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TUC supports women journalists over ‘highly damaging’ abuse


THE TUC’s women’s conference has passed an emergency NUJ motion on the spiralling abuse of female journalists. The NUJ highlighted the cases of Northern Ireland reporter


Patricia Devlin, who was subjected to threats including graffiti of her name against the crosshairs of a gun and Nadine White (see story on the opposite page), who was smeared online by government minister Kemi Badenoch for asking a question on a story. The motion said: “Such attacks not only harm the individuals concerned but also normalise and legitimise the harassment of journalists at work, which is highly damaging to the critical role that journalism plays in our democracy.” Natasha Hirst, chair of the NUJ’s equality


council, called on other unions for support in pushing for each recommendation to be implemented. She said: “We all know that abuse thrives behind closed


doors. It thrives when people choose to look away. It thrives when we do not actively challenge it. This is why I am a trade unionist. “Collectively, we bring solidarity and action to challenge


gender-based violence in all of its forms. So, sisters, let’s use our voices to drown out the trolls and the abusers and take action to make it stop.” Hirst told the conference that female writers are self-censoring


and withdrawing from online spaces because of abuse. Trade unionists representing members in schools, shops and


hospitals described the level of abuse many women experience during their working lives. The conference heard how domestic abuse has increased under the Covid-19 restrictions, of the stubborn statistic that on average a woman is killed by a man every three days and other findings outlined in the 2019 Femicide report. Natasha said: “Online abuse of journalists is highly gendered and is a form of discrimination and violence against women. It’s intersectional too, with black women journalists being especially targeted.” She said that, as female colleagues are


being forced to withdraw from online platforms, all our rights, freedoms and opportunities are compromised when that


journalist’s voice is silenced. The TUC’s women’s committee agreed to express solidarity


with women journalists and lobby for greater sanctions against the perpetrators of abuse. NUJ general secretary Michelle Stanistreet has played a key


role on the government and industry’s National Committee for the Safety of Journalists, and an action plan containing powerful recommendations to tackle violence, abuse and harassment of journalists in the UK.


Call to improve equality at work


TOUGHER laws are needed to improve employment equality, particularly as women have borne the brunt of the economic impact of the pandemic, Sara Lewis, vice-chair of the NUJ’s equality council told


the TUC’s women’s conference. Lewis highlighted the


proposed EU directive on pay transparency, quoting European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen who said that “for


equal pay, you need transparency”. That is why the NUJ,


unlike the government, had supported Stella Creasy’s private member’s bill to end the shameful situation where six out of 10 working


women do not know if they are paid less than their male counterparts, she said. Lewis said the Equal Pay


Act needed strengthening because there are too few sanctions for breaches. She said: “The three-


month time limit to bring a claim to an employment tribunal is a huge barrier to


Female Afghan TV workers killed


THE NUJ has joined the condemnation of the killers of three female journalists from Afghanistan’s Enikass TV. They were shot by unknown gunmen in two attacks as they attempted to return home from work in March. Mursal Wahidi, Sadia Sadat and Shahnaz


Roafi, who worked in Enikass TV’s dubbing division, were gunned down in different locations in the eastern city of Jalalabad in Nangarh’r province. The murders are the latest


06 | theJournalist


in a string of targeted attacks on media workers with the backdrop of US-brokered attempts to negotiate an end to the country’s civil war. Ekinass had earlier informed Afghanistan’s national intelligence agency about threats to its staff. The International Federation of Journalists and its affiliate the Afghan Independent Journalists’ Association called for urgent measures to improve the safety of media workers in the country.


justice. This needs to change. “As the #MeToo


movement has clearly shown, it can take a long time for women to report incidents. The NUJ also has evidence of employers delaying internal investigations, deliberately putting victims outside the time limit.”


“


Online abuse of journalists is highly gendered and is a form of discrimination and violence against women


Natasha Hirst NUJ equality council


GHULAMULLAH HABIBI/EPA-EFE/SHUTTERSTOCK


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