A Richmond councillor and White Ribbon champion is planning a charity walk as part of an anti violence initiative.
Katie Mansfield is hosting a walk from Twickenham to Richmond on 6 December in light of the White Ribbon charity, looking to end violence against women and girls (VAWG).
The event starts from York House in Twickenham at 5pm and will end at the Richmond train station and throughout there will be speeches and awareness sessions conducted by Mansfield and other spokespeople.
Bystander training is something that will be included, which aims to help people respond proactively to a potentially dangerous situation where violence is a risk, while maintaining discretion for the safety of everyone involved.
Mansfield said: “You ask anybody about violence against women and girls- and nobody’s going to tell you it’s a good thing, but people don’t know what to do.
“This walk is an opportunity for us to tell people the sorts of things that you can do, like with the bystander training to get more involved and help people in potentially dangerous circumstances, to get that confidence and to know that you’re doing it where you’re not putting yourself in danger.
“Doing the bystander training myself has made me react differently.”
On 15 October, the council proposed a three-year strategy to combat VAWG in Richmond, following increasing national and global focus on the issue.
Mansfield said: “VAWG is a scourge on our society at the moment, it’s almost at pandemic levels and has increased by 37% over the last five years.
“People don’t realise the impact and that it’s happening quite often because it happens behind closed doors and people assume it doesn’t happen in their own area.
“We have an image of what violence against women and girls is, which isn’t correct.”
The main goal of the initiative is educating the future generation of men through partnering with local schools, community groups and sports clubs in hopes of intervening early and holding perpetrators to account.
Mansfield said: “We’ve been working very closely with Hampton and Richmond Football Club and other local sports organisations because the coaches and the people who are there talking to these boys on a day to day basis, are the people who can make the change.
“They’re the ones that the boys listen to, because there’s a real lack of online role models for young boys nowadays, people who can help influence them in the right direction.”
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