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Write to End Violence Against Women Awards 2024 Awards

The 12th annual Write to End Violence Against Women (WEVAW) Awards, jointly presented by End Violence Against Women Coalition (EVAW) and Zero Tolerance celebrated responsible, accurate, and compassionate journalism that advances understanding and action on violence against women and girls  

Rachel Adamson, co-director of Zero Tolerance, and Andrea Simon, Director of EVAW, co-hosted the Awards. Opening the ceremony, Rachel highlighted the pressing reality of violence against women and girls, whilst Andrea showcased EVAW’s extensive network of 163 frontline services, activists, survivors, researchers, and NGOs working to end this violence. Together, they emphasised the media’s vital role in challenging the cultural attitudes that normalise violence against women. 

Sky News’ lead politics presenter Sophy Ridge delivered a powerful keynote speech highlighting the media’s important role in tackling violence against women and girls. She outlined three key responsibilities for journalists: holding the government to account for its commitments to reduce violence, supporting specific campaigns to improve the justice process, and helping reshape cultural attitudes. Sophy emphasised that media coverage must actively combat victim-blaming whilst fostering a culture where women are believed and all survivors’ stories are treated with equal respect. 

Best News Winner 

Shehnaz Khan, BBC News, Forced marriage cases will stay ‘underground’ after law change 

Judge Rosemary Douce, Head of Standards and Regulation at IPSO, awarded the best News Piece award to Shahnaz Khan to her article focussed on the harms of forced marriage despite changes in law. Rosemary highlighted the new perspective brought by the article, the prominence given to the voices of survivors, and the use of statistics to put the story in context.  

Shehnaz accepted the award, describing it as an ‘honour’ and thanking the women she spoke to for trusting her to tell their stories. “It means a lot to me to be able to share stories that I really care about from underrepresented communities that aren’t often heard.”  

Best Feature Winner 

Amandas Ong, Jacobin, Britain’s Asylum Process Endangers Sexual Violence Survivors 

Lexie Kirkconnell-Kawana, CEO of Impress, presented this award to Amandas for centring the women she spoke to with empathy and bringing solace to people with similar trauma of navigating hostile bureaucracy in Britain. She spoke of how the piece stood out against a media climate that’s largely hostile to immigrants and refugees. It was an educating and informing piece that provided context, held authorities and policies to account, and offered solutions. 

Amandas was ‘humbled’ to accept the award. She explained that she wished to highlight the culture of scepticism and lack of understanding that permeates healthcare and bureaucracy in the UK after one of the women shared how she’d stayed silent about her experiences of violence as she did not expect to be believed. Amandas expressed her gratitude to the women for sharing their story with her, “this story is really for them”. She finished with reflecting, “The way we work as journalists is so incredibly important, how do we work with care, how do we cast survivors of sexual violence as whole and complex human beings, and work with them rather than relying on tropes of victimhood to tell a story?” 

Best Opinion & Comment Winner 

Mireille Harper, Glamour UK, Why does Cassie’s trauma need to be seen to be believed?  

Awards judge Dr Natasha Hirst, President of the National Union of Journalists, said she had an uplifting experience judging the awards. She awarded Best Opinion and Comment to Mireille Harper for an excellent piece addressing an under explored area of men’s violence against women. The article brought in survivors experiences along with expert opinion and highlighted inequalities that disproportionately affect black women. 

Mireille thanked Glamour for platforming the piece and supporting her advocacy.  She dedicated the award to Sistah Space and Casandra Centre, two organisations doing brilliant work in the space of violence against black women, and her mother who spent years working in domestic abuse services. ‘It’s equally celebratory and heartbreaking to win this award, especially at a time where it feels like violence against women isn’t just rife but also lauded…I also fear the age we are in is one where the currency of violence reigns and where women of colour globally are paying the price. Unfortunately misogynoir remains on the rise.”  

Best Investigation Winner 

Hannah Summers, The Bureau of Investigative Journalism, Family Court Files Series 

Andrea Simon, of EVAW, presented the Best Investigation award to Hannah Price for exposing systemic failings in the family court systems handling of violence against women. She said the ‘meticulous’ reporting combined rigorous investigation with ethical journalism. The investigation achieved a landmark ruling allowing the naming of a perpetrator who is not a public figure in family court proceedings creating better transparency in the system. It prompted an internal review of the Children and Family Court Advisory Support Service regarding their assessment procedures, prompted discussions at the Ministry of Justice about legislative change on parental rights, and it provided a template of how family court cases involving sexual violence can report responsibly.  

Hannah accepted the award and spoke of her initial hesitance to apply to name Kristoffer White but the mother’s support drove her forward. Hannah recognised the mother’s resilience going through the court process, appeal, and her rapist being named in the press. Hannah said, “I was really pleased to be able to interview the mother in this case and to give her a voice.”  

Expert’s Pick: Best Broadcast Winner 

Anna Hall, Candour TV, The Push 

Rachel Adamson, Co-Director of Zero Tolerances, presented the Best Broadcast award to Anna Halll for The Push, for challenging assumptions around who is affected by domestic abuse and tells a story with cultural understanding and care.  

Anna Hall could not attend the event but shared the following message recognising the award. “The Push has now been recognised all over the world and we are so grateful to the bravery of the Javed family in their determination to tell the story of what happened to Fawziyah. Fawziyah was a remarkable woman who documented her abuse during her marriage and her evidence led to her husband’s conviction at her own murder trial. Fawziyah’s story shows us that domestic abuse can happen to anyone – a privately educated lawyer from Leeds. And her family wanted Fawziyah’s story to be told to give others the courage to leave their abusive relationships. Thank you so much to the Judges for the recognition of this work – we are extremely grateful.” 

Natasha Rattu, from Karma Nirvana, a specialist charity for victims and survivors of honour-based abuse in the UK which supported the making of the documentary, spoke of how The Push has increased recognition and understanding of domestic and honour-based abuse. Natasha highlighted that every time we tell these stories with respect, we honour the lives of the women who’ve been lost.  

Wooden Spoon 

Invisible perpetrators 

Our annual ‘Wooden Spoon’ anti-award, which exposes harmful media practices in reporting violence against women and girls, has named “the invisibilisation of perpetrators” as the most concerning trend of 2024.  

In her keynote address, Juliana da Penha, founding editor of Migrant Women Press, described how mainstream media routinely employs passive language that removes perpetrator accountability. She demonstrated how this practice normalises male violence as inevitable, shifts responsibility from perpetrators to victims, and critically, prevents us from addressing the root causes of this violence.  

Congratulations to all the award winners and shortlisted journalists. The media has the power to shape people’s attitudes and understanding of men’s violence against women, support survivors, and hold perpetrators to account. Thank you to everyone who contributed to The Write Violence Against Women Awards 2024, including our steering group. And thank you to all the journalists who write about men’s violence against women with care and compassion.