Awareness the first step to prevention
Spice Girl and international charity campaigner 'Mel B' Melanie Brown MBE backs our call to shine a light on a form of abuse that hides in plain sight.
The International Coalition Against Economic Abuse is today calling for the 26th November to be recognised as Economic Abuse Awareness Day.
Economic abuse is present in 99 per cent of domestic abuse cases**. Abusers use tactics like closely regulating their partner’s spending, taking their earnings, preventing them from working, accumulating debt in their name, refusing to contribute to household costs and more. Technology can also facilitate this form of abuse, with abusers turning the heating off remotely, for example, or sending abusive messages via bank payment references when paying child maintenance.
Victims often have trouble leaving due to lack of economic resources or the fear of being unable to support themselves and their families. Survivors of economic abuse typically face debt, poor credit and lasting financial instability, and one in ten ends up homeless.
The 26th November is the date on which Coalition co-founder Meseret Haileyeus herself fled violence. Through the Canadian Centre for Women’s Empowerment (CCFWE), which she went on to set up, she successfully called for this day to be recognised by all levels of government in Canada as Economic Abuse Awareness Day.
Coalition members are today at the UN Palais des Nations in Geneva to make the case for international recognition of the day. At last week’s inaugural Global Summit on Economic Abuse, Kalliopi Mingeirou, Chief of the Ending Violence against Women Section at UN Women recognised economic abuse as an important area of work.
Members include: the Centre for Women’s Economic Safety in Australia, the Canadian Centre for Women’s Empowerment (CCFWE) Surviving Economic Abuse in the United Kingdom, Good Shepherd in New Zealand, Women’s Spirit in Israel and the Center for Survivor Agency and Justice in the US.
Steering group members include Zubaida Bai of the Grameen Foundation and Pamela Zaballa of NO MORE.
Campaigner and Spice Girl Melanie Brown MBE said:
“Economic abuse can happen anywhere – from council estates to country estates. It cuts across class, race and background. It can financially cripple a survivor and force them to go back to the abuser. We need to face these issues now and do everything we can to change laws to deal with it.”
Meseret Haileyesus, Co-founder of the International Coalition and CEO of the Canadian Centre for Women’s Empowerment said:
“For too long, economic abuse has gone unseen. As a Coalition we’re determined to end it."