Voices Unheard is an amazing group of young Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) people that has strived across Scotland to raise awareness of young LGBT people’s perspectives of domestic abuse and what services can do to improve the way they offer them help. It is run by LGBT Youth Scotland.
Voices Unheard logo
Voices Unheard has done local fact finding and consultations with young LGBT people in four areas – Dundee, Edinburgh, Glasgow and the Scottish Borders. They launched this fact finding at local events which helped information sharing with lots of other organisations like Women’s Aid, youth workers, schools and the police forces of those areas.
Some members of VAV attended two of these local events – one in Dundee on the 2nd February and one in Glasgow on the 16th February. We found out many things like the fact that domestic abuse experienced by transgender people is more common than we thought. Also that the lack of representation of LGBT young people in advertising campaigns as well as lack of police awareness on the subject can create barriers to young LGBT people seeking help.
Delegates at the national launch
The launch of Voices Unheard’s national research which pulled together findings from all four areas was done spectacularly in Edinburgh’s Dynamic Earth. VAV got to go on a tour of the place then sat down to hear Voices Unheard talk about their fact finding and recommendations. The day ended with a panel of which we asked questions of Scottish Women’s Aid, the Government, the Police, LGBT Youth and others about how to raise awareness of the needs of young LGBT people and how to improve services and multi agency approaches.