My name is Kate Maggs and I am CEO of Better Things: a Manchester charity that supports young people with learning disabilities and autism.

Since 2022 our Better Things Ambassadors Mariam, Lorraine, and Katrina, have been part of a growing women-led movement for local action on gender inequality. We have worked with women with disabilities, women survivors, working class women’s peer support groups, mums of children fleeing war and violence, carers forums, mums of children with special educational needs, global majority women, and women struggling with the cost of living, to join together around what we hold in common as women, mothers, daughters and sisters.

We are tired of the erosion of our rights to a safe and healthy neighbourhood where our children and families can thrive.

We are asking Andy Burnham and his new government to ensure that our six threads for Just Neighbourhoods are stitched into the national policy fabric. We ask that this manifesto be used as the benchmark and driver for new policy and legislative reforms to improve our daily lives in the places where we live, work, play, grow up and grow old.

The evidence is clear: women and children are those worst affected by the intersecting cost of living, housing, and climate crises. It is time our voices are heard. Please sign this petition in support of our Women’s Manifesto for Just Neighbourhoods.

Together, we can do this. Divided, women and children will continue to suffer the harshest consequences.

A Women's Manifesto for Just Neighbourhoods

POWER: Protect and strengthen residents rights to shape their own local area; repeal anti-democratic planning reforms like the 'national scheme of delegation'; devolve decisions on local area resources to neighbourhood boards and assemblies.

HOMES: Decent, affordable, secure, well-insulated, healthy homes focused on actual needs and highest needs not “what developers want” and “viability loopholes”.

HEALTH: Address the mental health emergency; community-based, affordable, nutritious food; services tailored to local needs and our ageing population.

GREEN: Clean air; biodiversity; space to grow; community energy; cool spaces; warm spaces; green spaces.

YOUTH: Safe space to play; indoor and outdoor facilities designed by young people; training and employment opportunities for ALL young people; support for care leavers.

SANCTUARY: Spaces, homes, and support for our most vulnerable and marginalised: our homeless, our SEND families, and our women and children fleeing war and all forms of violence.

Please sign to show your support for the Women’s Manifesto for Just Neighbourhoods!