Men should be banned from being outdoors after 6pm to ‘make women a lot safer’ after the abduction and suspected murder of Sarah Everard in , a Green Party peer has suggested.
Baroness Jones made the comment in a discussion in the House of Lords during a debate on domestic violence.
The issue of women’s safety has been again thrust into the spotlight following the disappearance of 33-year-old Ms Everard as she walked home to Brixton from her friend’s home in Clapham, south-west London, on March 3.
The strength of feeling saw dozens of women shared their own harrowing stories online with the hashtags #saraheverard and #TooManyMen.
A vigil called Reclaim These Streets’ has been organised to in a show of support that everyone should be able to walk in public without fear.
Tips for men to make women feel more comfortable at night have also been shared on social media.
But amid demands for action, Baroness Jones, a 71-year-old mother of two daughters, went as far as to demand a blanket curfew for men.
Speaking last night, she said: ‘In the week that Sarah Everard was abducted and, we suppose, killed—because remains have been found in a woodland in Kent — I argue that, at the next opportunity for any Bill that is appropriate, I might put in an ********* to create a curfew for men on the streets after 6 pm.
‘I feel this would make women a lot safer, and discrimination of all kinds would be lessened.’
Her calls for a curfew echoed those made during the Reclaim The Night rallies in the 1970s, when members of the Women’s Liberation Movement took to the streets in the wake of the Yorkshire Ripper murders.
Baroness Jones made the comment in a discussion in the House of Lords during a debate on domestic violence.
The issue of women’s safety has been again thrust into the spotlight following the disappearance of 33-year-old Ms Everard as she walked home to Brixton from her friend’s home in Clapham, south-west London, on March 3.
The strength of feeling saw dozens of women shared their own harrowing stories online with the hashtags #saraheverard and #TooManyMen.
A vigil called Reclaim These Streets’ has been organised to in a show of support that everyone should be able to walk in public without fear.
Tips for men to make women feel more comfortable at night have also been shared on social media.
But amid demands for action, Baroness Jones, a 71-year-old mother of two daughters, went as far as to demand a blanket curfew for men.
Speaking last night, she said: ‘In the week that Sarah Everard was abducted and, we suppose, killed—because remains have been found in a woodland in Kent — I argue that, at the next opportunity for any Bill that is appropriate, I might put in an ********* to create a curfew for men on the streets after 6 pm.
‘I feel this would make women a lot safer, and discrimination of all kinds would be lessened.’
Her calls for a curfew echoed those made during the Reclaim The Night rallies in the 1970s, when members of the Women’s Liberation Movement took to the streets in the wake of the Yorkshire Ripper murders.
Alf Stewart
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