Outline of the meeting

The event was opened by Alison Irvine, CEO of Transport Scotland, who welcomed participants and provided some background on the work, which had produced the 10 recommendations.

This was followed by the Minister for Transport who addressed stakeholders outlining that her hope that the meeting would serve as an opportunity to identify practical actions to improve the safety of women and girls, who both use and work on our public transport network.

The Minister reflected that the event was taking place during the global 16 days of activism against gender-based violence, adding that the research, undertaken by KSO on behalf of Transport Scotland, built upon an established evidence base that highlights a significant international problem of unwanted sexual behaviour, sexual harassment, and sexual assault on public transport. There is clear evidence that personal safety disproportionately affects women’s decisions about using public transport and constitutes a barrier to fair and equitable access to the employment market, goods and services.

The Minister highlighted that the Scottish Government had taken steps to address this issue, exploring potential routes including the use of measures available under current antisocial behaviour legislation, and possible additional powers. The police, local authorities and other local agencies, empowered by the Scottish Government, are responsible for tackling anti-social behaviour at the local level. The research had highlighted the role of alcohol and drugs as exacerbating many of the incidents and causing feelings of unease. Passenger safety, which clearly includes that of women and girls on public transport is paramount. All views on the alcohol ban on ScotRail trains would be given due consideration and all impacts assessed fully. The Minster noted that the work on women and girls’ safety feeds in to the National Transport Strategy, the goal of which is a transport system that is accessible to all. 

Presentations

Kate Skellington-Orr, from KSO Research who were responsible for carrying out the in-depth research on understanding women and girls’ experiences on public transport in Scotland, provided an overview of the research and its recommendations.

  • A total of 35 women and girls from a diverse range of backgrounds took part in the research, ranging in age from 14 to 86 years old.
  • Most participants described feeling the need to maintain a constant state of ‘vigilance’.
  • Numerous self-protection strategies were reported by women to help them feel safer (e.g. not travelling alone, or at night, avoiding particular routes and using taxis or private transport, especially late at night.)
  • Previous personal experience, the experiences of others, word of mouth, stories in the media (including social media) and warnings from other people about the dangers of travelling alone/at night all influenced perceptions of safety and associated behaviours.
  • Female transport workers were those most likely to report previous incidents of unwanted physical contact or assault from men.
  • Wider systemic change to ensure women and girls have the freedom to maximise opportunities afforded by public transport travel.

Stakeholder presentations on the theme of ‘What’s working well’?

Prior to attending the workshop participants were asked to share details of work currently underway to improve the safety of women and girls (including transport workers) on public transport. From the participants who submitted work, it was necessary to make a selection in order to allow speakers sufficient time to communicate their work and to fit in a range from across the stakeholders who attended the meeting. Accordingly, attendees presenting their work represented Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) organisations, Transport Unions and Transport Providers. The presentations detailed a range of activity including research, marketing campaigns, innovations in reporting mechanisms and / or technology plans and wider activity. A brief summary of each presentation is given in Annex A:

Overview of working group discussions

For the discussion sessions participants were divided into four mixed groups who each reviewed three of the ten recommendations. Each of the groups had a chair and a note taker to capture the discussion which lasted for one hour, with equal time being accorded to each of the three recommendations under consideration. Each of the groups fed back the main points of their discussion, with key areas raised building upon the recommendations and taking practical steps. These are summarised here:

  • Ensuring that women and girls’, including female staff working in the transport sector, are engaged and consulted to ensure that developments are centred around their needs.
  • Creating a more unified, simplified and standardised approach to reporting sexual harassment across organisations and modes of transport.
  • Taking steps to increase women and girls’ confidence in reporting any type of incident, no matter how small.
  • Collectively building confidence and trust in reporting systems, by increasing understanding of the help and support provided if incidents are reported.
  • Creating a sector-wide, ongoing training programme that builds the confidence and resilience in staff to manage and report incidents.
  • Making a commitment to sharing best practice to create sector and Scotland-wide solutions, therefore identifying further opportunities for collaboration.

Round up and building consensus

The meeting was closed with remarks from Fiona Brown, director of Transport Strategy and Analysis at Transport Scotland. Fiona thanked attendees for their input across the meeting (see Annex B for the list of organisations attending) and advised that Transport Scotland would produce a report documenting the event and next steps to take this work forward. A show of hands was requested to indicate commitment from workshop attendees to continue to work together on this issue.