The Peterborough Evening Telegraph
Councillor’s bid to end abuse of women
Female councillors tell of threats and attacks
Peterborough City Councillor Dr Shabina Qayyum has vowed to continue her fight to end the abuse of women in politics by members of the public.
Cllr Qayyum (Labour, East), who said she had been the victim of a number of serious threatening and racist online attacks since being elected in May 2019, tabled a motion at last week’s full council meeting aimed at tackling abuse and bullying against women in politics from members of the public.
However, councillors were divided when a subsequent amendment looked to broaden the motion to include all political figures, not just women specifically.
Cllr Qayyum’s motion was defeated by the narrowest of margins at the meeting.
Following the meeting, adisappointed Cllr Qayyum, said: “This is not the end of the matter, only the beginning. My intention was to highlight specifically the abuse women in politics face from members of the public, and I’m very proud to have raised this issue.
“Clearly from what we witnessed
[at the meeting], female councillors from all political parties have also had abuse, bullying and harassment of some kind to deal with during their time in public office – some only admitting this for the very first time.
“Yes, I’m disappointed that Cllr Irene Walsh (Conservative, Orton Longueville), as a woman, did not support my motion.
“But firstly, there was no acknowledgment from her last night that my motion was specifically aimed at highlighting the abuse of women, with all the statistics showing this to be disproportionately the case.
“We offered her the opportunity to withdraw her
amendment so that my motion could pass, and Cllr Walsh could then bring her own motion calling for an end to abuse of all councillors – male and female – to the next full council; but she felt unable to do so.
“Cllr Walsh explained to me that if she’d done so, it would’ve ‘burnt-out’ the council officers with unnecessary additional work, well, I just don’t buy that.
“So, my motion didn’t go through – it was amended by Cllr Walsh; but I have no regrets, as I realise now that I have a lot of work to do articulating concerns and experiences of women in politics.”
Cllr Irene Walsh, who brought the ultimately successful amendment to full council, had also taken time to consider the events of the meeting.
She said: “I must admit that when I first saw the motion [from Cllr Qayyum] I was quite minded to support it, as I agree with her statements.
“The reason I brought the amendment was I believe a good outcome will come from it, fed into a Task and Finish Group.
“But this is something that’s directed towards both male and female councillors.
“Yes, it was shocking to listen to the stories being told by my fellow female councillors during the meeting – some coming forward for the very first time – but I wasn’t all that surprised, I’m saddened to say.
“Had my amendment fallen, we’d agreed as a group [the Conservatives] that we would support Cllr Qayyum’s motion, because this is work that needs to be done. I just felt that it was better if we included everybody at once.
“It seemed to me only logical that the same advice could be shared with our male counterparts, as it would be a waste of officer resources and time to do the work twice over, bearing in mind how overstretched our officers are with so many of them being deployed to Covid-19 work.”