SI TENBY
Members of SI Tenby in South Wales have been raising awareness of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) in the UK. They have been writing letters - 3000 in total over the last three years.
They have sent their letters to a wide range of people including Members of the UK Parliament, Welsh Members of the European Parliament, members of the Welsh Assembly, Scottish Parliament, Northern Ireland Assembly and the Irish Dail. They have also written to women's and men's organisations, chief constables and heads of twelve faiths in the UK.
Their work was acknowledged in the booklet produced for our Soroptimist delegation to the Commission on the Status of Women in 2007. Adopting Federation Immediate Past President Hilary-Kay Young's theme, the members of this Club have not been whispering; they have been shouting out for those who cannot shout out for themselves and are winners of the Federation's Good Practice Award 2007 for Exceptional Service as a Global Voice for Women in the Programme Area of Human Rights and the Status of Women.
The following statistics have been obtained by the club:
Estimated Number of maternities in Wales to women with FGM
Estimated Number of girls born in England and Wales to a mother born in an FGM-practising country
Most common age for the procedure is 6 – 8 years.
Quotes from the Liverpool Daily Post:
They have sent their letters to a wide range of people including Members of the UK Parliament, Welsh Members of the European Parliament, members of the Welsh Assembly, Scottish Parliament, Northern Ireland Assembly and the Irish Dail. They have also written to women's and men's organisations, chief constables and heads of twelve faiths in the UK.
The following statistics have been obtained by the club:
Estimated Number of maternities in Wales to women with FGM
| 2001-2004 | |
| Cardiff | 360 |
| Rest of Wales | 95 |
| Non-residents | 22 |
| Total | 477 |
Estimated Number of girls born in England and Wales to a mother born in an FGM-practising country
| 2001 | |
| Aged under 11 | 6,697 |
| Aged 1-4 | 24,086 |
| Aged 5-8 | 23,518 |
| Born 2002-04 | 25,335 |
| Total | 79,636 |
Most common age for the procedure is 6 – 8 years.
Quotes from the Liverpool Daily Post:
- African tribal elders are being flown into the UK to mutilate young Liverpool girls in a heartbreaking cultural tradition, also girls aged 4–11 are being taken abroad during summer holidays to be circumcised.
- In some ethnic communities in the city, 90% of women are mutilated, but a FGM specialist midwife in the city says that the figures do not reveal the whole extent of the problem. Some of the cases she says are heartbreaking.
- It is stressed that any case in the hospital would be handled with sensitivity and confidentiality. That begs the questions: 1) If it is known that the elders are being flown in to practise FGM, why have the police not acted, or have they not been informed? 2) If all cases in hospital are confidential, how can there ever be any prosecutions?