Cambridge City Council is supporting Sexual Abuse and Sexual Violence Awareness Week (3 to 9 February 2025) – a national week to raise awareness about the unacceptability of sexual abuse and violence.
To raise awareness, council officers and councillors were asked to provide messages around the campaign’s theme of #It'sNotOk. Contributions included that it’s not ok:
- how often sexual abuse doesn’t get reported
- that 1 in 4 women have been subjected to some form of sexual violence since the age of 16
- that 1 in 6 children have been sexually abused
- that 1 in 18 men have been subjected to some kind of sexual violence since the age of 16
- that 53% of LGBT+ people in the UK have been subjected to sexual violence in their lives
- that people with disabilities are sexually assaulted at nearly three times the rate of people without disabilities
- how long rape victims have to wait for police to charge an offender.
Help and advice
If you or someone you know are affected by sexual abuse or sexual violence, you can get help from:
- Cambridge Rape Crisis Centre - free specialist support for women and girls across Cambridgeshire who have been subjected to rape and sexual violence, no matter when the abuse happened
- Men’s Advice Line - helpline for male victims of domestic abuse
- Survivors UK - specialist service for boys, men and non-binary people aged 13 and over who have experienced sexual violence at any time in their lives
- Galop - UK’s LGBT+ anti-abuse charity working with and for LGBT+ victims and survivors of abuse and violence
- Choices Counselling – a confidential trauma-informed counselling service throughout Cambridgeshire and Peterborough for women and men who have experienced sexual abuse in childhood
- Childline - access to every child for free, confidential support whenever they need it.
Get involved
If you want to get involved in the awareness week you can:
- consider volunteering – local charity and council partner Cambridge Rape Crisis Centre will be recruiting emotional support volunteers from 31 March 2025. You can email volunteering@cambridgerapecrisis.org.uk to register your interest and be sent the application pack
- join in on social media using the hashtag #It'sNotOk.
