Posts Tagged ‘Spire’

Just back from the Swedish leg of the Spire project. What a place. Hjo (kind of pronounced “you”) is a small town of about 8,800 people. Some real eye openers are that for such a small population there are 17 social workers – here in the UK there are single social workers with case loads that big! During our four-day visit we saw one instance of graffiti, but not in Hjo itself, two pieces of litter and very little chewing gum trodden into the street. Alcohol is jolly expensive and its purchase controlled.   The roads are well maintained and traffic relatively light. Last orders at the bar on a Friday night is 10:30, that is supposing that one can find a bar open this late. Everyone seems to take a break at lunchtime for a cooked lunch. The workday begins at about 8am.

 A huge thank you must be sent to Anna and her team for the fantastic hospitality we enjoyed. During our stay we were given a tour of the town by the city architect that included a fleeting visit to the last remaining tinsmiths in the area. All of the guttering for the wooden houses in the city are hand made. Another highlight of the trip was a lecture given by the trout preservation ecology group, who have restored fish stocks to the town’s lake single-handed through their clearing of the tributary streams.

 A visit to Utväg was an inspiring bonus for the trip. Lovely to meet Christina again after her recent trip to Harborough.  Utväg is a centre supporting people who suffer from domestic abuse, or violence in close relationships as it is known in Sweden. Here women and children can begin to come to terms with domestic abuse and develop processes for reconstructing their lives. For me one of the innovations of the centre is the treatment of men as the perpetrators of domestic abuse. Treat the cause as well as the effect in an effort to break the cycle of abuse.

Fantastic stuff.

Link to Hjo: www.hjo.se  
Link to Utväg: www.utvag.se

For more information on the Spire project visit www.spirecentral.org

Our communications role in the Spire project got well and truly underway today as Plexus played its part in the Local Partnership Conference on Domestic Violence Abuse – held in Market Harborough.

The conference, which was attended by all the European partners involved in the project (with the exception of Crete who was tied up with the European elections), focused on the impact of domestic violence in two very different ways.

Firstly, with a presentation from Professor Carol Hedderman, a leading expert on domestic violence from the University of Leicester. Secondly, with a drama performance called Cracks of Light, which aims to illustrate how domestic violence affects people’s lives. As you can imagine, it was a very powerful performance, encompassing the whole range of human emotions.

Our increased understanding of the issues will really help us when it comes to producing communication materials for the project, plus of course, we’ll be working very closely with all the partners involved. We met the partners prior to the conference – and they also presented their findings from focus groups ran to find out how people view domestic violence in each of the project areas – Crete, Spain, Sweden and the UK. As you imagine, the findings were very interesting, revealing some fascinating differences and similarities between countries.

Plexus is all set to conquer Europe after being awarded the contract to produce communications for a European project tackling domestic violence in rural Europe.

Project leader Harborough District Council selected Plexus for the job on the strength of our previous work within the voluntary and community sector. The other partners represent the European equivalent of district councils in Crete, Spain and Sweden.

The project, named Spire, has been launched to specifically raise awareness of domestic violence in rural areas, as the problem is often ‘hidden’ and victims can often find themselves isolated. Rather than being aimed at victims of domestic violence, Spire aims to engage voluntary and community groups that have regular contact with rural communities – and are therefore in a great position to help and support both victims and perpetrators, whilst understanding local issues.

Plexus has been commissioned to produce a full suite of communication materials for the project, including a website, leaflet and training resources. As you can imagine, we’re very pleased and proud to be working on the Spire project – watch this space for more very soon!

If you’d like to find out more about how domestic violence affects rural areas in the UK here’s a recent news article from the Daily Mirror  – outlining the results of a survey carried out by the National Federation of Women’s Institutes.