Letter to BBC One – Panorama re Jimmy Savile

Hello,

Your story on Jimmy Savile was long overdue – about 50 years overdue. It felt like the Beeb was more disappointed it didn’t get the scoop and quibbling over who was responsible for pulling the story last November than investigating the real story.

The real story here is the Criminal Collusion in paedophilia of literally hundreds of people while he was a predator.

Everyone you interviewed who worked with Savile had heard him bragging about having sex with girls, had seen Savile with young girls and boys, had known there was something illegal going on – and did nothing.

Paul Gambaccini should be arrested – appalling that he knew what was going on and did nothing, said nothing. In fact, all the men from the BBC interviewed are obviously lying and chose to do nothing to stop the obviously wide-spread paedophile gang at the BBC. Your key victim said there were loads of people in the dressing room when Gary Glitter was raping a girl. It’s glaringly obvious that there are now hundreds of men shaking in their boots and hoping the police don’t expose their perversion.  I was victim to a predatory sexual abuser from age 5-10 and I know a liar when I see one.

It’s obvious that hundreds of people were in Criminal Collusion with Savile and that’s the real story. Savile’s own admission in his autobiography that he had taken a young girl in one night – and that if the officer told anyone about it, that everyone at the station would go down too – is a clear indication that everyone knew what was going on, and still it was allowed to continue for the ratings – incomprehensible. The POLICE knew and still did nothing. That needs criminal investigation.

How can you let this REAL story be allowed to go untold?

The more TRUTHFUL story is that this is still going on today – the abuse of girls and boys as sex slaves in England and all over the world perpetuates this attitude that it’s somehow OK to sexually exploit young people and the rest of the cronies getting gratification from this perversion will cover it up so they are not all exposed in their Criminal Collusion.

You have the opportunity and the RESPONSIBILITY now to blow this out of the water and get TRUE justice for all the girls and boys being exploited by paedophilia gangs. And insistently produce research to expose all the colluders in the Savile years at the BBC. I am more than willing to give time to support this if needed. Whatever it takes. Enough.

I sincerely hope you start to dig deeper into the rot of our society and expose the truth of what we are allowing to exist in our seemingly ‘free’ society. Only free for some, obviously.

Yours truly,
Sarah Cloutier

Abraham Lincoln and Governance

My amazing friend, Victoria Carter, wrote this and it has so touched me that I felt to share it with you all:

In my heart today, is just what government & governance is actually about.. What IS true governance? In the last couple of days, I have (again) found myself drawn to the amazing man that Abraham Lincoln was. A politician, who felt and considered every decision so very deeply… for he knew the great responsibility of governing PEOPLE. He cared most deeply for all.

Two brief examples… At the end of the civil war, he made no efforts towards glorifying any ‘victory’ (of the Union), but rather immediately set about bringing the people together (i.e. towards a truly lived ‘union’). At Gettysburg, in dedicating a cemetery for soldiers, Lincoln spoke of a “government of the people, by the people, for the people”, that those who had perished “shall not have died in vain” for this true form of governance “of the people…”, “shall not perish from the earth”.

I am deeply touched by this man’s example, so much so that I can no longer ‘give up’ and numbly accept the many ill ways our government & its systems operate, nor the fact that there are issues of great importance for all, for our times and future times, that ask us to not hold back in clearly calling for response from those who are “in power”. Lincoln earthed something for us all, but what have we done with it since?

We ALL have the power to speak up and communicate with our local members, & even our prime ministers (as Sarah Cloutier has done), on the issues we know with absolute clarity, are deeply important for all. So to those of us who may have long given up on having any capacity to truly call for change, I say, let’s shake off the cobwebs and reclaim the part we can all play – it’s about all of us, it’s about humanity. Let’s turn the tide. With deep love, Victoria
Thank you so much Victoria – true Governance comes from us all with our true voice.

The Show Must Go On?

Latin – collusionem “act of colluding,” from colludere, from com- “together” + ludere “to play,” from ludus “game” (see ludicrous).

English – collusion – secret agreement for a fraudulent purpose; connivance; conspiracy. To defraud another of his or her rights.

Esther Rantzen (English journalist and television presented who worked at he BBC from 1965-2006 and founder of the child protection charity, ChildLine) is quoted in the ITV documentary Exposure: Tthe Other Side of Jimmy Savile, “We colluded in this”.

There are now over 200 claims of sexual abuse and pedophilia against Jimmy Savile from women (who were girls) from charities he was the patron, hospitals he volunteered in, while he was at the BBC, in the girl’s home he was a patron – over a period of about 60 years. The man was a predator and if he was alive, the documentary claims he would be arrested.

Let’s start this performance with a play on words from the definitions …

  • Have we been silenced from speaking truth because we are unwittingly being deceived into a secret agreement for a fraudulent purpose?
  • Are we playing a ludicrous game together to defraud another of his or her rights?
  • Is the collusion another level of the numb stupor we are in?
  • Are we blind to the collusion of ignorance and apathy?
  • Are we acting and performing as puppets in some secret agreement?
  • Are we sticking together in the game to not be singled out in truth?

My recent letters to the PM’s were an expression I find natural and effortless. My truth is an expression of our truth and all of humanity – all equally so. So why then did I feel to control the manner and time of their release? When the truth needs telling so desperately, why do we hold back saying it?

Yes, we speakers of truth have been persecuted in the past, but that’s not happening today. The only persecution is to HOLD BACK – oh the irony.

The pain of holding back truth is now greater than silence.

The women speaking publicly about their treatment at the hands of Jimmy Savile are a tiny speck of society who are saying no to collusion in abuse. They were afraid of Savile and have not felt comfortable in coming forward until after his death. Even now, some of the women are still afraid and had their identity changed and voices digitally altered in the interviews.

We continue to accept abuse and allow it every day. These women were colluding in Savile’s ‘celebrity’ and the crumbs of attention they were receiving were enough for them to accept the sexual abuse. I know pedophilia first hand and the impact of keeping silent had a huge impact on how I lived my life. I was promiscuous, and took drugs, alcohol and food to numb myself.

In truth, the abuse continues when we don’t take responsibility for ourselves. In my case, it is an ongoing tender treatment of myself that stops the spiral of self-abuse. In holding back sending the letter because ‘it wasn’t going in the right format’, I was in truth being abusive to myself and humanity. My centralised view of myself had an impact on the whole. Thank God I’ve sent it and stopped the collusion in silence!

But that’s the game! We are so centralised and think that what we do doesn’t affect anyone else. We collude with the game and defraud another of his or her rights. We allow abuse to permeate everything and live a performance, scripted for us to be accepted and liked and not wanting to be singled out.

The show must go on. Really?

We are all invested in the collusion, as Esther Rantzen says, ‘We colluded in this’. We have allowed this lie to perpetuate and we create lies and justifications to keep our tiny world spinning around with little regard for our brothers.

The show needs to be cancelled. No curtain call. No standing ovation. One final bow. Enough.

Letter to Prime Minister David Cameron

October 8, 2012

Mr. David Cameron
Prime Minister
10 Downing Street
London SW1A 2AA

Dear Mr. Cameron,

“ANY FAILURE WITHIN THE MEDIA AFFECTS ALL OF US”

Lord Justice Leveson opened the hearings on 14 November 2011, saying: “The press provides an essential check on all aspects of public life. That is why any failure within the media affects all of us. At the heart of this Inquiry, therefore, may be one simple question: who guards the guardians?”

I call on the Leveson Inquiry, and you as the Head of our Government, to establish a monitor for the Abuse of Women in/by the Media and to create a platform for this type of journalism to stop as part of Module 4: Submissions on The Future Regime for the Press.

In your own words from the Andrew Marr interview on 7 October 2012, “We need to have a regulatory system that works.” I know you were particularly referring to members of the public directly affected by phone hacking – but there is a bigger remit called for, as a matter of urgency. There is a greater need for the Government to harness the complete picture of the media and its need for regulation.

In July 2012, London lit up with the opening ceremony of London 2012. During the event, the Suffragettes were wheeled out to show how far we had advanced as a society and how far we’d come as a western civilisation. Have we really?

The recent allegations against Jimmy Saville, and the revelations that Radio 1 boss knew about his behaviour towards girls, show that we allow impropriety and abuse without question. We are continuing to allow the abuse of women in our society by not challenging and questioning it. These allegations have started an out-pouring of honesty of sexually abusive treatment of women within the BBC, including Liz Kershaw and Sandi Toksvig. Women’s silence perpetuates the behaviour at the BBC experienced by Ms Kershaw and Ms Toksvig and that experienced by many thousands of women, including myself.

There are some male dominated industries, journalism is one – and I have worked in film and television for over 25 years – I know all about the aside remarks about my arse, snide comments, stares at my breasts, sexual innuendo, groping, put downs in meetings and judgment of my capability based on the fact that I am a woman, not on my experience or tertiary degree. I have endured the whistles from builders, groping in nightclubs and pubs and the inevitable judgment on my appearance, comments on the length of my skirt, the tightness of my jeans/t-shirt etc, etc.

Having worked my way up the ranks to General Manager for a film post production company, I still have to deal with the “don’t get emotional” comments when I need to manage a difficult situation at work. I expose it when it happens, and I can change my work environment because I am the boss. The men on the Executive can still be condescending and inappropriate. This attitude, and the fact that men feel this behaviour is acceptable, is perpetuated by the onslaught of soft porn and opinion-based ‘journalism’ we are bombarded with from the mainstream media today, and the denigration of women as a result.

“For women working in [the showbusiness] industry, sexual harassment was something you just had to ignore every day of your working life” said journalist and broadcaster Janet Street-Porter, writing in the Daily Mail. “To understand a male mindset that considers fondling, groping and worse as perfectly normal behaviour in the workplace, look at what was broadcast at the time, and how women were portrayed.”

Nothing’s changed.

Please feel free to review the links here from recent ‘stories’ about Kristen Stewart, Geri Halliwell, Page 3 Girls, and you will see that we have not evolved one iota – the Media continues to treat women as play things and mindless twits who allegedly hug teddy bears, seek spiritual support – or better still – just get their kit off and act like a porn star. These three examples took me all of two minutes to find on The Sun* online – and these are accessible to young women all over the world. Is that how you would like your daughter, niece, granddaughter, girlfriend, sister or wife portrayed? Or are you OK with the continued degradation of women on a daily basis? We have reduced women to objects (again) and technology has brought it onto the phones of our children – I strongly recommend that more responsibility is needed from the Media, its regulators and Heads of Government.

Now I know most men will say – “Love, if you don’t like it then don’t read it, you sensitive little thing.” With a patronising tone aimed at belittling any feeling of objectification these stories/publications have on women. And I know there are some women who would discount this opinion with “Don’t be a prude – you just need a f*&k/vodka/chocolate”.

The barbed response by The Telegraph’s Brendan O’Neill to the Campaign to Stop the Sun’s Page 3 was revealing in his attitude towards women simply as a “daily serving of boobs” – Seriously?! – Is there no end to the feminist nagging about Page 3? Yet another censorious campaign has been launched to try to rid Britain of the alleged scourge that is the Sun’s daily serving of boobs.” Very revealing is the attitude of men in England from responses to this article, with the majority supporting his view. Begs the question – Is showing bare breasts ‘news’?

Two comments to Mr. O’Neill’s ‘article’ are more close to a healthy societal view –  “I am a Father and a Doctor, I have been observing the continual rise of violence especially sexual violence against women. The facts are out there, continual exposure to pornography turns the female into an object there for the gratification of desire, whether it is The Sun or an advert. It is time for our society to grow up and behave responsibly to its children, I fear for my daughters. I am disgusted and disappointed with the trite, childish comments in this article.” And, “[The Sun is] a family paper that will be left around the house and on trains, on benches. Children can pick it up and see that apparently it’s entirely normal for a woman to have bare breasts in this family newspaper. They grow up thinking this is normal, that porn belongs in the mainstream, rather than on the top shelf. That’s the difference. It normalises women as sex objects. Hear that? Normalises it. Places it in the mainstream.”

There’s nowhere to hide anymore.

These all highlight the lack of responsibility taken by people (predominantly men) in power to act when they are aware there is wrongdoing. As a society, we have made this behaviour acceptable. As individuals we feel we have no power and no voice against the establishment of large organisations, headed by men. These women are our sisters, daughters, nieces, granddaughters, wives, mothers and friends.

How long are men in power going to allow the abuse of women to be ‘normalised’ to the level that it is today?

We are supposedly in a modern western society, where women have the right to choose what we study, where we work, where we live, whom we marry, what we wear, whom we date, what we eat and the life we choose to live. There are other women in the world who do not have these freedoms and are still subjected to witch hunts, stoning, slavery, forced marriages and lives of abuse.

Through lack of responsibility and passive acceptance, we continue to perpetuate a society that condones the abuse of women. This type of behaviour is legally not allowed in the workplace and, after studying UK and Australian HR law, this behaviour regularly gets employers and perpetrators into a world of litigation. Yet we allow it every day in our press and media. Why is that?

The Australian press (Courier Mail, News Corp*) has made claims recently that women who seek truth and a loving way of life are gormless, mindless followers and that we don’t have the intelligence to choose how we live. The blatant approval of sexual abuse in the article is simply shocking. The author states that one of the healing techniques offered by female practitioners caused women “to not allow their partners to touch [their breasts] without permission”.

There in-lies a deep fracture in the Media and how it portrays women as a whole. Less concerning is the drivel of two men’s opinion thinly veiled as ‘journalism’ – more devastating is the impact of this tirade of derogatory and misogynistic attitude towards women by mainstream media.

According to the NSPCC, “Including all costs, the total cost of domestic abuse for the state, employers and victims is estimated at around £16 billion per year”. Though further independent findings by London Metropolitan University estimate it to be £23 billion per year.

The Crown Prosecution Service (UK) released a transcript – Domestic Violence: the facts, the issues, the future – Speech by the Director of Public Prosecutions, Keir Starmer QC (posted 12 April 2011) – it states some chilling facts:

  • Nearly 1 million women experience at least one incident of domestic abuse each year
  • At least 750,000 children a year witness domestic violence
  • Two women are killed each week by their partner or ex-partner
  • 54 per cent of women victims of serious sexual assault were assaulted by their partner or ex-partner
  • Victims of domestic violence are more likely to experience repeat victimisation than victims of any other types of crime
  • 76 per cent of all DV incidents are repeat
  • Women experience an average of 35 incidents of domestic violence before reporting an incident to the police
  • 19 per cent of women have experienced stalking since the age of 16

These statistics are our sisters, daughters, nieces, granddaughters, wives, mothers and friends.

His closing statement is one for reflection, “The steps that we and our criminal justice partners are taking to tackle domestic violence risk limited success unless this complacency is tackled head on. A change in attitude is clearly needed.”

Where are we headed if all the rates of domestic violence, violence towards women is increasing year after year?

Rudi Giuliani’s decision to have a zero tolerance for crime when he was Mayor of New York City was welcomed by residents of the city. From 1993-2001, crime and related violence dropped 56% in the FBI Crime Index. New Yorkers wanted to remain living in the city and it became the “safest large city in the nation”. With decisive action, a message would be sent to everyone that order would be maintained.

How amazing would our society be if the Government were to boldly establish zero-tolerance to the Abuse of Women in/by the Media? If you set a zero tolerance to the abuse of women in our daily papers, it will have profound affect on home life. And the £23 billion we are spending on the results of domestic violence could be joyfully redirected.

The Leveson Inquiry, and you as the head of our Government, have a responsibility to consider guidelines, recommendations and regulations on the Abuse of Women in/by the Media to ensure we arrest this momentum. We need to leave a foundation for our children and our future generations that respects women and shows that there is another, more caring way to treat women that will inevitably benefit men and our society as a whole.

ENOUGH.

Seriously, Enough. Our complacent attitude towards the treatment of women in our society by the Media has to stop. We need to step up and take responsibility for the impact that the Media has on our attitude towards women.

This issue is not going away – daily revelations about the treatment of women are becoming the norm and it cannot be ignored any further. Please advise me on receipt of this letter and I would appreciate any update on the progress in seeing these real concerns through.

Inaction on your part will clearly show collusion and acceptance that the current state of affairs is acceptable for you, your wife, your daughters and women everywhere.

I welcome your questions and would make myself available to meet with you or one of your team to discuss this further.

Yours truly,

Sarah Cloutier

Letter to Prime Minister Julia Gillard

October 10, 2012

Dear Ms. Gillard,

The Australian High Court passed a law on August 14, 2012 to remove branding from cigarette packets. This has created a foundation for how we legislate for true change, which is to be applauded. Nicotine related lung cancer costs the Australian Community according to the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare A$107m per year. Domestic Violence and Childhood Sexual Abuse cost the Government A$8bn per year – an immense difference that we choose to ignore. And the A$8bn a year does not include the costs of ongoing counselling and healing – and the emotional costs for victims is unfathomable.

Why isn’t the Government addressing the Domestic Violence and Childhood Sexual Abuse as fervently as it has lobbied for the removal of branding on cigarette packets?

Your recent exposé of misogyny and sexism relating to the Opposition Leader, Tony Abbot, is the earthquake that has cracked a chasm of truth about the appalling treatment of women and you have an obligation as leader of the Australian Government to do something about it.

Alan Jones’ consistent denigration of you is tiresome, and personally extremely hurtful and offensive, yet, by everyone not standing up to this, and as you so clearly pointed out, we are accepting it as the norm and allowing it to continue. We have allowed it to creep into our everyday lives so that when it happens we make an excuse to stay silent and collude with the abuse.

There are some male dominated industries, journalism is one – and I have worked in film and television for over 25 years – I know all about the aside remarks about my arse, snide comments, stares at my breasts, sexual innuendo, groping, put downs in meetings and judgment of my capability based on the fact that I am a woman, not on my experience or tertiary degree. I have endured the whistles from builders, groping in nightclubs and pubs and the inevitable judgment on my appearance, comments on the length of my skirt, the tightness of my jeans/t-shirt etc, etc.

I have worked my way up the ranks to General Manager for a film post production company in Melbourne. While there I had to deal with the “don’t get emotional” comments when I needed to manage a difficult situation at work. I expose it when it happens, and I can change my work environment as the manager. Men on the Executive could still be condescending and inappropriate. This attitude, and the fact that men feel this behaviour is acceptable, is perpetuated by the onslaught of soft porn and opinion-based ‘journalism’ we are bombarded with from the mainstream media today, and the denigration of women as a result.

The recent allegations, now over 120, against Jimmy Saville in the UK, and the revelations that Radio 1 boss knew about his behaviour towards girls, clearly show that we allow impropriety and abuse without question. We are continuing to allow the Abuse of Women in our society by not challenging and questioning it. These allegations have started an out-pouring of honesty of sexually abusive treatment of women within the BBC, including Liz Kershaw and Sandi Toksvig. Women’s silence perpetuates the behaviour at the BBC experienced by Ms Kershaw and Ms Toksvig and that experienced by many thousands of women, including myself.

“For women working in [the show business] industry, sexual harassment was something you just had to ignore every day of your working life”, said journalist and broadcaster Janet Street-Porter, writing in the Daily Mail about her experiences in the 1980’s “To understand a male mindset that considers fondling, groping and worse as perfectly normal behaviour in the workplace, look at what was broadcast at the time, and how women were portrayed.”

Nothing’s changed. And these instances are not isolated to the UK or Australia – they are a global issue. And the honesty will overflow as women everywhere begin to feel their confidence in speaking out.

Do children see their fathers, uncles, cousins, brothers, fathers and grandfathers treating women with disdain every day? And as a society, are we making it OK for snide comments and put-downs – absolutely. Have we then created and exacerbated a society that makes the Abuse of Women mainstream?

Is there a link between pornography and violence towards women and children? Worth mentioning in the very least, and it’s an area that our society does not want to address because men are in positions of power to make change and they like the accessibility of it on supermarket and newsagent shelves.

Reviewing the FACTS of the figures, should it be soft/pornography that is removed from the shelves as well as the brand labels on cigarettes?

According to Cancer Research UK (updated 10 May 2012), there were 48,417 new cases of breast cancer in the UK in 2009 – and that doesn’t include the cases already being treated. In the news on Monday 8th October 2012, it was reported that in Australia 37 new cases of breast cancer get diagnosed a DAY and this is expected to rise. Consider for a moment that the MCG holds 100,000 people – fill it up with those ‘new cases’, and top it up with the husbands, children, parents and siblings of those women and every year you have that many NEW people affected by our rot in society and the complacency in our treatment of women. Sure, we are seeking a cure to the symptoms, but how deeply do we want to address the cause?

“Pear shaped” and “tits up” are expressions commonly used by men and women expressing when something has gone wrong. Our colloquial language reveals that the denigration of women is part of our psyche. A woman’s anatomy has been commoditised to parts denoting something bad.

You have a responsibility, as well as a great opportunity, to consider guidelines, recommendations and regulations on the Abuse of Women to ensure we arrest this ill momentum. We need to leave a foundation for our children and our future generations that respects women and shows that there is another, more caring way to treat women that will inevitably benefit men and our society as a whole.

By choosing to ‘let this slide’ we are choosing to allow it to continue – and we have for many, many years. We need to clearly underline that we will not allow this to continue to give the opportunity for future generations the opportunity to see there is another way. On Tuesday 9th you stood up in the Parliament and gave that 15min speech which has been echoing throughout the World. It was a concise exposé on misogyny, backed up by facts, that Australia needed to hear. And not just Australia. I congratulate you on opening this can of worms. However, let this not be your final act in the long overdue need for change to our attitude to women.

This constant barrage of degradation and abuse of Women is having an impact on the lives of our children.

We are now experiencing the most accessible soft/pornography of all time and children all over the western world as young as 10 are “sexting” images of themselves to each other – they are our sons and daughters, grandsons and granddaughters, nieces and nephews. The deepest concern for us all as a society is that these children think it’s normal to behave sexually with each other.

The United Nations UNICEF Convention on the Rights of the Child states that, “The Convention on the Rights of the Child is the first legally binding international instrument to incorporate the full range of human rights—civil, cultural, economic, political and social rights. In 1989, world leaders decided that children needed a special convention just for them because people under 18 years old often need special care and protection that adults do not. The leaders also wanted to make sure that the world recognized that children have human rights too.” And, “It spells out the basic human rights that children everywhere have: the right to survival; to develop to the fullest; to protection from harmful influences …”

Do we then have a LEGAL OBLIGATION to protect our children “from harmful influences”?

There is nowhere to hide anymore.

These all highlight the lack of responsibility taken by people (predominantly men) in power to act when they are aware there is wrongdoing. By inaction, we are condoning and colluding with the Abuse. As a society, we have made this behaviour acceptable. As individuals we feel we have no power and no voice against the establishment of large organisations, headed by men. These women are our sisters, daughters, nieces, granddaughters, wives, mothers and friends.

How long are people in power going to allow the abuse of women to be ‘normalised’ to the level that it is today?

We are supposedly in a modern western society, where women have the right to choose what we study, where we work, where we live, whom we marry, what we wear, whom we date, what we eat and the life we choose to live. There are other women in the world who do not have these freedoms and are still subjected to witch hunts, stoning, slavery, forced marriages and lives of abuse.

Through lack of responsibility and passive acceptance, we continue to perpetuate a society that condones the abuse of women. This type of behaviour is legally not allowed in the workplace and, after studying UK and Australian HR law, this behaviour regularly gets employers and perpetrators into a world of litigation. Yet we allow it every day in our press and media. Why is that?

The Australian press (Courier Mail, News Corp) has made claims recently that women who seek truth and a loving way of life are gormless, mindless followers and that we don’t have the intelligence to choose how we live. The blatant approval of sexual abuse in the article is simply shocking.

There in-lies a deep fracture in the Media and how it portrays women as a whole. Less concerning is the drivel of two men’s opinion thinly veiled as ‘journalism’ – more devastating is the impact of this tirade of derogatory and misogynistic attitude towards women by mainstream media.

Your speech has been so well received and celebrated throughout western world (USA, UK), but it is getting ‘frosty’ reception by male journalists in Australia.

The Crown Prosecution Service (UK) released a transcript – Domestic Violence: the facts, the issues, the future – Speech by the Director of Public Prosecutions, Keir Starmer QC (posted 12 April 2011). His closing statement is one for reflection from a global perspective “The steps that we and our criminal justice partners are taking to tackle domestic violence risk limited success unless this complacency is tackled head on. A change in attitude is clearly needed”.

Where are we headed if all the rates of domestic violence, violence towards women is increasing year after year?

Rudi Giuliani’s decision to have a zero tolerance for crime when he was Mayor of New York City was welcomed by residents of the city. From 1993-2001, crime and related violence dropped 56% in the FBI Crime Index. New Yorkers wanted to remain living in the city and it became the “safest large city in the nation”. With decisive action, a message would be sent to everyone that order would be maintained.

How amazing would our society be if the Government were to boldly establish zero-tolerance to the Abuse of Women? If you set a zero tolerance to the abuse of women in our daily papers, it will have profound effect on home life. And the £8 billion we are spending on the results of domestic violence could be joyfully redirected.

How amazing would it be if you created legislation that made it illegal for a woman to be paid less than a man for doing the same job? How empowering for a community to feel that support and know that we have a voice and that Abuse will no longer be tolerated?

As the head of our Government, you have a responsibility to consider guidelines, recommendations and regulations on the Abuse of Women to ensure we arrest this momentum. We need to leave a foundation for our children and our future generations that respects women and shows that there is another, more caring way to treat women that will inevitably benefit men and our society as a whole.

ENOUGH.

Seriously, Enough. Our complacent attitude towards the treatment of women in our society has to stop. And, we need to step up and take responsibility for the impact that the Media has on our attitude towards women.

This issue is not going away – daily revelations about the treatment of women are becoming the norm and it cannot be ignored any further. Please advise me on receipt of this letter and I would appreciate any update on the progress in seeing these real concerns through.

I welcome your views and questions and I have colleagues in Australia who share our zero tolerance attitudes on sexism and misogyny and would be available to meet with you or one of your team to discuss this further.

On Tuesday you expressed beautifully: “And the Government will not be lectured about sexism and misogyny by this man. Not now, not ever.” Let us see you put these words into practice and live up to your powerful and just assertion.

Yours truly,

Sarah Cloutier
Dual Australian and UK Citizen currently living in the UK

Old London Town

There’s a confidence about London – self assured and knowing that it is gloriously old and refreshingly new at the same time.

And it has a propensity to rub off …

There’s a confidence in my expression in London that I love – more willing to explore and be adventurous with how I dress and have more fun in mixing up my wardrobe.

The creative industry I work in has a wonderful blend of nationalities, ages and attitudes. And each comes together in the melting pot of style and easy charm that London exudes. Walking around, on the tube and in the office, I am constantly inspired by men and women and their choices of clothes, hair styles and accessories.

Returning to London has re-ignited my creative flare to explore my expression within this amazing city and be more ME in every moment, every interaction and re-imprint my living way – time to not hold back and express me within the welcome arms in the city I LOVE.

Have fun exploring your expression … wherever you are 🙂