Poyner, Claire

Poyner, Claire

Claire Poyner

1 December 2015News

Eight women (and more) ‘emotionally and sexually violated with state approval’

Eight women, after a four-year struggle, have won an apology from the Metropolitan police, who finally conceded that undercover relationships were an abuse of power and violated women’s human rights. Seven of the women were present at a press conference on 20 November, and they presented their experiences and how the relationships have since affected their lives.

One of the women, Kate Wilson, did not accept any settlement with the police and is continuing her case. She will be…

1 June 2015Feature

Network for Peace co-ordinator Claire Poyner reflects on the likely impact of the election on anti-nuclear campaigning

The overall majority gained by the Conservatives took a lot of us by surprise. Many were expecting a minority Labour win, with some support from the Scottish National Party. Meanwhile the Liberal Democrats had the worst election night since their formation.

There’ve been many attempts to analyse Labour’s failure to win the election – were they too left or too right? Is he ‘Red Ed’ and a ‘class war zealot’ or middle-of-the-road ‘austerity-lite’? Was it the media that ‘won it’? It…

1 December 2011News

Claire Poyner reports from UK Feminista's Annual Conference

Fem11, the national conference of UK Feminista held on 12 November at Friends House, London gathered over 1000 feminists.

Keynote speaker Sandy Toksvig bemoaned the lack of suitable role models in children’s literature – “If Rapunzel had hair long enough for a prince to climb up, couldn’t she have fashioned a rope out of her hair to escape?”

Also criticised: the way female role models were re-fashioned to make them more “respectable”. Did you know that Florence Nightingale was…

26 November 2011Blog

<p>Claire Poyner reports from this year's huge feminist gathering in London</p>

UK Feminsta was founded in 2010 and Fem11, the national conference held on 12 November at Friends House, London was a gathering of over 1000 feminists. Mostly women with a smattering of men, and for the most part, women who don’t appear to meet the stereotype which may be responsible for some, particularly younger women, to proclaim: “I’m not a feminist”.

The keynote speaker was a very popular Sandy Toksvig who bemoaned the lack of suitable role model in children’s literature – “If…