The betrayal of abused women

We’ve had a recent issue here in Wales.

By Cathy Larkman

We happen to think that women fleeing domestic violence, who are accessing a service that they believe will consist of female workers only, should not be gaslit.

That they should feel safe and secure that when they are told that a woman will support them.

That their case worker will be an actual woman. 

That they should not be confronted with a man pretending to be a woman.

But that is exactly what has been allowed to happen here.

We think that is unlawful, immoral and a betrayal of vulnerable women.

Domestic abuse charities do great work. They were, after all, originally established by the hard work and dedication of grassroots women who had themselves experienced or witnessed domestic violence. They knew from bitter experience what was needed – supportive services for traumatised women to escape violent, abusive relationships and to rebuild their lives, and those of their children. They also knew how important it was that traumatised women were supported by fellow women, and that a woman-only service could be assured.

As these services have developed from grassroots organisations (funded by women out of their own pockets, in their front rooms and in broom cupboards in the students’ unions) into funded organisations with CEOs at the helm and multiple employees on the payroll, that dynamic has remained constant. Traumatised women need the support of other women. Inflicting men on them at such a time is unthinkable and cruel.

To ensure this horror doesn’t happen, Schedule 9, Part 1 of the Equality Act 2010 helps out such organisations applying for staff with an occupational requirement exception, which permits such jobs to be applicable for women only. Otherwise, job applications for sensitive roles like this would be open to men too who could sue for discrimination if prohibited from applying or taking up these roles. Schedule 9 Part 1 is explicit in stating that there is no ‘get around’ this exception by virtue of being transgender.

This makes good sense for domestic abuse organisations because the statistics in terms of which sex are primarily the victims of domestic violence, and the sex that are primarily the perpetrators, are overwhelming. Victims are mainly female, perpetrators are mainly male. Welsh Women’s Aid acknowledge this fact:

“The ONS 2020 reports that in year ending March 2020 that 92% of defendants in domestic abuse related prosecutions were male. Further evidence from the Crown Prosecution Service shows the disproportionately gendered nature of these crimes.”

So earlier this week, when we were alerted by a deeply concerned former domestic abuse support worker of an email she had received from the Indeed jobs recruitment site, encouraging her to apply for one of three ‘Road to Recovery Project Worker’ roles that cited Schedule 9, Part 1 incorrectly, we felt we had to look into it. The advert had been placed by Carmarthenshire Domestic Abuse Services, who are in partnership with West Wales Domestic Abuse Services. The relevant section of the advert is below. Spot the very obvious problem.

Yes. They are including men. Despite the fact that they were citing Schedule 9, Part 1, they were including men ‘with lived experience of being a woman’. What does that mean exactly? Calling oneself Daphne? Wearing a dress? Getting paid less? Doing the majority of the housework?

We could picture job applications going in with a rapidly approaching deadline, and the said ‘Daphne’ being recruited with all his ‘lived experience’ and being allocated to a vulnerable abused woman. Not acceptable.

We were also having flashbacks to the Edinburgh Rape Crisis fiasco of Mridul Wadhwa, a man who was Chief Executive there who talked of raped women ‘reframing their trauma’ when confronted with a man pretending to be a woman.

A long exchange of letters was not an option. So we immediately gave this public exposure via a short, polite and to the point X post thread, tagging in the WWDAS CEO. We pointed out the unacceptability of the advert and that the exemption cited is the reason for excluding ALL men.

Perhaps we were a little optimistic in expecting a professional response along the lines of ‘This is an error and will be rectified forthwith. Thank you for bringing it to my attention’. Ahem. Instead, we were met with a flurry of responses from the CEO starting with – you are so wrong, you don’t understand the oppression of women, you aren’t ‘truly feminist’ and then morphed into – it’s not us anyway, that advert was placed by our partners.

We were also told we weren’t being ‘kind’. Where have we heard that before?

We asked many times if she thought men pretending to be women should be allowed to apply for these jobs, but perhaps she missed these questions, as she certainly didn’t answer them. Then eventually (at our own suggestion), she appeared to very grudgingly take on board the need to look into the advert the next morning and potentially correct it. Phew!

The next morning brought corrected adverts (yippee! Well, there is one that hasn’t been corrected yet, but we’re on it). And a tweet from the CEO saying that "conversations have been had in a very thoughtful and kind way and the highlighted issue has been looked at and has been changed. Thank you to those who pointed out this mistake."

Gosh, that’s better, isn’t it? Although we were still being tone policed. But we all know about the Bananarama thing, don’t we? It’s not what we said, it’s the way that we said it.

(This is not WRN Wales)

This brief but heightened exchange took place against a background of total ideological capture in Wales at the very highest levels of government. The Welsh Government have still not made changes to any policies in light of the Supreme Court judgment and claim to be ‘waiting’ for the EHRC.  In the meantime, their own policies continue to piously state their belief that TWAW. And of course, they provide vital funding to the very domestic violence organisations needed to support abused women. So it should come as no surprise at all when these very organisations parrot the same ideological nonsense of ‘lived experience of being a woman’. Their funding likely depends on it.

These local domestic abuse services come under the umbrella of Welsh Women’s Aid, who are funded by Welsh Government, but whose policies and statements on their website are unclear and contradictory at best. We have, of course, tried to clear this confusion up with them, writing to them (along with our fellow Welsh women’s group, Merched Cymru) in May 2025. Despite addressing the letter to the CEO, we have received no reply. Funny that.

Read the full letter here.

Our concern is not just a precautionary one. Take a look at this statement by Welsh Women’s Aid in October 2023.

“This is not the time to stand back and be silent. We stand with all women and all victims and survivors of violence. We are inclusionary and when we discuss ending violence against women, we inherently include transwomen.” 

It was good to win this particular battle and to make sure women escaping domestic violence in Carmarthenshire and West Wales won’t be further traumatised and gaslit. BUT. We will be checking each and every domestic violence service in Wales.

Expect those still betraying the women they serve, and the women who worked so hard to set them up, to be called to account.

Hopefully with a little less CEO drama.