Sisters Uncut

NO POLICE IN OUR WOMEN’S BUILDING – Fill out the survey

Friday, June 9, 2023

The Women’s Building* that Peabody has promised to build on the site of Holloway Prison is at risk of housing probationary services. 

Formerly the largest women’s prison in Europe, Holloway prison was a site of intense violence and harm. The Women’s Building was demanded by the community, to be a space for healing and support for people who have experienced violence at the hand of the state. 

Embedding probationary services into the Women’s Building would be the complete opposite of what the community demanded. We do not want more policing of our communities. We do not want a prison under another name. We want a Women’s Building that works in the interests of us all.

We are asking people to fill out this survey from Peabody to make it clear that we want no probationary services in the Women’s building, that the building should provide specialised services for all survivors and that the building should be for women, non-binary and intersex people, and their children.

Please use our answers below as a guide, but use your own words.

GUIDE ANSWERS

QUESTION ONE

Choose ‘not important’ to the suggestion of ‘Probation referrals’.

Choose ‘other’ and in the text box specify that:

• We need specialist services for Black survivors and survivors of colour, LGBT* survivors (emphasise the need for all services to be fully trans-inclusive), D/disabled survivors, and women, intersex and non-binary people who were formerly incarcerated. 
• There should also be a safe injection site/needle exchange.
• No services in the building should be linked to the Criminal Justice System.
• All services should be run by organisations that recognise the harms perpetuated by the Criminal Justice System. 
• All services should be free at the point of use.

QUESTION TWO

Choose ‘not important’ for ‘commercial space’. 

Choose ‘other’ and note that the space should also: 

• Include a kitchen
• Be fully accessible
• Be free at the point of use

Note that there should be no commercial space in the building.

QUESTION FOUR

Choose ‘not relevant’ for ‘exclusive use for women only’ and then clarify in the text box below that it is important that the space is for women (trans and cis), non-binary and intersex people and their children. 

Choose ‘other’ and note in the text box that:

• There must be no connection to the Criminal Justice System (including immigration enforcement).
• All services, including childcare, must be offered free at the point of use.

QUESTION FIVE

Strongly state that there must be no probation services in the building. Probation services are an arm of the Criminal Justice System that entrench state surveillance in the lives of formerly incarcerated people and set near impossible standards and codes of behaviour that they must adhere to. Probation services are another way that the Criminal Justice System cements itself in the lives of those currently and formerly imprisoned.

Probation services are not spaces for healing or support. 

When the Community came together to demand a Women’s Building, the vision was that it would be a place of healing for those who have experienced violence at the hands of the state. It should work to rectify the pain and trauma inflicted by prisons and the Criminal Justice System. This can only happen if it is completely independent of these systems. No services that are linked to or co-operate with the Criminal Justice System should be housed in the building.

Services provided must not cooperate with the Home Office or Ministry of Justice in any capacity or deny access to individuals on the basis of immigration status. 

*’Women’s Building’ is the term used by the Council, Peabody and some community groups. We insist that the building must be inclusive of all women (trans and cis), non-binary and intersex people.

LETTER: Raising the alarm on police violence against women

Monday, November 1, 2021

WE ARE RAISING THE ALARM ON POLICE VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN.

WE ARE CALLING ON THE PUBLIC TO JOIN US TO DELIVER A LETTER OF COMPLAINT ON BEHALF OF ALL WOMEN.

There is an epidemic of police violence against women in this country. Today we withdraw our consent to police power.

This is our super complaint on behalf of all women and all victims of police violence and corrupt criminal justice institutions.

This week, 63 police officers have been found abusing their powers for sexual gain. We know this is just the tip of the iceberg. 

750 Metropolitan police officers have been accused of sexual misconduct since 2010, only 83 were sacked. Police are a third less likely to be convicted of domestic abuse than the general public. This is a CRISIS.

The police claim Wayne Couzens was one bad apple, a lone monster. But we know 15 officers have killed women since 2009.

We know colleagues referred to Couzens as ‘The Rapist’. They did nothing. 

We know he exposed himself not once, but multiple times. They did nothing. 

We know he sent vile misogynistic, racist and homophobic messages to colleages on WhatsApp. They did nothing. 

We know, even after Couzens pled guilty, colleagues attended court to provide positive character references for him.

We know the police treated the family of Bibaa Henry and Nicole Smallman with utter contempt: officers took photos of their dead bodies and turned the horrific violence they’d experienced into a joke.

Women in Black, immigrant, disabled and working class communities bear the brunt of complicity in this corruption. We withdraw our consent NOW.

There is an epidemic of impunity protecting the police across the entire criminal justice system. From the streets to the courts: the whole system is guilty.

We call out these institutions: the police, CPS, courts, Home Office, psychiatric institutions, the DWP, Family Courts, and Social Services.

Whilst violent police are protected, activists and mourners who protest police violence are punished.

Courts in Bristol are handing down draconian sentences to campaigners against police violence, like Ryan Roberts who is facing riot and arson charges for standing against police brutality. 

Yet the police who brutalised women at Clapham Common vigil have faced no consequences. 

The Government is pushing through the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill, which would give even more powers to police already drunk on the ones they have.

We are raising the alarm because the police are entirely unaccountable. There is no recourse to justice or safety for victims of police violence.

We will take action until we are safe from police. CopWatch groups are forming around the country to intervene in police activity to keep our communities safe. Expect us.

We raise the alarm with our sisters, siblings and communities at the sharpest edge of state cruelty. 

In rage and grief we will resist, we refuse to be silent.

Sisters Uncut
Women of Colour Global Women’s Strike
Women Against Rape
Feminist Fightback
Black Lives Matter

Why we’re marching on Mayday

Wednesday, April 28, 2021

On Saturday 1 May, tens of thousands of people are expected to take to the streets in 40 different locations across the UK. Why? To stop the controversial Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill.

The Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill is a huge, 300-page piece of proposed law that seeks to increase police powers in terrifying ways.

If this police powers bill becomes law, we will see even more police violence – against people who speak up against injustice, and specifically against Black, Muslim and Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities.

What is in the bill that’s sparked all of these protests?

This proposed laws will give police unprecedented powers to use against the public. Police are already drunk on the powers that they have – if they are given more, it will only lead to more violence.

Here are the specific parts of the bill we are most concerned by:

Protest (the right to assemble) is a human right

You never know when you might need to take to the streets to speak up against injustice, but you have a right to do it. The police powers bill will try to shut down our ability to do that, police will have the power to seriously restrict and criminalise protest by:

• Imposing a start and finish time
• Setting noise limits
• Applying rules of a demonstration by just one person
• If someone fails to follow police directions, they could be fined up to £2,500.
• Police will be able to arrest people at protests without warning. Right now, police need to prove to protesters that they knew they had been told to move on before they can make arrests. The bill gives the police the right to arrest someone where they “ought to have known” a condition existed.
• The proposed law includes an offence of “intentionally or recklessly causing public nuisance” – and language in the bill suggests that if someone ‘annoys’ a police officer, they could be charged. The language and the scope of powers given to senior officers and to the Home Secretary through this Bill are open for abuse.
• The bill will seek to lock up protest organisers for longer sentences – increasing the maximum sentence from 3 months to 11 months imprisonment. These changes risk plunging people further into the criminal justice system, simply for exercising their democratic right.
• Trespass is currently a civil law offence and police have no powers to arrest offenders. The police powers bill makes it a criminal law and would empower police to arrest any person and seize any vehicles or property. This impacts the right to protest overnight or set up protest camps. This also has a huge impact on Gypsa, Roma and Traveller (GRT) communities – even the police don’t want this.

The police already abuse the powers they have – and shouldn’t be given more. The violent policing of the Sarah Everard vigil, the reckless brutality of police against protestors in Bristol and London (including police pretending to be postmen to gain entry to a protestor’s house, handcuffing her while half-naked), the use of mobile fingerprinting technology at protests to harvest public biometric data, and the £10,000 fine given to a nurse protesting the 1% NHS pay rise are very recent examples of this.

If the police are handed more powers, we’re about to see more terrifying violence against people who are courageous enough to speak out against injustice.

Gypsy, Roma and Traveller (GRT) rights

Gypsy, Roma and Traveller (GRT) communities are among the most persecuted and marginalised in the UK. The police powers bill wants to criminalise their existence. This will be done by criminalising ‘unauthorised encampments’ and established trespass – effectively criminalising GRT communities’ way of life. The proposals in the Bill are extremely discriminatory:

• The Bill will create a new offence of “residing on land without consent in or with a vehicle”. It is undoubtable that these powers will be used to target GRT communities – whose vehicles include homes, and who may end up homeless. It’s vital to recognise this in the context of a country that has a huge shortage of sites for GRT communities to reside on.
• If a person or family is removed from an area, they are banned from returning for 12 months. A person who returns will face harsh criminal punishments, including up to 3 months in jail or a fine of up to £2,500.

GRT communities anticipate even more violent evictions than they already face if this police powers bill goes through. As GRT socialists have said: “this bill has rubber stamped the treatment we receive, such as being racially stereotyped, segregated from public spaces and businesses and economically excluded”.

Stop and Search

The proposal to create a new civil order, the Serious Violence Reduction Order (SVRO), will hand police an extraordinary power to stop and search a person who has previously been convicted of a weapons offence at any time, in any place, completely free of suspicion. This will hand the police a highly oppressive tool, unlike anything seen before, which will disproportionately impact Black men. Already, Black people are 8.9 times more likely to be subject to a stop and search than white people, and non-Black people of colour 4.1 times more likely.

• Stop and search is already a discriminatory and invasive police practice, but right now, a stop and search can only be lawfully exercised during a set timed period and over a defined geographic location. Previous convictions have never been used as a grounds to stop and search someone. The current time period for suspicionless stop and search is 24 hours. SVROs will be implemented for up to 24 months at a time – and can be renewed indefinitely.
• SVROs can be handed to someone who has never handled a weapon, but “ought to have known” another person they were with at the time, did.
• This means police will be given extraordinary powers to stop and search someone anywhere, at any time, despite no evidence of a person ever handling a weapon before.
• If someone resists an SVRO – for example, by failing to do anything required, or obstructing a police officer in the exercise of it – they could be put in prison for up to two years, or receive a fine. Human Rights organisation Liberty is concerned that “this could be interpreted broadly, to criminalise people requesting that police provide the legal authority for subjecting them to a stop and search or failing to provide an answer to a question put by a police officer”. Liberty also say that “making a refusal to co-operate a criminal offence may lead to people being fined or criminalised in circumstances where they do not understand the instructions given by a police officer and therefore fail to comply. This may also detrimentally impact disabled people or people with mental health needs, some of whom may find it difficult to follow directions.”

Other provisions in the Bill will see invasive surveillance of young people and children, similar to the widely-condemned PREVENT strategy, and a mandate for controversial children’s prisons (known euphemistically as ‘secure schools’) to be run for charitable benefit.

The Bill has also opened the gateway for retrogressive policies like Diane Johnson MP’s tabled amendments on sex work, which will push sex workers into dangerous working conditions by.

What does Kill The Bill mean?

We believe that the police powers bill should be scrapped entirely. It is authoritarian in tone and in nature, and will lead to more abuse of police powers. All of the above affects all of us, and it will take a mass movement to force it to be thrown out of parliament.

Kill The Bill weekend of action

Thursday, April 1, 2021

Over the past two weeks we have seen the explosion of a national movement against the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill. People across the UK have taken to the streets to say: no more police powers – the Police Crackdown Bill must be stopped. In this short space of time, we have gained some big wins, including forcing the government to delay the Bill through Parliament, instead of quietly rushing it through like they had originally planned to do. 

Amazingly, and unsurprisingly, this movement has rapidly grown way beyond us.

This weekend, people across the UK are once again taking to the streets to demand that the government #KillTheBill. There have been demos called across the country throughout the weekend including one in London on Saturday, April 3rd. 

We are calling for a National Day of Action on Sunday, April 4th: this is not a demonstration, but rather a series of small events and actions you can take from home. There is more information on this below.

We know that not everyone can, or wants to, go to demonstrations.  The actions below contribute to the movement and can be done from home. Our strength is in our numbers, and it is only through a national mass mobilisation that we will defeat the police powers bill. We already know the police are drunk on power, and they cannot be given more.

Although we are not leading on any demonstrations this weekend, we encourage those that do go out to do so safely: please follow COVID-safe protocols and check out Green and Black Cross’ website for advice on your rights when protesting. Remember to not go to or leave a demonstration alone, and if asked to do anything by a police officer, always ask: under what power? 

This is a national movement and one that we are proud to be a part of. We have spent the past week reaching out to and organising with groups affected by the police powers bill – you can read our collective statement of solidarity here.  This Bill affects communities differently, but is bad for all of us: it threatens our right to work, assemble, protest, and travel. This also means that we will need all of us to defeat it, this movement leaves no one behind. 

Many of you have sent us posters, designs and more support over the last few weeks. We’re now putting these to use as part of our National Day of Action on 4th April 2021. 

What can you do on 4th April?

• Use the resources available here to let your community know that you are part of the #KillTheBIll movement. 
  • Put a poster up in your window
  • Flyer outside a busy spot (wearing masks and observing social distancing)
  • Post flyers through all your neighbour’s letterboxes
  • Put up posters in your community
• Share your posters online using the hashtag #KillTheBill
• Set aside some time to read more about the Policing, Crime Sentencing and Courts bill.

Part of the government’s strategy is to let time pass in the hopes that we forget about the bill. We will not let this happen. We are asking that everyone, in their cities, towns, and villages call their local radio stations to say: do not give more powers to the police. 

• You can find your local digital radio station here.
• Here are some talking points:
  • The police are drunk on power and should not be given more
  • You are concerned about the Policing, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill that is moving through parliament, and want it to be scrapped entirely.
  • The events at the Clapham vigil and at demonstrations over the last few weeks are a dangerous indication of what the future of protest will look like if the police powers bill moves through parliament.
  • The police powers bill will give police increased power to threaten, intimidate and use violence against Gypsy and Traveller communities – including give them permission to seize their property (which includes homes) 
  • The police powers bill will increase stop and search powers, which already discriminate against marginalised communities

We are letting the government know: we will make this bill unenforceable in the streets. This is just the beginning. We will #KillTheBill.

Download resources for day of action

Sisters Uncut Statement on Bristol – We Will Not Be Divided

Tuesday, March 23, 2021

It feels like every day a new story about police violence comes to light. Over the past week, we’ve seen a police officer walk free after being caught on camera assaulting a woman, using tactics that he had learned on the job to force her to the ground, screaming that she was a ‘fucking slag’ when she managed to escape. In the 6 years between 2012 and 2018 there were 594 complaints of sexual violence against Met police employees, of which only 119 were upheld. We know that only a fraction of incidents of sexual violence are ever reported to the police, so it’s safe to assume that the true number is far, far higher. With the passing of the Covert Human Intelligence Sources (Criminal Conduct) Act earlier this month, the state authorised police officers to deceive women into sexual relationships, and even into pregnancy. The police are the perpetrators.

The police already have a monopoly on violence and the Police Crackdown Bill will only entrench this further. Protests in Bristol over the weekend were described in national newspapers as having ‘turned violent’, yet we know that it was protesters, not police, who bore the brunt of that violence. Police tactics, including kettling, the use of batons, and dispersal techniques such as horse charges, are violent in both intent and effect. Whether they are manhandling protesters at Saturday’s vigil in memory of Sarah Everard, aggressively pursuing young Black women for their details, or forcefully arresting protestors for shaking their heads at officers, as we saw last weekend at Bristol, it is clear that it is the police who turn protest into violence.

The Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill will enable the police to decide where, when and how citizens are allowed to travel, congregate, protest, and work. Sentences of up to 10 years are laid down for anything from a protest to a house party or even just a lone individual causing ‘serious annoyance’. This bill attacks all communities, and it is all of us that must resist.

31 years ago, a mass movement formed in opposition to Thatcher’s poll tax, a flat tax that would have punished the poorest in society, and took to the streets to defeat a bill that could not be defeated in parliament. During the protests, mounted police and police vans charged through crowds of people, who were beaten with batons, but politicians and the media drew a contrast between a moral majority and a small number of violent protesters. The stigmatisation of protesters is a tactic of division that we won’t stand for. It is a fearful response by a state that thrives on division and scarcity. While the police can use violence against people with impunity, protesters are condemned for ‘violent’ damage to property. 

We applaud all those who went out this weekend, and took to the streets to defend the right to a life free of state violence. The police use violence to divide us, but we will not be divided. The conservative media attempts to paint a moral hierarchy, but we will not be forced apart. We know that this bill can be defeated, and we are coming together in a coalition of solidarity to do just that. We will not be silenced. We will kill the bill!

Signed By

8M Feminista Latinx
Abolitionist Futures
Anarchist Communist Group
Black Lives Matter UK
Community Action on Prison Expansion (CAPE)
Cradle Community
Disabled People Against Cuts
Docs Not Cops
Jewish Solidarity Action
Kurdistan Solidarity Network
Migrant Media
Migrants Organise
Minority Protection Initiative
No More Exclusions
Prisoner Solidarity Network
Red Fightback
Remember & Resist
Revolutionary Socialism in the 21st Century
RS21
Sisters of Frida
SOAS Detainee Support
United Families and Friends Campaign
Women Defend Rojava
Women’s Strike

Why we gathered at Clapham Common, even when we were told not to

Sunday, March 14, 2021

We gathered at Clapham Common on Friday, because of our grief and anger at the senseless murder of Sarah Everard. We gathered because after Sarah’s disappearance, the police told women that they should stay at home after dark to avoid being attacked. This isn’t the first time.

Almost 50 years ago, when another murderer the Yorkshire Ripper was attacking women, the police said the only way for women to remain safe is to stay at home. Then, as now, women said NO. We will not be curfewed. Time and again the police have attempted to control us and to divide us by playing in good women and bad women narratives. But we demand the right not only to survive but to thrive. And that means going where we want, when we want. We don’t care if you’re out at night partying, drinking, or to see your friends, or sex working, or if you’re gender non-conforming, no one deserves to die for being out at night-time.

Many of us know that surviving and thriving means disobeying orders and that’s why so many of us are here tonight. The police have tried and tried to silence and repress us. A sickening response when the man who has been charged with her murder is a metropolitan police officer. A man who days earlier was reported for indecent exposure and was allowed to continue his duties. And when we say we want to attend a vigil to remember Sarah Everard, when we want to resist a curfew that stops us having a full life, the police have the nerve to threaten us and intimidate us. No.

From April 2015 to April 2018, there were almost 700 reports of domestic abuse against police officers. In the 6 years from 2012-18 there were 1,500 accusations of sexual misconduct, including sexual harassment, exploitation of crime victims and child abuse resulting in only 197 officers being sacked. From 2015-17, 415 referrals were made for officers that had abused their position to sexually assault someone, with domestic and sexual violence victims, sex workers and drug users being most at risk of being abused by an on-duty police officer. And by the way that is no accident, abusers always target those who they think no one will believe them. Since 1990 there have been over 1,500 deaths in custody or following police contact but no officer has ever been held accountable. The police are allowed to abuse their partners, sexually assault crime victims and even kill with almost no accountability. Why was the man who has been charged with killing Sarah Everard not held accountable for indecent assault? How many other incidents have the police turned a blind eye to? How many people, knowing that nothing will be done, have not even made a complaint against a police officer that has abused them.

The police tell us that we will only be safe if we stay at home and get more bobbies on our streets. But perpetrators are in our homes, they are on the streets and they are the metropolitan police. We are the only route to safety. A united movement of all those impacted by gender violence and we are most at risk of gendered violence when we are

We are women, when we are poor, when we are black or brown, when we are disabled when we are trans and when we are migrants. The cops thought they could threaten us, they thought they could intimidate us they thought they could stop us. But we know that the route towards endings violence means disobeying orders. These streets are our streets.

No police in our women’s building

Monday, November 30, 2020

The Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime (MOPAC) plans to turn the Women’s centre on the Holloway Prison Site into a probation centre, instead of a place for community and transformation.

Members of Sisters Uncut have sprayed the following stencils in key areas around Islington:

MOPAC = police 

Policing =/= community healing

We want community not criminalisation

No police in our women’s building*

We want members of the local community to know about Peabody Housing Association’s relationship with policing institutions. We demand a Women’s Building that works in the interests of us all, without relying on the criminal justice system – which often creates the problems that the building will aim to rectify. We do not want a prison under another name.

MOPAC is the body that is responsible for overseeing the Metropolitan Police. They fund a range of services, including Domestic Violence services, which in turn have to prove some compliance with MOPAC’s methods and aims. MOPAC’s involvement in the Women’s Building (WB) should be considered a part of the Criminal Justice System’s move towards ‘gender responsive policing’. It is important to note how, over the last decade, domestic violence services and shelters have become more and more embedded in the state’s apparatus. Plans for a women’s building in Holloway are thus linked to government plans to expand the criminal justice system as they move towards embedding prisons and probation centres in our communities.

Further expanding the criminal justice system is not an adequate response to domestic violence; the more police are involved in instances of domestic violence, the more likely it is that survivors or other vulnerable people end up in prison, and communities will continue to be disrupted and fragmented. Police and prisons don’t keep the most systematically vulnerable survivors safe; many cannot rely on the police for fear of deportation or further brutality. The reduction in access to domestic violence services due to a decade of austerity means many do not have a safe place or safety net to fall back on and cannot escape violent situations.

Prisons and probation centres do next to nothing to address the root causes of domestic violence, evidenced by the fact that the prison population in England has more than tripled since 1950, while the number of women murdered by a current or former partner (2-3 every week) remains the same. The majority of people in women’s prisons report experiencing domestic violence at some point in their life. 

A probation centre is a criminal justice service that keeps track of the formerly incarcerated, and assists with communication with criminal courts and sentencing duties. This is yet another way that the criminal justice system cements itself in the lives of those currently and formerly imprisoned. We do not believe that embedding policing, prisons and the CJS into the lives of survivors is an effective way of combating gendered violence. In fact, these systems aid and perpetuate the very cycles of violence they claim to break. Though their stated aim may be to prevent reoffending, their true purpose is to entrench state surveillance in the lives of those who have already been negatively impacted by imprisonment, setting near impossible standards and codes of behaviour that they must adhere to. Probation centres are not spaces for transformative justice. Probation centres are not spaces of support. They continue the control and coercion of formerly incarcerated people.

Women and people of marginalised genders who have been through and live under the threat of the criminal justice system need financial, emotional and mental health support, fully funded community resources, and a space to understand their experiences of trauma and gendered violence. This is what the Women’s Build should be: a place of refuge. We need processes of transformative justice that are community-led, separate from the Criminal Justice System, that seek non-punitive approaches to rectifying harm. When we say we want community and not criminalisation, we mean we have a vision of a world without policing and prisons, where every person has their needs met and is able to access the resources needed to live a full and dignified life. We mean community services run from the ground up with no connections to courts, police and prisons.

The Criminal Justice System perpetrates violence and so it cannot be the solution. It locks survivors into a vicious cycle of poverty, precarious housing and employment, and vulnerability to further abuse. The community of Holloway were promised a space where women could come together, provide support and solidarity for one another, and heal. Instead, they have been lied to and misled by Peabody Housing Association and MOPAC. We demand more: the immediate severing of ties between Peabody Housing Association and MOPAC, as well as evidence that Peabody understands the community’s visions for the Women’s Building, and commitments to put that vision into practice.

* ‘Women’s Building’ is the language used by Islington Council. We will fight for a building and services that are available to all non-binary, gender non-conforming people and women and that the name is changed to reflect that.

A decade of austerity

Monday, December 2, 2019

As the election looms, we want to draw attention to this moment and what it means to us. Deaths from domestic violence have reached a 5-year high with 173 people killed in 2018 – up from 32 in 2017. 3 people a week are now killed by a partner, ex-partner or family member. Spending on domestic violence refuges has been cut by nearly a quarter (24%) since 2010.

Things are getting worse. We are a group that was born from austerity, born from a desire to resist cuts because we understand that cuts kill. We prioritise the lives of survivors of domestic, sexual, and state violence because they are overlooked by the mainstream: they are killed silently and their stories unheeded. We are living in a state of emergency and a decade of austerity has only exacerbated these dire conditions. We want you to remember the women who have died because of the state’s negligence. We want you to learn how many domestic and sexual violence services were forced to close in the last 10 years. We want this information to stay with you, we want to make it impossible to look away.

Austerity is a regime of devastating cuts to public services, resources and welfare programmes that has systematically ruined the lives of survivors and lessened their ability to escape the violence they experience. Austerity makes our lives miserable. We know that any survivor needs well-funded, free and accessible services that can provide them with the emotional and financial support they need to escape violent situations.

We want to build a world where all kinds of harm are addressed using the principles of transformative justice. Transformative justice holds that instead of relying on the police, prisons, courts and the ‘justice’ system, individuals can be held to account by their communities instead of disappeared by the state. Transformative justice calls on us to build a world where the designation ‘criminal’ becomes impossible. That means free education, free social housing, abolishing the prison industrial complex, fully funded mental health services, an end to racism, sexism, homophobia, an end to capitalism.

In the short term, we know that survivors need access to services that shelters provide without fear of deportation or imprisonment. The Conservative and coalition governments have systematically made this harder. The roll out of Universal Credit under the Tories means that benefits are now paid to the highest earner in a household, straight into the hands of abusers. This means many women are economically trapped in abusive situations. Not only have the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats cut funding for a majority of domestic violence shelters, Theresa May used the language of empowerment to propose increased police powers in instances of domestic violence. This ‘tough on crime’ approach does nothing to improve the lives of survivors. Survivors do not need perpetrators to go to jail, they need to be provided with routes to safety. They need shelters. They need trauma-based therapeutic services. For those women on the breadline, in the queue for jobseekers allowance, who fear their partners, Sisters Uncut sees you, stands with you and is fighting to build the world you deserve.

We believe that feminism is about making the world more liveable for the most oppressed – it is a tool we use to fight back against the government’s attempts to silence survivors. We are abolitionists. We do not believe that our freedom can be granted by the state or that the state has the capacity to grapple with our long-term demands. We want the abolition of all of the structures that put us at risk and increase our proximity to violence. But we know the difference between 5 more years of austerity, increased police presence in the lives of survivors and increased surveillance, and a promise to fund programmes for social care, education and housing.

We do not believe in political parties. We believe that our choice in this moment is simple: more death or less death. We implore you to think about this fact and –if you are choosing to take part in electoral politics – to make sure you vote with this simple choice in mind. Our immediate aim is to protect domestic violence shelters and to extend their services to all those who need them. We know that regardless of the outcome of this election, we will be fighting the government on their failure to protect survivors. We know that fight will be easier under a government that promises to roll back the devastating consequences of austerity.

Do you care about women and non-binary people fleeing domestic violence? Do you think that they should have somewhere to go that doesn’t interrogate, criminalise or deport them? Then join us. Come to a local meeting, get skilled up, and learn how you can contribute to our fight.

Why we plastered our demands on the fence of Holloway Prison

Friday, October 11, 2019

The death of a newborn baby in HMP Bronzefield just two weeks ago reveals the violence of the prison industrial complex. An incarcerated woman was left to deliver the baby with no pain relief or medical assistance overnight. This horrific story is just one of countless examples of the criminal justice system’s structural brutality. These incidents happen in secret, out of the public eye, because so often women in prison aren’t deemed worthy of our care and protection. 

Holloway Prison has been the site of similar state violence for centuries. The prison population is overwhelmingly made up of people experiencing mental health problems, those who have experienced sexual violence, and people who have grown up in care. Sarah Reed, a 32-year-old working-class black woman with mental health support needs, died in Holloway Prison in January 2016 after a long journey of state-inflicted violence. Instead of receiving the mental health support she needed after losing her child, Sarah was subjected to abuse time and time again. The multiple instances of violence perpetrated against Sarah included an assault by an officer of the Metropolitan Police, which led to further deterioration of her mental health due to the trauma, and an attempted rape while she was later detained in a psychiatric unit under the Mental Health Act. When she died, she had been in HMP Holloway on remand for more than three months. Sarah’s story is one of many: too many to name.

When Holloway Prison first closed in 2016, many of the women inside were transferred to overcrowded facilities outside of London, further isolating them from their support networks, family and resources. The violence that took place on the site of Holloway Prison remains unhealed. Prisons do nothing to solve social problems; they are simply a management method for filtering out the ‘undesirables’ from our society. We know that they are rife with abuse, exploitation and mistreatment. We also know that once inside the prison system, chances of successful ‘rehabilitation’ for the poorest and most marginalised women is next to none. Sisters Uncut believe that nobody deserves to suffer silently as a result of state violence. We seek to expose violence, to bring it into the public eye, in order to demonstrate that the way our society functions and the way the state allocates funds and resources is fundamentally racist and sexist.

The fight to reclaim Holloway

We occupied the site of Holloway Prison in 2017, hosting a week-long community festival in the visitor centre. We wanted to demonstrate that the land could be transformed into a space of healing and safety. We demanded the use of the principles of transformative justice as an alternative to the carceral state. 

Our original demands, that the site be used for social housing and the construction of a women’s building, were initially agreed to by the council. However, these promises have been threatened by the developers’ cooperation with the police. Peabody Trust, the housing association which bought the site in March this year, is working with the Mayor’s Office for Police and Crime (MOPAC) to finance and direct the construction of the site. Sisters Uncut asserts that this relationship poisons the potential for creating a space committed to transformative justice and addressing the harms of the criminal justice system.

Yesterday, we took action by plastering the wall around the site of Holloway Prison to reaffirm demands that the land be reclaimed for social housing and the construction of a ‘women’s building’ committed to addressing the harms and violence of the criminal justice system.

We pasted shortened versions of our demands on the walls of Holloway Prison. 

Our Demands

In full, our demands are:

1. 100% of housing on the site must be at social rent.

2. 100% of housing on the site must be fully accessible, including but not limited to wheelchair accessibility, hearing loops, translation services and gender-neutral toilets. There should be a separate budget for any accessibility requirements that may arise.

3. The housing on this site should be prioritised for formerly incarcerated people and those impacted by domestic, sexual and state violence.

4. The Ministry of Justice (MOJ) should not use the money it gains from the sale of Holloway to build more prisons. Prisons are racist and expensive; they are places of suffering and state violence. 

5. Peabody should centre survivors of domestic, sexual and state violence in the decision-making and day-to-day operations of the women’s building. Survivors should be central to the creation of shared values that define the building’s purpose and operation.

6. The so-called ‘women’s building’ must:

• be inclusive of all women (trans and cis), intersex and non-binary people.
• be a full, dedicated building as opposed to a single space.
• provide support (counseling, art therapy, healing, trauma-focused initiatives, amongst other things) by prison abolitionist organisations that recognise the harms perpetrated by the criminal justice system.
• provide specialist services for marginalised groups, including survivors of colour and queer, trans, migrant and disabled survivors.
• only house provisions that do not cooperate with the Home Office or MOJ in any capacity or deny access to individuals on the basis of immigration status.
• provide a free childcare scheme.
• be free at the point of use for organisations operating in the building.
• display the artwork of survivors of state and domestic violence and provide a library, craft space, kitchen and comfortable and accessible seating. It should be a free, relaxing space for members of the local community.

We also demand that Peabody sever its financial and organizational relationship with MOPAC, and commit to constructing social housing and a women’s building guided by the above and serving the needs of the community and survivors of state, domestic and sexual violence.

While the government invests in more prisons and more policing, we know that these only increase violence; social housing and fully funded, specialised services for all survivors of domestic abuse can decrease it. There are over 14000 households on the waiting list for social housing in Islington. The Holloway site must be used to provide these services. We will fight for as long as we need to in order to ensure our demands are met.

Sisters Uncut statement on the sale of Holloway Prison

Friday, March 8, 2019

After reclaiming Holloway Prison’s Visitor Centre and working with community groups on a new vision for Holloway, we at Sisters Uncut hope that the new owners, Peabody, will listen to our demands and stick to their promises.

In May 2017 we reclaimed Holloway Prison’s Visitor Centre. We transformed a space of state violence, holding a week-long community festival with activities and workshops and demanded that the land continued to be used for public good.

We demanded that the land be used to provide genuinely affordable housing, and host a women’s* building. This building could provide services to all women and non-binary people affected by state violence, especially supporting survivors of colour, LGBTQ and disabled survivors.

New owners, Peabody, reached out to us today. They have promised a minimum 60% affordable housing provision and a Women’s Centre on the old prison site. We are glad to see our demands reflected in Peabody’s statement, and we are keen to enter discussions with them to create a new vision for Holloway which works for the community. We remain sceptical until we see our demands met in practice.

Community demands are all too often forgotten about or diluted beyond recognition in the implementation phase. We will keep on fighting ensure this land is actually used for public good, and not just as good PR for Peabody. One aspect that already gives us concern, is the changing of ‘women’s building’ in our initial demands to ‘women’s centre’ in Peabody’s documents. We will hold Islington Council and Peabody to account over our demands to ensure they are not watered down.

We regret that the sale of this land has helped generate income for the Tories’ plan to build new mega-prisons’, which slash prison budgets while doing nothing to reduce prisoner numbers. Prison and detention are dehumanising, racist, classist, sexist and transphobic. We do not believe that prisons offer a solution to crime. We at Sisters Uncut continue to fight state violence and injustice.

“Abolitionist feminism is a response to the carceral feminism of the past. This project will help to create greater insight, and hopefully more action against the prison industrial complex.”

Angela Davis speaking about the reclamation of Holloway Women’s Prison, 2017

Our demand is that the money made from the sale of the prison be used to fund services in the planned women’s* building. Using money from the sale of the site would be a symbol of recognition and reparation for local survivors of domestic and sexual violence and the women of Holloway Prison.

We hope the new site can act as a remedy for the pain so many women suffered at the hands of state violence.

* ‘Women’s Building’ is the language used by Islington Council. We will fight for a building and services that are available to all non-binary, gender non-conforming people and women and that the name is changed to reflect that.

Images from the week-long community festival we held in the reclaimed visitor’s centre of Holloway Prison.