TRADE UNIONISTS will be issued guidance on how to support women who report domestic violence from other union members, a motion at Unison conference resolved yesterday.

Delegates heard harrowing accounts from women who had survived domestic abuse and misogyny both at home and in the workplace. One woman who told a powerful tale of escaping extreme physical and emotional abuse was given a standing ovation.

The passing of the resolution, which describes domestic violence as a “gendered issue” and notes that it is overwhelmingly perpetrated by men against women, will be seen as a victory for feminist campaigners who have previously struggled to get the issue onto the agenda.

At last year’s conference, delegates challenged the ruling on a similar motion, which had been ruled out on the grounds that its affirmation that the union should start from a position of believing women’s accounts would conflict with the law.

The extensive new motion, also proposed by the union’s national women’s committee, argued that it is “essential … that all women who complain of male violence … have the right to be listened to, their allegations taken seriously and properly investigated with the appropriate action being taken.”

Critics of both motions complained that the wording failed to recognise violence perpetrated against men.

But proposing the motion, women’s committee member Pat Heron said: “We do not and we never have denied that men are the victims of domestic abuse.

“We do say that women are, in the main, the victims of the most severe and most repeated abuse.

“All this motion seeks is a place where women can have equal freedom … a place where their home and work are safe.”

Islington delegate Jo Cardwell said: “It’s a trade union issue because it’s a class issue.”

She said the recent Nigella Lawson case highlighted that domestic violence occurred throughout society but that “Nigella had the resources at her fingertips to make an escape.

“Women’s refuges are being closed left, right and centre,” she added.

Havering delegate Marshajane Thompson pointed to the “disgrace” of abuse within the union movement.

“It’s an even bigger disgrace that when these incidents are reported we haven’t covered ourselves in glory,” she said.