Petition launched to save Glasgow's Rape Crisis Centre

Hundreds of people have signed a petition calling on Children in Need to reinstate funding for Glasgow's Rape Crisis Centre.

The service announced on Facebook they would have to close their waiting list to new victims because vital cash has been withdrawn.

It is currently taking them up to 9 months to see victims.

Centre manager Isabelle Kerr said: "It's been one of the most difficult decisions I've ever had to make and I do feel a sense of personal failure because I can't keep the service going at the capacity we have been operating.

"Unfortunately these decisions have to be made but I do feel awful about it.

"This decision is against a backdrop of funding we have lost recently from BBC Children in Need. They provided funding for a project for 13 to 18 year-old girls.

"One of the reasons it was discontinued after 6 years of a very successful project was because they flt we couldn't do enough for male survivors.

"That's unfortunate because we've only ever been a service for women and girls and never pretended to be otherwise."

A spokesperson for BBC Children in Need said: “We have been pleased to fund Glasgow and Clyde Rape Crisis since 2012. Glasgow and Clyde Rape Crisis’ three-year grant recently came to the end of its term, and their subsequent application for new funding was unsuccessful.

"This decision was in no way connected to the support of male victims, we award grants to charities regardless of gender.

“Although the public are extremely generous in their support each year, we simply don’t have the money to fund all of the projects that apply to us for grants and we have to make some really difficult decisions.

"We currently fund 313 projects to a value of £18.8 million in Scotland and receive thousands of funding applications every year from projects across the UK helping to change young lives."

The petition can be found here.

• glasgow rape crisis