W.C.A.A

Women's House (operating under the name of the Women's Community Aid Association) was established by eight feminists in 1975 with the aim of working towards the liberation of women.

During its herstory, WCAA has sought to identify areas where women are under resourced in the community. This has led to the creation of several initiatives that have developed into separate services in their own right. These include the Women's Legal Service and the Women's Health Centre.

The main services operating out of WCAA have been a women's refuge and a rape crisis centre. The Brisbane Rape Crisis Centre began operating in April 1975, and Women's House Shelta commenced in May, 1975.

In May of 1978, the Federal Government granted Women's House $10,000 to operate the refuge (on the proviso that WCAA raised $2,500).

It wasn't until 1983 that the Rape Crisis Centre received some funding from the Department of Family Services.

Memorable moments from the 70,s include Women's House workers being arrested for singing "Lest we Forget" for women raped during war and monumental struggles with the government over abortion laws.

1990 saw the launch of "Facts on Rape" and in 1991, the Brisbane Rape Crisis Centre was funded by the Women's Health Policy Unit. Within a year, 'Incest' had been added to the title to recognise the scale of intra-familial sexual violence. By 1998, Women's House had finally been able to buy its own premises in Woolloongabba.

So, over 30 years after those committed eight feminists decided that there was a pressing need for women to advocate for social change to end oppression of all women, here we are, often fighting the same battles fought by Women's House workers back in the seventies and eighties.

Throughout the years the 'baton' has been passed on to new generations of workers, who will undoubtedly continue to pass it on into the next millenium. Even now the pressing need to effect social change that spurred on those women in the early seventies, is still alive and well in the Women's House of the 21st century.

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