Women's Aid: 1990s

1993
• The Home Affairs Select Committee Enquiry into Domestic Violence recommended that funding to ensure effective provision of refuge services was the single most important measure that the government could take.
• Women’s Aid began supporting the television soap opera Brookside in a long-running, high-profile storyline on a family experiencing domestic violence until its conclusion in 1995.
• Women’s Aid released the first ever domestic violence cinema advert ‘Don’t Stand For It’ in October, to the soundtrack of Lyle Lovett’s ‘Stand By Your Man’. Supported by the Home Office, it ran in Pearl and Dean cinemas throughout the UK until January 1994, reaching a projected audience of 2 million people. A subsequent joint public awareness campaign with the Home Office was released in October 1994, with leaflets and posters.

1994
• The Women’s Aid Training Unit was established to provide training for women working with domestic violence and refuge projects in England. 

1995
• Women’s Aid launched a national postcard campaign with The Body Shop, the ‘One: 5’ campaign, to raise awareness of domestic violence and to lobby the government for greater legal protections. Women’s Aid also worked with The Body Shop’s design team to update their logo and branding for their publications. 

1996
• Women’s Aid successfully lobbied for amendments to the Family Law Act 1996, which introduced orders that helped exclude perpetrators from victims-survivors’ homes and forbade them from threatening or using violence against a victim and any relevant children.
• The Housing Act 1996 broadened the definition of homelessness for those who were eligible for state accommodation, including explicitly referring to victims of domestic violence for the first time.

1997
• The Protection from Harassment Act 1997 was passed as law, introducing in 1998 new protection orders which could be used when dealing with post-separation harassment and stalking.
• The National Domestic Violence Helpline extended its opening hours and received a ‘Lo-Call’ 0345 number.

1998
• Women’s Aid launched the campaign ‘Families Without Fear: the Women’s Aid Agenda for Action on Domestic Violence’ on 14 October, with recommendations to the government of actions needed to tackle domestic violence. The subsequent report was circulated to over 40,000 organisations and individuals, and was backed by a postcard campaign to the government and Women’s Minister to lobby for a national strategy on domestic violence.

1999
• In response to the ‘Families Without Fear’ campaign, the government launched ‘Living Without Fear’, a national strategic approach to violence against women. It was the first government initiative to address violence against women.
• Women’s Aid launched their Millennium Campaign ‘A Future Without Fear: Stop Domestic Violence’ in London on 23 November, supported by a week of action to tie in with two other events: the International Day Against Violence Against Women and the European Women's Lobby campaign for ‘Violence-free Cities’.

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