THE UK has still to ratify a European convention on women’s rights, despite signing up to it four years ago.Now, nine women’s groups have added their name to a letter penned by Paisley MP Gavin Newlands, urging David Cameron to make the measures in the treaty legally binding.White Ribbon UK, Scottish Women’s Aid, Women’s Aid UK, End Violence Against Women Coalition, Engender, iChange, No More Page 3, Rape Crisis Scotland and Zero Tolerance have all added their names to the demand. They acknowledge that there has been “positive work” in terms of abuse, but point out that one in four women still experience some form of violence in their lives – a statistic, they say, that should “shame and anger us all”.The letter goes on: “In 2012, the UK signed up to the Istanbul Convention and agreed to implement a series of co-ordinated measures and preventative policies that would help to tackle violence against women. However, to date the UK Government has failed to ratify the Istanbul Convention”Newlands said: “Tackling and ending the violence that many women face on a daily basis is an issue that unites the parliament, however we should not allow that level of consensus to foster complacency.”The convention has been signed by 39 countries, but has been ratified by just 19. Most measures in the bill, creating offences against stalking, rape, forced marriage and female genital mutilation are already illegal in the UK, but there are some, such as making support services statutory, which would require significant investment. During a debate in parliament last week, Home Office minister Cheryl Gillan said the problem with ratification was over the “extraterritorial jurisdiction” measures allowing countries to claim legal authority beyond their borders.Gillan said: “There is one article – article 44 – that we are not yet in compliance with. That is the extraterritoriality measure, which basically means that the criminal law in the UK would extend to conduct abroad. I hope that hon. Members from Scotland and other devolved administrations will understand why there may be some problems in ensuring that the two jurisdictions’ legal systems work with that particular issue. We will need to introduce primary legislation in the UK to put that in place, but when we have done that we will be able to ratify the Istanbul convention.”
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