WNC07/2/03
The Muslim Women’s Network
The Muslim Women’s Network (MWN) began life as a small group meeting from time to time with the then Secretary of State for Trade and Industry and Minister for Women, Patricia Hewitt, to act as an unofficial sounding board for a particularly excluded group. In 2003 Patricia invited the WNC to take over support for the group, and to extend the group to make it more representative of a wider range of Muslim women and to mainstream its advisory role across other Government Departments. Whilst Minister for Women, Patricia met with the group regularly. The WNC’s remit was to facilitate the MWN’s engagement with government, the aim being to build their links to government and make key contributions to inclusive community dialogues across the various faith communities that embrace Islam, and to reach the more secular groups within the community. The MWN is particularly focussed on reaching excluded women who have no other voice. Muslim women’s organisations are among the most poorly resourced in the voluntary and community sector.
In 2004, the WNC’s applied and obtained funds from the Race, Cohesion and Faith Unit (RCFU), then based in the Home Office, to undertake a listening exercise with Muslim women. The objectives contained in the proposal were to reach the most excluded women and to bring their authentic voice to Government, without setting the agenda for them. The proposal document identified the MWN as the steering group for the report. The aim was to bridge the gap in data about the opinions of women in the Muslim community.
The MWN used their contacts to help WNC reach 200 women from five cities across England. Five one-day events were held at which women spoke freely about the barriers they face as Muslim women. In addition, small focus group discussions were held for lesbian and transsexual Muslims, and for those suffering form domestic violence and other forms of violence, to enable women who were unable to raise these issues in open forum, to speak.
The keynote speaker at the Birmingham event was a Muslim woman chaplain who worked in a local hospital. Her particular line of work and experiences generated much positive discussion, with many women applauding her role and questioning why more Muslim women were not carrying out similar roles within the public sector
The report ‘She Who Disputes – Muslim Women Shape the Debate’ was launched in December 2006. Patricia Hewitt, by this point Secretary of State for Health, attended and spoke. In February 2007, the WNC Chair and Professor Haleh Afshar, Chair of the MWN, as well as MWN members, met Patricia Hewitt to discuss how to take the health issues identified in the report forward. WNC officials agreed to meet Health officials to discuss further research in pilot PCTs to develop solutions to the problems identified. Department of Health funding is being agreed for this. In addition the MWN are looking for alternative ways to fund their independence.