Good practice event makes domestic abuse everyone's business!
MORE than a hundred people have
gathered at Liverpool's FACT centre to celebrate and examine what good working
practices could be learned from a Public Health collaborative campaign to help
put an end to domestic abuse.
Nearly 20,000 people engaged with the:- ‘Be a Lover not a Fighter' campaign
which was launched by award winning actress Crissy Rock earlier this year.
Aimed at the general public across the nine local authorities in Cheshire and
Merseyside:- ‘Be a Lover not a Fighter' intended to breakdown boundaries
and uncover the scale and impacts of domestic abuse which is often a hidden
issue in communities. It asked people to pledge their support to help put an end
to domestic abuse and encouraged people to talk more about it.
The FACT event provided an arena for senior organisational leaders to connect
and debate how to work better together across sectors on domestic abuse. It
included key note speakers Melanie Sirotkin Centre Director of Public Health
England North West, Ian McNichol, Chair of Men's Centre and Ambassador of The
Mankind Initiative and Lee Charles, World Kick Boxing Champion and Actor. There
was also a panel debate hosted by BBC's Jim Hancock.
The conference showcased a number of films to highlight the boundary pushing:-
‘Be a Lover not a Fighter' campaign in Cheshire and Merseyside, including a presence
from the celebrity support the campaign gained.
Delegates to the event included, Local Authority Directors of Public Health,
Directors of Adult Social Services, Directors of Children's Services, Domestic
Abuse Commissioners, Heads of Community Safety Partnerships, Heads of Public
Health Programmes and Chief Officers in Policing.
The campaign was the brainchild of Champs, a public health collaborative of the
Directors of Public Health across the nine local authorities in Cheshire and
Merseyside. It aimed to generate discussion about domestic abuse and how all
organisations can share success and work together to achieve more in bringing
the subject out into the open.
1 in 3 women and 1 in 6 men have suffered domestic abuse with 2 women killed
every week in the UK by their partners. But it's not just physical violence;
emotional and psychological abuse is less well acknowledged but is also domestic
abuse.
Matthew Ashton, Director of Public Health for Knowsley (with lead responsibility
for Domestic Abuse across Merseyside and Cheshire) said:- "We have been
overwhelmed by the response to the Be a Lover not a Fighter campaign and
consequently felt we had to share how successful this approach had been with the
partners, share best practice and help put an end to domestic abuse. The level
of partnership working in this campaign has helped to make it a success. We
can't let this good work stop here. Encouraging people to talk about domestic
abuse is hard; people are often afraid to talk openly and the social norm can
be to accept that it is happening, so I'd like to be able to build on what we
have achieved so far in order to work together further and put an end to
domestic abuse once and for all. "
For more information about the campaign and for more advice go to:-
LoverNotFighter.Org.UK.
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