The European Parliament adopted by 492 votes to 126 with 75 a resolution on gender mainstreaming in the European Parliament.
The resolution presents the state of play regarding the promotion and implementation of gender mainstreaming in the European Parliament, both within Parliament’s administration and through the latter’s policies. It presents a critical assessment of the progress made over the past two years and makes concrete recommendations for further progress.
Parliament noted that the composition of the European Parliament reflects severe female under-representation, since only 36.1 % of Members are female. This gap is further emphasised by the composition of Parliament’s Bureau, which is made up of 7 women and 13 men. Only 11 % of Parliament’s senior management appointments (Directors-General and Directors) were women in 2016 and 33 % were women in 2017.
General remarks
Parliament called for the new multiannual financial framework (MFF), like the last MFF, to be accompanied by a joint declaration by Parliament, the Commission and the Council, committing them to ensure that the annual budgetary procedures applied for the MFF integrate, as appropriate, gender-responsive element.
The Commission was asked to present a genuine European Equality Strategy in the form of a communication that contains clear and, as far as possible, quantifiable objectives. For its part, Parliament should foster a culture of diversity and inclusion and a safe working environment for everyone, together with targeted measures to achieve gender-balanced representation both at administrative and political level.
The resolution further encouraged the promotion of different role models for overcoming all kinds of gender stereotypes. It applauded male and female role models for gender equality as well as initiatives both in the Parliament administration and at political level that actively contribute to gender equality and equal opportunities.
Parliament regretted the lack of coherence and coordination between the various bodies working on gender equality and diversity in Parliament, and reiterated their call to improve internal coordination in order to achieve a higher degree of gender mainstreaming.
Gender mainstreaming tools
Parliament called for the adoption of a common gender action plan for the European Parliament which should, at least, contain provisions regarding equal gender representation in all parliamentary work and all of Parliament’s bodies, the introduction of a gender perspective in all its policy activities and in its working organisation and the use of gender-neutral language in all documents. Parliament’s Rules of Procedure should be amended accordingly.
Memberscalled for closer cooperation among the parliamentary committees aimed at bringing a real gender dimension to their reports and stressed the importance for all parliamentary committees of showing respect for the competences of the Committee on Women’s Rights and Gender Equality, both by accepting the gender mainstreaming amendments tabled by the Committee and by working together to avoid conflicts of competences.
Anti-harassment
Members welcomed the new measures to counteract sexual harassment, as called for in Parliament’s resolution of 26 October 2017, against harassment, which entered into force on 1 September 2018.
They demanded that attention be given to the full implementation of all requested measures, in particular by means of the 2017-2019 roadmap on ‘preventive and early support measures to deal with conflict and harassment between Members and APAs, trainees or other staff’, which should be revised as soon as possible to adequately include at least the following demands:
- mandatory training for Members and staff;
- a task force of independent, external experts to be convened with a mandate to examine the situation of sexual harassment in the European Parliament and the functioning of its two harassment committees;
- strengthening the anti-harassment committees by merging them into one sole committee with a variable composition depending on the case under examination and including experts such as lawyers and doctors as standing members of the committee.
Political level
Members commended the appointment in 2016 of the standing rapporteur on gender mainstreaming in the European Parliament and recommended that Parliament maintain this position for the 2019-2024 parliamentary term.
Pointing to the importance of increasing the presence of the under-represented gender, often women, on electoral lists, Members strongly encourages the European political parties and their party members to ensure a gender-balanced representation of candidates for elections to the European Parliament in 2019 by means of zipped lists or other methods such as parity lists. They also encouraged political groups to adopt a gender mainstreaming strategy.
Whilst condemning in the strongest possible terms the misogynistic language used on several occasions in the plenary chamber, Members called for an additional clause in the Rules of Procedure requiring Members in parliamentary debates to refrain from adopting language that incites hatred or discriminates on specified grounds including gender and race, and to impose exemplary sanctions in the event of non-compliance with this clause.
Administrative level
Parliament welcomed the report by Dimitrios Papadimoulis on gender equality in the European Parliament secretariat for 2017-2019’ and the roadmap for implementing the report. It urged the High-Level Group on Gender Equality and Diversity to perform a two-yearly structural, point-by-point assessment of the implementation of the roadmap on gender equality.
Lastly, Parliament noted that despite the fact that the majority of Parliament officials are women, their representation in senior or middle management positions is still very low. It stated therefore, that when choosing between applicants with the same profile (experience, qualification, etc.) the under-represented gender should be preferred.