Covid-19 & Women - The Weekly Update 👌

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Covid-19 & Women: your weekly update

Week 9: May 29 - June 5 2020

Dear Subscribers,

We hope you are safe and well. This is our tenth weekly newsletter, bringing you the latest on gender, the economy and Covid-19.

We want to express our continued support and solidarity with the Black Lives Matter protests taking place across the globe. We are part of a sector that has work to do to be genuinely anti-racist. We must reflect & commit to change, today & everyday.

Our colleague and director Mary-Ann Stephenson will be participating in a webinar held by the Feminist Library on the impact of Covid-19 on women. Details:

When Crises Collide: Women and Covid-19
11 June 2020 |19:00-21:00 (BST)
Feminist Library invites you to its second event in a series of webinars on women, care and Covid-19. This webinar explores the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on women from a number of different perspectives. Register here.
Speakers:
Mary-Ann Stephenson, Women's Budget Group
Eleanor Lisney, Sisters of Frieda
Wanda Wyporska, The Equality Trust

Keep reading for more news on the gendered and economic impacts of the pandemic in the UK and beyond. Scroll down to the bottom to catch upcoming events on gender, the economy and Covid-19.

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The Women's Budget Group on Covid-19

New data reveals “crisis of support” for BAME women
New polling analysis reveals the pressure on BAME women during the coronavirus lockdown. 43% of disabled or retired BAME women and 48% BAME men say that they had lost government support compared with 13% white women and 21% white men. Over half (51%) of BAME women say they were not sure where to turn for help compared with 1 in 5 (19%) white women. Read the full report here.

Progressive groups call for tax reform post-covid
The Women's Budget group, along with 15 other organisations, signed a statement organised by Tax Justice UK calling for tax reform post-Covid for a fairer and greener future. Read more here.

Briefings on Covid-19
Find everything the Women's Budget Group has done on Covid-19 here. This includes our reports on the impact that Covid-19 has on Social Security and Social Care, as well as joint letters, policy responses, and more.

Find it all here

Covid-19: the latest from home

Coronavirus UK: BAME women suffer harder financial hit - Writing for the Guardian, Haroon Siddique reports on analysis from Women’s Budget Group, Fawcett Society, Queen Mary University London and London School of Economics which suggests that Black, Asian and minority ethnic women in the UK are suffering greater financial and psychological consequences from the coronavirus pandemic than their white counterparts. Read more here.

If we do not address structural racism, then more black and minority ethnic lives will be lost - Co- Authors of the study referenced above, Zubaida Haque, Dr Sophie Harman and Clare Wenham write a blog for the British Medical Journal, reflecting on how Covid-19 brings into stark view how racial inequalities within the health sector have been damaging, detrimental, and deadly. Read more here.

Baby steps: The gender division of childcare during the COVID19 pandemic - Researchers at Bristol University's Department of Economics, Almudena Sevilla and Sarah Smith, published a working paper into the division of childcare in two-parent households where the parents are a heterosexual couple. The gender childcare gap on the additional hours from schools closing is narrower than before the crisis. Read more here.

Petition: Improve Maternal Mortality Rates and Health Care for Black Women in the U.K. -Black Women in the U.K. are 5 times more likely to die during pregnancy and after childbirth compared to White Women. More research is needed to understand why this is happening and recommendations to improve health care for Black Women as urgent action is needed to address this disparity. Sign the petition here.

Coronavirus and personal debt: a financial recovery strategy for households - UK debt charity StepChange published a report on personal debt, with recommendations for policymakers on how to support households with low- to middle-incomes, who on average entered lockdown with £1,076 in arrears and £997 in debt per adult affected. Read more here.

UK Failing Domestic Abuse Victims in Pandemic - Human Rights Watch writes about how the Government is stalling on establishing a robust legal framework to address violence against women and girls even as reported domestic abuse spikes during the pandemic. Read more here.

Forced out: The cost of getting childcare wrong - Trades Union Congress published a new report, calling on the government to take immediate action to support women to stay in work or risk losing decades of progress on women’s labour market participation. Read more here.

Return to spender - New research from Resolution Foundation looks at how the coronavirus crisis is affecting families’ living standards. Findings show that many high-income families have reduced their spending in recent months, but for those on lower incomes, cutting back can be far harder. Read more here.

Carers of disabled children face lockdown hell - Writing for The Times, Rachel Sylvester reports on how emergency measures have denied many parents of special needs pupils the extra help and support they need to cope. Read more here.

Covid-19: the global pandemic

Re-inventing public finance: a closer look at New Zealand's Well-being Budget experiment: In a blog for the International Budget Partnership, Delaine McCullough, Paolo De Renzio & Chye-Ching Huang discuss their new paper, 'New Zealand’s “Well-Being Budget”: A New Model for Managing Public Finances?' and reflect on lessons for other countries. Read more here.

No disabled person will be left behind in Senegal: Senegal has been praised for its response to the coronavirus crisis. In this blog post, Pam Bailey writes about the Federation of Associations of Persons with Disabilities (FSAPH) who are fighting against the inequalities in access of people with disabilities to even the most basic of social services, such as health care and education. People with disabilities now have a seat at the table when Covid-19 responses are planned. Read more here.

'We're poor people': Middle East's migrant workers look for way home amid pandemic: Reporting for The Guardian, Martin Chulov and Michael Safi write that the in Middle East, where the highest proportion of migrant workers are employed, states are preparing for a massive demographic shift as the dual crises of the pandemic and the economic situation mean that many migrant workers are preparing to return home. Read more here.

Events for isolation

When Crises Collide: Women and Covid-19
11 June 2020 |19:00-21:00 (BST)
Feminist Library invites you to its second event in a series of webinars on women, care and Covid-19. This webinar explores the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on women from a number of different perspectives. Register here.
Speakers:
Mary-Ann Stephenson, Women's Budget Group
Eleanor Lisney, Sisters of Frieda
Wanda Wyporska, The Equality Trust

All in this together? Women with no recourse to public funds and Covid-19
18 June 2020 |19:30 BST
Fabian Women's Network invite you to a panel discussion on the realities of living with 'no recourse to public funds' (NRPF) and the impact this has on the lives of women. NRPF is a condition attached to a migrant's visa which means they are unable to access any state benefits, including Universal Credit or Employment Support Allowance. Women with NRPF are more vulnerable to economic exploitation, domestic and sexual violence including death. Register here.

Speakers:

Cllr Dr Kindy Sandhu (Chair), Fabian Women's Network
Helena Kennedy QC
Pragna Patel, Southall Black Sisters
Liam Byrne MP

Putting gender equality at the heart of the wellbeing economy
24 June 2020 |1pm-2pm BST
The Women’s Budget Group invites you to join this webinar, on Wednesday 24 June, 1-2pm BST, where investigative journalist Rebecca Omonira-Oyekanmi will be chairing a discussion on what a gender-equal economy with wellbeing at its core might look like. This is the second webinar in our series for the Women’s Budget Group’s Commission on a Gender-Equal Economy, where we delve into some of the bigger questions arising from the discussions that have taken place throughout the Commission, exploring what a gender-equal economy could look like. R egister here.

Speakers:
Dr Katherine Trebeck (Wellbeing Economy Alliance)
Rachelle Earwaker (Joseph Rowntree Foundation)
Dr Angela O’Hagan (Wise Centre for Economic Justice
Natasha Davies (Chwarae Teg)

Calls for papers: Gender and Covid-19

Feminist Studies Journal. Submit by July 15, 2020. Find out more here.
Politica Economica/Journal of Economic Policy. Submit by June 30, 2020. Find out more here.

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The Women’s Budget Group scrutinises government policy from a gender perspective. We are a network of leading feminist economists, researchers, policy experts and campaigners committed to achieving a more gender equal future. We have worked towards this since 1989.