Social Context / Legislation

The Select Committee on Violence in Marriage: collects evidence and publishes its reports in 1974 and 1975:

"The Committee consulted relevant departments of central government, some local authorities, legal and law enforcement agencies as well as organisations providing services directly to battered women." (Hanmer 1976).

Conferences

National

National Women's Liberation Movement Conference, Edinburgh.
Demands 5 & 6 Adopted:
5. Legal and Financial Independence for all Women
6. An End to Discrimination against Lesbians/The Right to a Self Defined Sexuality.

"The lesbian demand came in at Edinburgh […] It was meant to be a recognition of our presence and the necessity for women to confront their own sexuality for heterosexual women to confront their own sexuality." (Shulman 1983: 53)

The focus of the demands turns to the right to independence from men, legally, financially and sexually. Demands are stressed as revolutionary while the use of demands as a tactic is debated. Traditional left tactics, such as the use of a guiding 'line' for group members, the existence of a programme for change that can sideline other issues and the hierarchical nature of campaigns are seen as alienating and patriarchal by many women in the movement:

"I went to the 1974 Women's Liberation conference in Edinburgh with women from the Communist Party. I was innocently surprised when they met together [...] to decide how to vote in the [...] plenary. At that plenary a woman [...] stood up and spoke. A Communist Party woman I was with said: 'That's not the line. Stop her.' One of the group went over and told her to be quiet and she shut up for the rest of the afternoon. She toed the line. It's clear that women from the male left groups caucus like this for the plenaries at all WLM conferences. They set up block voting. They dominate the microphone. They don't develop thoughts, just the line." (Sutton 1978: 4)

(Demands 1-4 were adopted at the Skegness conference in 1971). See Appendix 1 for a complete listing of the demands.)

Welsh National Women's Liberation Conference, Aberystwyth

Regional

North East Regional Women's Liberation Conference, Bradford (1)

North East Regional Women's Liberation Conference, Hull (2)

Socialist Feminist

Women's Liberation and Socialism Conference, Birmingham (2)
On: Women in the Family

Women's Liberation and Socialism Conference, Oxford (1)
On: The Four Demands and Campaigns of the Women's Movement. Or, on "The Theoretical Problems of/for the Tactics for Strategy of WLM as a Mass Movement." (Chester 1977: 27).

This conference proposes the fifth demand to the Edinburgh National WLM conference. The fifth demand is initially titled "Abolition of the Legal Definition of Women as Dependent on Men. " The Oxford group takes the demand to the Edinburgh WLM Conference in July (McIntosh 1974: 4).

Sexuality / Sexual Politics

National Conference of Gay Women, Canterbury (1)
Leads to the adoption of the sixth demand at Edinburgh

Second National Lesbian Conference, Nottingham (2)

Sexual Politics Conference, Leeds

Violence Against Women

First Women's Aid (WA) National Conference, London
Erin Pizzey and the Chiswick refuge are the basis of the emerging Women's Aid movement. This conference organises the movement nationally:

"Erin Pizzey offered to employ a national co ordinator with money supplied by the Department of Health and Social Security (DHSS). The other groups agreed and Jo Sutton...took up the appointment." (Hanmer 1976)

Workplace Issues

Working Women's Charter Campaign (WWCC) National Conference, Leeds

The Working Women's Charter emerges from the London Trades Council to focus on the work women do outside of the home, on employment and equal opportunity. The Charter's goals include; a minimum wage, equal education, extended nursery care, maternity leave, free contraception, family allowances and greater trade union participation by women.

"Many people at the conference felt that the document, despite its faults, offered an excellent opportunity to bring ideas current in the WLM into the Labour movement." (Oxford Women and Socialism Group 1975)

Reproductive Rights

Other

Childcare, London

Libertarian Women's Conference, Leeds

Need for a National Nursery Campaign, Nottingham

Structure and Organisation of the Women's Movement, Coventry

Woman as a Consumer, York

Women and Education, Manchester

Women and Health Conference, Sheffield

Women's Health Project, London

Women in History, Brighton

Women and Media Conference, Bristol

Women's Movement: Problems, Perspective and Possibilities, London