This article contains references to stalking, rape, and murder.
An emergency number created to support women who feel unsafe when walking alone has reportedly been scrapped.
It's estimated that one in two women feel unsafe walking alone after dark in a quiet street near their home (compared to one in seven men via End Violence Against Women and Girls Coalition). BT proposed the ‘888’ helpline in the wake of Wayne Couzens' arrest for the murder of Sarah Everard, a 33-year-old marketing executive who was kidnapped by the then-serving police officer in March 2021.
Pitched as a “walk me home service,” the helpline would allow women who felt unsafe to have their journeys tracked, as well as give them the opportunity to trigger an alert if they didn't get home on time.
The response to the initiative was decidedly mixed. While the former Home Secretary Priti Patel showed tentative support for the scheme – describing it as “innovative” – many women's rights campaigners argued the potential new emergency number was a waste of time and resources used to distract from the systemic nature of male violence against women and girls.
A spokesperson for BT told HuffPost UK, “It became clear over the course of our work that it does not make sense, as we thought initially, to launch a new BT service, but rather to share our learnings for the wider benefit of others already working on this,” and recommended that anyone concerned for their personal safety should “continue to dial 999.”
“Every man I saw, I wondered, ‘Is it him? Is he following me?’”
Labour’s Jess Phillips, shadow minister for domestic abuse and safeguarding, told HuffPost UK, “Again and again, this Conservative government put gimmicks and headline chasing above the hard work needed to tackle the epidemic of violence against women and girls.
“This helpline was never a serious plan, and it is telling of the Conservatives’ weakness that they supported it in the first place.”
Reclaim These Streets co-founder Jamie Klingler further criticised the motives behind the initiative in the first place, describing it as “a way to pretend that the government was doing anything substantial to actually keep women any safer.”
She adds, “It was never really a possibility and fiscally made no sense. Since the so-called watershed moment of Sarah’s murder, the government and police have done nothing to make our lives safer.
“We are getting stalked, raped and killed with our attackers never being brought to justice while they pretend to create new phone lines.”
The Home Office has distanced itself from the scheme, with a spokesperson saying, “The 888 phone line for women was a BT project, not a government scheme. We are committed to tackling all forms of violence against women and girls.
“We have so far allocated £125 million to communities across England and Wales to invest in measures including improved street lighting and CCTV, and street marshals.
“We are also supporting the Protection from Sex-Based Harassment in Public Bill, which will ensure that the criminals who intimidate and harass women face the consequences.”
A sign in Maidstone police station listed rape and sexual assault as ‘non-emergency crimes’.
BT's suggestion that women “continue to dial 999” if they feel unsafe is a small comfort. Look at Kent Police Station, which came under fire for listing rape and sexual assault as “non-emergencies.” In many cases, feeling unsafe is just that: a feeling. How do we know when the situation has escalated enough to call an emergency number?
Sadly, it's also worth pointing out that calling an emergency number, 999 or otherwise, is of limited use when the perpetrator is a serving police officer – as was the case with Wayne Couzens.
Andrea Simon, Director of the End Violence Against Women Coalition, described the 888 number as “the latest in a long line of poorly thought out ‘safety’ measures that just don’t get to the root of the problem, which is men's violence against women.”
“Unless we start thinking about this being an issue of women’s rights and freedoms instead of our safety, we’ll continue to see solutions that wrongly place the responsibility on women to protect ourselves and monitor our behaviours and movements under the guise of keeping us safe.”
She also points out the inherent security risks of the proposed number, telling GLAMOUR, “When the 888 number was proposed, we expressed concerns about the potential security risks and impact of private companies having access to women’s locations and patterns of movement – particularly as we know domestic abusers use tech platforms to monitor and perpetrate harm against women."
For more information about reporting and recovering from rape and sexual abuse, you can contact Rape Crisis.
If you have been sexually assaulted, you can find your nearest Sexual Assault Referral Centre here. You can also find support at your local GP, voluntary organisations such as Rape Crisis, Women's Aid, and Victim Support, and you can report it to the police (if you choose) here.
For more from Glamour UK's Lucy Morgan, follow her on Instagram @lucyalexxandra.
