started by saying:
For women and girls to feel safe, men must change their behaviour. Tackling domestic abuse will always be a key priority but challenging lower-level behaviours, such as wolf whistling or social media trends that encourage toxic behaviour in our schools, is equally important as this can lead to more extreme behaviour in the future. Men must play their role in influencing change and having positive male role models is hugely important.
We then spoke to Spencer around the Chelmsford Make Space for Girls project to understand the work they’ve been doing around this important agenda:
Chelmsford launched its Women’s Safety Charter in 2022, which asks organisations to make six pledges to improve women’s safety. Alongside the Charter, we began an ongoing campaign, Women’s Safety in Our City, which is aimed at our residents and visitors, encouraging them to consider their own behaviour and what part they play in upholding a culture that contributes to women feeling unsafe.
We began the second instalment of the campaign this year, which focuses on Active Bystandership, asking people “what part can you play?” and showcasing a variety of ways we can all help women feel safer. The campaign invites everyone to take Essex County Council’s Essex Bystander Awareness training online.
Early in 2024 we partnered with the charity Make Space for Girls and the consultants Social Place. The focus of this work was to make our green spaces safer and more inclusive for young girls and gender diverse young people. We have now completed three consultations at urban, rural and destination park locations working with Year 9 students from local schools. Their ideas have been fantastic, and we will be putting them into action over the next few months by installing colourful hang-out areas in safe, green spaces, together with street art projects and other ideas for each area. One consultation has helped in the procurement of some new youth facilities to ensure that the finished product will be diverse and inclusive for all users, and not default male like so many green space facilities provided across the country.
The work with these students has been inspiring, for the council and our partners, and encouraging young people to use our green spaces more effectively can have clear public health benefits by improving mental health and reducing teenage obesity. The social media reach of these projects has topped 90,000 and we hope its contributing to a wider conversation around preventing violence against women and girls and driving effective change.
With lots of work taking place in this sphere, it was great to hear Spencer talk about the journey they’ve been on, and importantly what they have learnt. He added:
The importance of community participation and giving our young people a voice. We should not assume we know what young people want from our green spaces, and involving them in the process has been an enlightening experience. Our consultants did an amazing job encouraging the young people to present their views and all participants improved their confidence and self-esteem as part of the process. The three key elements our young people value are safety, inclusivity and social interaction. The first consultation concluded with a celebration party in one of our parks which was absolute fun with lots of activity designed by the participants.
A simple and effective intervention is to challenge the behaviour of your friends and co-workers; sexist banter is a thing of the past and should be called out at every opportunity. It is never too late to change your behaviour, and you may be surprised at the influence that has on your peers going forward.
Following on from Active Essex’s pledge to White Ribbon, and our Director Jason Fergus reflecting on the role the sport and physical activity sector in Essex has to play, we are confident that together, we can truly make a real difference.
If you’d like to find out more about the White Ribbon campaign, and see how you can get involved, click here.
