The domestic abuse sector is unique and varied, working with perpetrators and victim-survivors comes with its own complexities and challenges. The work is incredibly specialist and can be emotionally complex and challenging for the highly skilled workforce delivering it and supporting this work.
The theme for Black History Month this year is ‘Reclaiming Narratives,’ something that is so relevant within the domestic abuse sector. It is important to help combat the misinformation surrounding the groups of people who are discriminated against, which includes Black, minoritised and migrant communities and victim-survivors of domestic abuse, and is particularly pertinent for those who fall into both groups.
To celebrate this year, we are sharing the work of changemakers from Black, African, Caribbean and Mixed Heritage communities within the domestic abuse sector. For this blog, we spoke to Selma Taha, Executive Director of Southall Black Sisters (SBS).
Selma has over a decade of experience working to reduce and eliminate all forms of violence against women and girls (VAWG). She has been a manager of advocacy and support services at the nia Project, Advance Charity, and Victim Support. At the nia Project, Selma co-founded an anti-racism working group at the height of reflections on the relevance of Black Lives Matter to the VAWG sector.
The theme for Black History Month this year is ‘Reclaiming Narratives.’ What does this mean to you?
Reclaiming our narrative during Black History Month is about taking back control of how our stories are told. For too long, our history, our culture, and our experiences have been shaped by others—filtered through a lens that often distorts or diminishes who we are and what we’ve experienced. When we talk about reclaiming our narrative, we’re talking about telling our own stories in our own voices. It’s about ensuring that the depth of our struggles, the beauty of our resilience, and the power of our contributions are seen and honoured for what they truly are.
It’s deeply personal too. For me, reclaiming our narrative is also about reclaiming my own story. When I was targeted in the racist attack as one of the #kingscross3, the system failed to see me as the victim. Instead, it tried to silence me, distort the truth, and criminalise me and my sisters. But we refused to be defined by that injustice. I refused to let others decide how I would be seen—how my pain, my fight, or my identity would be understood. So, reclaiming our narrative to me means refusing to let the system, or the people who perpetuate violence and racism, erase our voices. We should stand tall and tell our stories with pride, on our own terms.
At its core, reclaiming the narrative is fundamentally about resisting the systemic silencing of Black, minoritised and migrant communities, particularly women. My personal experience on the London Underground serves as a stark reminder of this issue. I was physically attacked and verbally and racially abused by a white woman and later criminalised for demanding she be held accountable. This situation starkly highlights how the system consistently prioritises the protection of aggressors—particularly when they are not from marginalised backgrounds—while vilifying victims, especially those from Black, minoritised and migrant communities. Despite enduring a vicious, racially motivated assault that left both me and my friends physically and emotionally scarred, the justice system responded by charging us, while our attacker received merely a caution.
What’s even more shocking is that an off-duty police officer was present during the attack but chose to intervene only to defend our assailant. This not only reinforces the harmful ‘angry Black woman’ trope, but also exemplifies the bias embedded within the system. The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) charged us with assault, yet no action was taken against the woman who attacked us—aside from that single caution.
Therefore, reclaiming the narrative means refusing to accept this unjust outcome—not just for ourselves, but for all Black, minoritised and migrant women who face criminalisation simply for speaking out. It is about rejecting a system that tries to silence us and, instead, amplifying our voices to demand justice and equality.
Moreover, this issue extends beyond isolated incidents; it encompasses a broader challenge to the way our experiences are framed. It signifies our collective effort to regain control over how our stories are told. Ultimately, it is about ensuring that the issues we face—whether they involve racist abuse, violence, or two-tier policing—are addressed in ways that genuinely benefit our communities.
Can you tell us a little bit about your role and the work of SBS?
I’ve had the privilege of being the Executive Director of SBS since 2022. SBS, founded in 1979, is a ‘by and for’ Black, minoritised and migrant women’s organisation dedicated to tackling VAWG in our communities.
At the heart of our work is empowering women to assert their human rights to freedom, equality, and justice. We do this through a combination of community-based services, advocacy, and strategic campaigning to challenge all forms of gender-based abuse. SBS operates within a human rights and intersectional framework, addressing inequalities based on sex, race, class, and immigration status.
Our holistic women’s resource centre provides vital services like helpline support, advocacy, and counselling. The real-life experiences of the women we support shape our wider work, which includes policy reform, education, and litigation efforts that have helped influence changes in the law and social norms.
A significant proportion of our casework involves migrant women with No Recourse to Public Funds (NRPF), and we’ve been at the forefront of campaigns like the Domestic Violence Indefinite Leave to Remain (DVILR) and the Destitute Domestic Violence Concession (DDVC). But the law still fails many victim-survivors with precarious immigration status, and we continue to push for change.
Our work also extends to campaigning for justice in cases of honour-based abuse (HBA), with our Banaz’s Law campaign advocating for it to be treated as an aggravating factor in sentencing. Across all our campaigns, SBS stands firm against institutional racism and the hostile environment policies that disproportionately harm Black, minoritised and migrant women.
In our manifesto, we have detailed some key asks to help us work towards stopping harm, one of which is ‘Make justice work’. Can you tell us about what that would look like for you?
To make justice work, we need to rebuild trust in public institutions, which is at an
all-time low, especially within Black, minoritised and migrant communities. These communities have been subjected to state violence through discriminatory policies like the hostile environment, over-policing, under-protection, and the racist rhetoric that fuels xenophobia, anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim sentiments and deepens structural inequalities.
For justice to truly work, we need a fundamental reset. This means dismantling harmful policies and addressing the institutional attitudes that perpetuate injustice. Reform must be grounded in human rights and include input from Black, minoritised and migrant communities, as well as the organisations that advocate for them.
In light of the far-right riots following the horrific male violence against girls in Southport, we issued a list of 12 demands to the Prime Minister. These include ending the hostile environment, reversing austerity measures, eradicating institutional racism in policing, and rejecting alarmist anti-immigrant rhetoric.
Reforming the criminal justice system is crucial. My own experience of being criminalised after a racist attack shows the need for systemic change. We’re calling for the government to acknowledge institutional racism, ensure data transparency, implement independent oversight of policing, and create safe reporting mechanisms for
victim-survivors regardless of immigration status.
Ultimately, justice only works when it works for everyone—because none of us are free until all of us are free.
What is your understanding of the response to victim-survivors of domestic abuse within Black African, Caribbean and Mixed Heritage communities and what do you think needs to change?
Domestic abuse, like all VAWG, is too often not treated with the seriousness it deserves. The statistics are staggering—1 in 4 women experience domestic abuse—but Black, minoritised and migrant women face additional barriers, including institutional racism and systemic disbelief.
In our frontline work at SBS, we see how Black girls who report abuse are
hyper-sexualised and adultified, leading to under-protection. Black women, too, are often criminalised when they seek help, reduced to harmful stereotypes like the ‘angry Black woman.’ Harmful practices such as HBA are frequently misunderstood or ignored by statutory agencies, which can escalate the danger these women face.
Migrant women, particularly those with insecure immigration status, face what we call ‘dual perpetration’—trapped by both their abuser and the state. Their immigration status is used as a weapon to control them, and the state denies them protection on the same grounds, forcing them to choose between abuse, destitution, and deportation.
Barriers like limited legal aid and language access only compound these issues, contributing to the systemic failings that leave Black, minoritised and migrant women particularly vulnerable. In 2023, 62% of all femicides in London were of Black women—an unacceptable and alarming statistic.
To change this, we need real reform. This includes accepting the findings of the Casey Report, which highlighted institutional racism, misogyny, and homophobia in the Met police, and ending the unequal treatment of Black, minoritised and migrant women. These communities and their advocates must be consulted on any reforms.
A firewall is also urgently needed to prevent data sharing between the police and Immigration Enforcement, so migrant victim-survivors can report abuse without fear. We also need to extend protections like the Migrant Victims of Domestic Abuse Concession (MVDAC) and the DVILR to all victim-survivors, regardless of immigration status, and abolish the hostile environment and NRPF policies. Only then can we build a response that truly protects and supports all victim-survivors.
Can you tell us about how you have been part of changing the dominant narrative about your community, your work or your organisation?
At SBS, we’ve been at the forefront of challenging and reshaping narratives around violence against Black, minoritised and migrant women. One of our earliest successes was the case of Kiranjit Ahluwalia in 1992. By winning justice for Kiranjit, a victim-survivor of domestic abuse, we didn’t just secure her freedom—we changed the law on provocation and forced the criminal justice system to recognise the impact of domestic abuse on women. It was a landmark case that opened up national conversations about domestic abuse in our communities for the first time.
Another crucial case was that of Banaz Mahmod, tragically murdered by her own family in 2006 in a so-called ‘honour killing.’ Banaz had sought help from the police five times before her death, exposing serious failings in how the police respond to Black, minoritised and migrant women facing abuse. We supported Banaz’s sister, Bekhal, who bravely testified against her father and uncle, despite enormous risks to her life. Bekhal’s story is now immortalised in her book No Safe Place, co-authored with our Head of Policy, Dr. Hannana Siddiqui, which continues to raise awareness about HBA.
SBS has always worked on deeply unpopular and challenging issues long before they were widely recognised, including religious fundamentalism, forced marriage, HBA, and the NRPF condition. We fought tirelessly to address these injustices when no one else would, often at the cost of repercussions from both the state and within our own communities. For instance, our ongoing campaign against NRPF is now seeing support from funders, which is a direct result of the groundwork SBS laid decades ago.
We’ve continued tackling issues like the hostile environment and institutional racism, more recently through my own case, where I experienced both personal and systemic racism after a racist attack. Alongside this, we’ve also taken a leading role in addressing fundamentalist developments like The Sikh Court, where an attempt is being made to wield and institutionalise religion in a form that undermines women's rights within the Sikh community. Such courts promote fundamentalist interpretations of religion that contradict principles of gender equality and justice. SBS has raised concerns that such courts could marginalise women, restrict their autonomy, and deny them access to fair legal recourse, particularly in matters relating to family law, marriage, and domestic abuse.
Our advocacy has emphasised the risks posed by these religious courts operating outside the secular legal framework, ensuring that the rights of Black, minoritised and migrant women remain protected within the UK's legal system. This work forms part of our broader efforts to resist religious fundamentalism and its harmful impact on women's rights.
Even today, the issues facing Black, minoritised and migrant women remain marginalised. While there may be more visibility, it often manifests as tokenism or lip service, failing to address the structural inequalities at play. To combat this, SBS continues to centre intersectionality in our work. A clear example of this is our participation in Module 2 of the Covid-19 Inquiry as Core Participants, where we provided evidence on the disproportionate impact of the pandemic on these communities. Our involvement aimed to highlight the systemic inequalities exacerbated by the pandemic, which led to severe challenges, including increased exposure to domestic abuse, economic hardship, and healthcare inequities.
We ensured that the experiences and voices of marginalised women, often overlooked, were central in discussions about the government’s pandemic response. By advocating for an intersectional approach in analysing the failures and impacts of the pandemic, we pushed for accountability and lessons to be learned to better protect vulnerable groups in future crises. This work aligns with SBS’ broader mission to address and challenge institutional racism, economic disparities, and social injustice, ensuring that these critical voices are heard as we continue our fight for meaningful and long-lasting change.
