Twenty-two of the twenty-seven EU ministers responsible for equality, together with their Swiss counterparts and the European Commission, supported the proposal put forward by the German EU Council Presidency, on Friday 20 November, to set up a European hotline for Women Victims of Violence.
It will be “a free, anonymous number - 116 016 - that can be reached anywhere from Europe, 24 hours a day, seven days a week”, German Minister for Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth Franziska Giffey told the press.
Violence against women “is a great challenge in all European countries. This is why we need a European response”, she added.
She said that she had held “intensive” discussions with her European counterparts on this subject over the past few months and explained that the European number would be based on the one that has been available in Germany since 2013, which is available in 18 languages.
This number should make it possible to “reach the corresponding national emergency service”, according to a press release from the German ministry.
In a European Union where it is so easy and commonplace to cross borders, “it is absolutely essential that there be a telephone number accessible everywhere”, Giffey said, but she did not go into more detail about how the initiative would be implemented in practice.
Germany will launch the “formal process” by the end of its mandate on 31 December, and Portugal - which will take over the Presidency of the EU Council for the following six months on 1 January - will continue to take the project forward, as confirmed at the meeting by Portuguese Minister Mariana Vieira da Silva.
Need help on the ground
The creation of such a number does, however, raise some questions. Anne-Charlotte Jelty, Director of CIDFF92 (France), Information Centre for Women and Family Rights, welcomes the willingness to set up new issues, but wonders: what will be the outcome of this project? Of its steering? Of its funding?
“The numbers are one thing, but then it’s the grassroots associations that will offer legal or psychological support, shelter and emergency accommodation. And that’s where we need help, subsidies”, she explains to EUROPE.
In France, for example, listeners, trained to answer calls on these emergency numbers, will provide an initial welcome, reassure the victim, then redirect the victim to the nearest local associations for concrete support. This is more difficult to envisage at the European level.
Anne-Charlotte Jelty also wondered about the need for such a number for countries that already have one. It would be better to support the systems that exist and work, she says. For countries where such numbers do not exist, she welcomes, on the other hand, the fact that the EU “ can help make up for national shortcomings”.
Increase in violence
Finally, it should be noted that this initiative was presented to the ministers at a ground-breaking informal meeting (see EUROPE 12605/24), in which the Swiss, Norwegian, Liechtenstein and Icelandic ministers responsible for equality also took part.
Discussions at this meeting also focused on the increase in domestic violence observed in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic (see EUROPE 12464/23).
The ministers therefore exchanged good practices and informed their colleagues of initiatives taken in their respective States, such as the strengthening of the system of reception centres, the development of information campaigns and the improvement of the work carried out by the police, for example. (Original version in French by Agathe Cherki)