'We need to ask' about gender-based violence

Poppy Murray said more data should be collected to find out if a taskforce is needed

A safety campaigner is calling for more research to establish whether a task force is needed to combat violence against women and girls on the island.

Poppy Murray, the founder of charity Safety Net Guernsey, said it was "impossible" to say without data and she added that just 15% of victims were currently reporting crimes.

It comes after Home Affairs president Marc Leadbeater said there were no plans for a specific task force like the one Jersey has but he said he wanted to improve services to encourage victims to feel they could come forward.

"When we look at the global picture we are incredibly far behind because we don't know what the state of the situation is," Ms Murray said.

'Not being heard'

She said students in Guernsey had not been asked about their experience of violence towards women and girls.

"The absolutely essential thing we need to be doing is collecting data to understand the prevalence of these issues and getting the experiences of all victims," she said.

"We have a situation where 85% of victims of gender-based violence are not being heard."

She said she was initially disappointed that there would be no task force but she added that she thought the door was "looking a bit more open than it initially did".

Ms Murray called for more work around the experience of young girls.

Sexual harassment

Deputy Tom Rylatt asked a question in parliament about the creation of a Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) taskforce similar to the one in Jersey.

Deputy Leadbetter said it was not right to say Guernsey was behind Jersey as "our strategy continues to support the delivery of improved legislation and services locally".

He said it was likely to see an increase in the reporting of crime.

Ms Murray said: "Jersey has given us a complete road map in how to do this."

She explained Jersey's action was prompted by the high number of schoolgirls who had reported "a high level of sexual harassment during the school day".

Ms Murray added: "We have not asked students in Guernsey what their experience is.

"The United Nations is calling this an epidemic and calling it a human rights violation against women.

"In understanding the scale of this issue and where our efforts are best directed it is impossible to be ahead of anyone if we don't have the data because that means you're trying to fix a problem that you don't understand."