In the women’s restrooms of a bar in Finsbury Park, there is a poster. It explains the meaning of the codeword “Ask for Angela”, which a woman can whisper to a bartender if she feels frightened and needs assistance leaving. For months, the poster has been hanging. In 2021, the barman responded to a reporter’s question about it by asking, Who is Angela?
The discrepancy between the UK’s aspirations for women’s safety and its actual situation is shown by that moment captured by Metro.co.uk during a single evening spent touring seven locations in London. Because, on paper, the last ten years of funding, advocacy, license reform, and cultural pressure constitute one of the longest running national initiatives to improve the treatment of women in nightlife that any nation has attempted. In reality, it’s inconsistent, underfunded in some areas, and largely relies on exhausted bar employees’ ability to recall a quick training session they may have attended once prior to a hectic Saturday shift.
| Initiative / Focus | Women’s Safety in UK Nightlife |
| Key Policy | Westminster After Dark Strategy (March 2025) |
| Founding Campaign | Ask for Angela — Lincolnshire, 2016 |
| Charter Launched | Mayor of London’s Women’s Night Safety Charter, 2018 |
| Charter Signatories | 2,143+ organisations across London (as of November 2023) |
| Funding Invested | £159 million+ via Safer Streets Fund & Safety of Women at Night Fund |
| Hospitality Worker Training | 10,000 workers targeted for spiking training by spring 2025 |
| Spiking Reports (England & Wales)** | Nearly 5,000 in one year (Sept 2021–Sept 2022) |
| Key Apps | Hollie Guard (200,000+ downloads), WalkSafe (500,000+ downloads) |
| Industry Value | UK night-time economy worth £153.91 billion (2024) |
Hayley Child, a sexual violence coordinator for Lincolnshire County Council, came up with the idea for Ask for Angela in 2016 based on a straightforward observation: women who were harassed in bars were afraid to report it. They were able to signal for assistance without drawing attention to themselves thanks to the scheme. Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and portions of the United States had implemented it by 2021.
The Metropolitan Police back home reported that more than 150 London venues have signed up. Half of the employees in those same locations were either unaware of the codeword or were unable to explain what to do when they heard it. There is no need for training. Keeping up is difficult due to high personnel turnover. Those who don’t know to look can’t see the posters that are frequently hidden in women’s restrooms.
The events that followed Sarah Everard’s death in March 2021 drastically altered the political landscape. While heading home through Clapham, 33 year old Everard was kidnapped and slain by a current Metropolitan Police officer. The public outcry that followed was unprecedented in the nation, and for a short while, the phrase “women’s safety” dominated all discussions regarding public life. The Safer Streets Fund was doubled to £45 million by the government.
Westminster declared that it would add 100 more security cameras. Project Vigilant was expanded nationwide, with plainclothes officers stationed outside pubs and clubs to spot predatory behavior. In the meantime, many more women came forward to report what had long been thought to be unremarkable: being harassed in broad daylight, followed, groped, and terrified to walk home.
There have been some truly important developments since then. Over 2,143 companies, including Arsenal, Chelsea, Tesco, and Boots, have signed the Mayor of London’s Women’s Night Safety Charter, which was introduced in 2018 under Sadiq Khan’s office and Night Czar Amy Lamé. The Safer Business Network’s WAVE training program has given over 110,000 hospitality employees useful tools to recognize predatory behavior and vulnerable individuals. Founded by Bryony Beynon in 2014, the Good Night Out Campaign has taught employees in more than 250 locations.
After completing the program, 97.8% of participants felt more prepared to handle sexual abuse in nightlife. Rape crimes in Manchester’s city center decreased by 50% during a Safer Streets initiative that ran from December 2023 to March 2025. Safety evaluations are now a requirement for new licenses under Westminster’s ambitious 2025 plan, Westminster After Dark. A number of authorities, including Brighton, Rotherham, and Telford, have updated their licensing regulations to specifically address women’s safety.
It has been extremely difficult to overlook drink spiking. Nearly 5,000 reports were submitted in England and Wales between September 2021 and September 2022. According to a Cambridge research, 90% of occurrences go unreported, meaning that about one million people may be spiked each year. Prime Minister Keir Starmer met with police chiefs and hospitality executives at Downing Street in November 2024 to announce that 10,000 hospitality employees would receive spiking prevention training by spring 2025 and that the government planned to make spiking a specific new criminal offense. Dawn Dines, the founder of Stamp Out Spiking, and other activists had been advocating for this since 2004. It’s unclear how soon that legislation will be passed.
Observing all of this gives the impression that the campaigns are actually making progress, but that progress is obstinately slow. According to a 2024 Liverpool John Moores University study, 58% of nightlife visitors reported having been sexually assaulted on a night out. According to UN Women UK, 71% of women report having been sexually harassed in public places.
Plan International survey conducted in late 2024, 62% of girls and young women between the ages of 14 and 21 use cabs home at least once a month in order to reduce hazards, spending an average of £528 annually for safety. Apps like WalkSafe, which maps crime data to help plan safer routes home, has 500,000 users and Hollie Guard, which sends real time alerts to trusted contacts, has over 200,000 downloads. The fact that a 16 year old in 2025 needs a panic button in her pocket to feel safe walking home is not, in retrospect, the victory anyone was hoping to celebrate.
The cultural transformation occurring below the policy level is more difficult to ignore. The Have a Word commercial, which featured a group boy supporting his friend’s harassing of a woman waiting for a cab, significantly increased the likelihood that young males would step in to stop misogynistic behavior. The readiness to intervene among guys aged 18 to 34 increased from 73 to 81 percent during the follow up Maaate campaign, which was based on behavioral science research and seeded through channels such as WhatsApp and LADbible. In Bristol, where 97% of women reported experiencing sexual harassment, nightlife workers, venue owners, and volunteers marched through the city center with torches during the Shine A Light Parade. Venues must have two committed women’s safety champions on staff as part of Nottingham’s Safe Space Pledge.
Layer by layer, it’s still uncertain if these actions will eventually result in the numbers that count: fewer attacks, less women taking other routes, fewer people waking up with no recollection of the previous night. The findings are actually conflicting. There was no statistically significant increase in overall sentiments of safety, according to the government’s own assessment of the Safety of Women at Night Fund. Employees at financed locations reported being better able to respond to events, having a clearer understanding of warning indicators, and feeling more confident. Even though it isn’t included in the crime survey yet, that still counts for something.
i) https://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/womens-safety-westminster-city-council-nightlife-b1216070.html
ii) https://edm.com/industry/uk-womens-safety-police-patrols-in-nightclubs/
iii) https://www.gov.uk/government/news/millions-awarded-for-new-projects-to-keep-women-safe
iv) https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ce3y8l1nwkeo.amp