IWD: ‘if you educate a woman you educate a family’: Projects for women and girls - Ruth Healey

Helen Clarke

Continuing our International Women's Day content - we spoke to Ruth Healey, President of SIGBI, and the president of SI Manchester - an organisation running projects to help women and girls.

Soroptimist International Great Britain and Ireland (SIGBI) works to tackle gender violence and inequality, creating a positive impact both locally and globally and has lobbied on personal safety, domestic violence, modern slavery, education rights and women’s health in recent years.

With reports stating it will take at least another five generations of women until we reach gender parity - why are we still seeing issues that disproportionately affect women and what can be done?

World wide, the UN estimates that it will take 286 years to close legal gaps, 140 years for equal leadership and 40 years for gender parity in parliaments.

This year marks the 30th anniversary of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, a bold international agreement on women’s rights adopted by governments in 1995 that remains unmatched in ambition. In reviewing its progress, 24% of countries say that the backlash on gender equality has undermined the implementation of commitments that could unlock equality, rights and protection for all women and girls.

Ruth Healey, Credit: Soroptimist International Great Britain and Ireland (SIGBI)

Insecurity, crises and democratic decay have created a perfect storm of backlash against women’s rights. According to the UN, nearly three quarters of the world’s population are living under autocratic rule that have curtailed rights and freedoms, and over 600 million women and girls lived in conflict-affected countries.

The Covid-19 pandemic and its aftermath, numerous conflicts and crises around the world, and the encroachment on women’s sexual and reproductive health and rights have derailed the path to gender equality.

What mistakes are we making now and how do we empower women of the future, especially those that have struggled with the issues of domestic violence and homelessness that your projects seek to support?

Gender inequality has been allowed to flourish for generations. In order to counter this trend, we believe that governments must invest in the education of women and girls. While not enough by itself, achieving universal girls’ education has been proven to improve gender equality significantly.

Each additional year of schooling can boost a girls’ earnings as an adult with further impacts on poverty reduction, better maternal health and reduced violence against women. The commonly used phrase 'if you educate a man you educate an individual, but if you educate a woman you educate a family' is never more apt.

During the Commission on the Status of Women 2024 at the UN, with a theme of poverty, the assembly called for gender neutral budgets to be implemented and for the, largely, male-dominated financial services sector to find a way to allow female entrepreneurs to be adequately supported - thereby ensuring women can earn their own income, become independent, educate their children and break the cycle of poverty, poor health and violence.

In the UK, gender bias is still evident in many policy decisions, our budgets are not neutral and policies often overlook gender-specific health concerns. The way we are addressing these issues must change if we are to make any change in women’s equality and safety.

What actions can we take to accelerate the strength and understanding of these women?

• Become aware. It’s vital to hear the stories, know and understand the issues and then advocate. Ask ourselves, ‘Is this good enough?’

• Lobby and campaign our parliament and local councils to ensure that women’s issues are part of every ministerial department’s agenda

• Attendance at CSW - over 100 Soroptimists are going, making themselves known

• Work at grassroots level to support women and girls in breaking down barriers and highlighting opportunities

• Listen to survivors of domestic and other abuse

• Soroptimists work with food banks, kitchens, and support refuges

• Support schools with STEM competitions, public speaking competitions etc to develop a sense of worth and esteem in young girls

• Work to highlight the issue of online abuse and help to educate girls on how to make healthy relationship decisions

• Develop partnerships with other like-minded organisations. None of this can be done on our own but together we are stronger

• Get journalists familiar with the issues