Reviewed by: Ravinder Khumra

On 1 June I went to the Sound of Change Live concert at Twickenham, which was attended by 50,000 people, broadcast to more then 150 countries and watched by a billion people.

The concert was presented by Chime for Change, a global campaign to promote ‘Education, Health and Justice. For every woman. Every girl. Everywhere’. With an amazing line-up including Florence + the Machine, John Legend, Jennifer Lopez, and headlined by Beyonce (pictured), no doubt some of you will have seen the pictures afterwards and read the articles asking you to donate generously.

The audience was given soundbites by Madonna (‘Education is not a luxury, it’s a basic human right’), archbishop Desmond Tutu (by video message), and his daughter Mpho Tutu, advocating that ‘empowering girls and women is the challenge of our time’.

The message was loud and clear – once we were at the event. More should have been done to promote the concert leading up to Saturday, as the stadium was unfortunately not sold out.

What came across strongly throughout the event were the messages relating to injustices that women encounter daily. Messages relating to the disparity of pay, revealing that women around the world earn an average of 20% less than men and, although they perform 66% of the world’s work, only receive 11% of the world’s income.

Access to justice, however, was not dealt with well. A video clip was shown with women talking about being victims of sexual assault on public transport. A blog had been set up by a victim and she was shown reading other posts she had received, talking about how victims are made to feel.

But the concert itself – a non-stop four-hour show – was seamless. A great evening, but an even greater cause.

Ravinder Khumra is a senior solicitor at bsb solicitors, London

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