London Mayor Sadiq Khan has announced a new £15.6 million fund aimed at giving women and girls a direct role in shaping safer public spaces across the capital, as he warned that
violence against women and girls (VAWG) remains a “global disgrace”.
The new funding is part of a broader package of more than £37 million unveiled alongside the Mayor’s latest strategy for tackling VAWG. The programme is designed to respond to emerging threats, including technology-enabled abuse, online misogyny and the influence of social media personalities promoting harmful attitudes towards women.
Khan said the scale and changing nature of violence against women and girls demanded a sustained response involving City Hall, policing, transport authorities, local councils, community organisations and the wider public.
Since taking office, the Mayor has overseen what City Hall describes as a record £318 million investment in measures designed to prevent VAWG, support victims and survivors, and tackle the behaviour and attitudes that can contribute to violence and abuse.
Women to help shape safer streets and parks
The new £15.6 million Mayoral fund will be delivered jointly by City Hall, the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime (MOPAC) and Transport for London (TfL).
Local authorities will be able to use the funding to improve public areas based on the experiences of women and girls who live, work and travel in those communities.
Potential measures include improved street lighting, additional CCTV, removing poorly visible areas, redesigning routes and opening up spaces to improve visibility. The wider objective is to create public environments where women and girls feel safer and where public areas are more welcoming and better used.
The initiative follows a pilot programme conducted in 2024, when MOPAC and TfL worked with women and girls in five London boroughs to identify safety concerns and explore how their experiences could influence the design of public spaces.
Research underlines the scale of the challenge. Across the UK, 86 per cent of women aged 18 to 24 have reported experiencing harassment in public spaces. Londoners also tend to feel less secure in locations such as town centres, parks, pubs and clubs and on public transport than in environments including their homes and workplaces.
The Mayor's new strategy seeks to build on measures introduced since his previous VAWG strategy was published in 2022. City Hall says London has since recorded improvements in police investigations and prosecutions of rape, alongside a rise in the proportion of women saying they feel safe walking alone in their local area after dark.
New funding targets online abuse and economic independence
The additional £37 million package will support a series of initiatives aimed at prevention, victim support and tackling perpetrators.
Among the largest allocations is £6 million to address technology-facilitated abuse. The funding will target crimes in which smartphones, social media platforms and connected devices such as smart doorbells are used to monitor, intimidate or harass women. It will also address the role of technology in controlling behaviour within abusive relationships.
A further £6 million will support a third round of the Mayor’s VAWG Grassroots Fund. Community organisations will use the money to provide vulnerable victims and survivors with services including legal assistance, counselling and other specialist support.
Another £3 million will be used to develop a specialist service helping victims and survivors gain employment skills and overcome barriers to work, with the aim of improving financial independence from abusive partners.
The Mayor’s Violence Reduction Unit will receive £3 million for programmes addressing online harms affecting young people. The work will include mentoring for girls and young women exposed to misogyny, exploitation and abuse, while boys and young men will be targeted through education on masculinity and resilience, support for fathers and mentoring linked to football.
A further £2.4 million will support victims and survivors of child sexual exploitation and grooming gangs through expanded advocacy and therapeutic services.
The package also includes £1 million to address the spread of the so-called manosphere and online hate, including public-awareness campaigns and educational initiatives promoting positive role models.
An additional £100,000 will extend a pilot providing independent legal advice to survivors of sexual violence in London.
A wider approach to tackling VAWG
The Mayor's strategy forms part of a broader public-health approach that seeks to intervene before violence occurs while strengthening support for those already affected.
City Hall says this includes efforts to improve the Metropolitan Police’s response to VAWG, strengthen the criminal justice experience for victims and survivors, protect children from exploitation, and use GPS monitoring programmes to place greater emphasis on the behaviour of perpetrators.
Campaigns such as Have a Word and Say Maaate to a Mate are also being used to challenge misogynistic attitudes and encourage people to confront harmful behaviour.
Khan is launching the new strategy in east London, where he will visit a public area designed with input from local women and girls. Features include consistent lighting, open spaces and seating intended to encourage groups to use the area, alongside landscaping designed to maintain visibility and clearly defined routes.
The site also incorporates designated safe havens and place markers intended to make people feel more secure.
During the visit, the Mayor will meet survivors, practitioners and specialists working in the VAWG sector to discuss how the nature of violence and abuse is changing — and how London’s response needs to evolve with it.
The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan said: “My goal as Mayor is to make every woman and girl in London safer – and feel safer – in our city, which is why I have overseen a record-breaking £318m to tackle VAWG, addressing its root causes and supporting victims.
“We have seen real progress from this work, but the epidemic of violence against women and girls is a global disgrace that shames us all. What so many women and girls have had to endure and continue to endure is unacceptable and every aspect of society has a part to play in changing this.
“That’s why I have launched a new strategy to accelerate our efforts and adapt to the changing threats that women face online, at home and on our streets. This includes a first-ever new fund that will see us work with women and girls to help transform public spaces across our capital. By giving a voice to women and girls who know their local areas best, we can work with local authorities to make these spaces safer and more welcoming at all times of day.
“Despite the challenges, VAWG truly is preventable and I am committed to working with the government, the Met, charities, as well as local, national and global partners, to ensure that every woman and girl can participate fully in the life of our great city, without experiencing or fearing harassment, abuse or violence.” Photo by Raph_PH, Wikimedia commons.
