Every year, on the eighth of March, the language of celebration arrives early and stays late. Bouquets are sent. Panels are convened. Speeches are written and delivered with great care. I have spoken at many of them, and I will speak at many more.
But this year, I want to use the day differently. I want to use it to be honest.
The truth is that women in this country are not safer than they were a decade ago. In some respects, they are demonstrably less safe. Domestic abuse related suicide has now surpassed the number of women killed by a current or former partner, with three women a week ending their own lives as a consequence of the abuse inflicted upon them.1 These deaths are not counted as homicides. They rarely reach a courtroom. And until very recently, they were not counted at all.
That is the country we are marking International Women’s Day in.
Honour, and the misuse of the word
I have spent more than two decades working with Black and minoritised women and girls who have been harmed by abuse inside their families and inside their communities. Forced marriage. Female genital mutilation. So called honour-based abuse. The Halo Project, which I founded in 2011, has supported over 2,500 women through its umbrella organisation, the Tees Valley Inclusion Project.2
I use the phrase “so called” deliberately. There is no honour in coercion. There is no honour in a daughter being beaten for refusing a husband she has never met. There is no honour in a young woman setting fire to herself because she has been told that her life belongs to everybody but her. The word itself is part of the harm, and it is well past time we stopped repeating it without challenge.
This year, the Halo Project is developing the first community education programme designed specifically to address honour-based abuse and to close the gaps in criminal justice intervention that allow perpetrators to operate without consequence.3 We are working with Manchester Metropolitan University to push for statutory guidance on honour-based suicides.3 These are not abstract policy ambitions. They are the difference between a young woman being heard and a young woman being buried.
The invisible survivors
In 2020, the Tees Valley Inclusion Project co-authored the first ever police super-complaint in the history of the system.4 It exposed widespread failures in how sexual abuse cases involving Black and minoritised women were investigated, recorded, and pursued across England and Wales. The work that followed, alongside His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary, the College of Policing, and the National Police Chiefs’ Council, has begun to change how officers are trained and how cases are reviewed.4
I am proud of that work. I am also realistic about it. A super-complaint exposes a failure. It does not, by itself, repair the lives of the women whose cases were mishandled. That repair is the work of the next decade, and it requires every institution in the criminal justice chain to do more than acknowledge the problem.
Why I am writing this on International Women’s Day
I write this on International Women’s Day because the day asks us to take stock. And taking stock is not the same as taking comfort.
In June 2026, Durham University will confer upon me an honorary Doctorate of Civil Law.5 I am deeply grateful for that recognition, and I am clear that I do not accept it on my own behalf. I accept it on behalf of the women whose names I will not write here, because their families would find them. I accept it on behalf of the students at the Halo student hubs, which began at Durham ten years ago and have now expanded to universities and colleges across the country.5 I accept it on behalf of every survivor who told her story to a police officer who did not write it down.
The honour belongs to them. The work belongs to all of us.
What I ask of you this year
If you are a policy maker, fund specialist by-and-for services. The mainstream sector cannot do this work alone, and it has never been asked to.
If you are a university leader, look at your safeguarding. Look at it honestly. The Student Halo Hubs model exists, it works, and it is ready to be adopted nationally.3
If you are a police officer, ask yourself when you last read the super-complaint findings. They were written for you.
If you are a woman reading this and you recognise yourself in any part of it, please know that the Halo Project is here. You do not have to use the word honour. You do not have to translate yourself. You can call us in your own language, and we will listen.
International Women’s Day is not a celebration of how far we have come. It is a measurement of how far we still have to go. This year, let us measure honestly.
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Founder and Chief Officer of the Halo Project. Former National Advisor on Violence against Women, Domestic Abuse and Sexual Violence to the Welsh Government, 2018–2026.
