The name of a local woman who was found dead last week was included in a list of women read out in Parliament.
In a debate on international women’s day (8th March), Labour MP Jess Phillips listed all women killed in the UK over the past year where a man has been convicted or charged.
Ms Phillips told Parliament that “killed women are not vanishingly rare, killed women are common”.
The list ended with the name of Sarah Everard but included Samantha Heap, of Congleton, who was found dead at an address on Nursery Lane, Congleton. A man has been charged with her murder.
Ms Phillips told Parliament: “We love to count data about our own popularity (but) we do not currently count dead women. No Government study is done into the patterns every year of the data on victims of domestic abuse who are killed, die by suicide or die suddenly.
“Dead women is a thing we have all just accepted as part of our daily lives. Dead women are just one of those things.”
She told Parliament: “Killed women are not vanishingly rare; killed women are common. Dead women do count, and thanks to the brilliant work of Karen Ingala Smith and the Counting Dead Women project, and the academics and charities working on the femicide census, these women’s lives and the scale of male violence against women can be known.”
She then read list comprising women killed in the UK where a man had been convicted or charged as the primary perpetrator in the case.
The list started with Vanita Nowell, (68), found unresponsive at her Peckham home on 8th March. Her son Andrew was arrested and taken into custody by police.
Ms Heap’s name came fourth from the end.
Great Grimsby MP Lia Nici spoke next and commented: “There are no words. There are no words at all.”
