POSITIVE

In the UK, family courts have long presumed it is in a child’s best interest to maintain contact with both parents, even when one is known to be abusive. According to Women’s Aid’s latest report, this has led to 19 more children being killed by an abusive parent in the last decade. In total, that’s 67 children in 30 years.

Every single one of them could have been prevented, if only they had been heard by the justice system.

To help raise awareness, we staged a protest outside Parliament that no one could ignore. We assembled a choir of 19 children singing ‘Lovely’ by Billie Eilish, but gradually they all stopped until the choir fell silent — representing the 19 children whose voices were silenced and ended up losing their lives. 

The stunt was attended by several ministers from the Department of Justice, including Jess Phillips, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Safeguarding and Violence Against Women and Girls, and Ministers Sarah Sackman and Alex Davies-Jones. 

The idea builds on Hijinks’ previous OOH campaign for Women’s Aid, which launched in June with the message “Hear the children, or grieve them,” and was named Campaign’s Ad of the Day.