d o c u m e n t s

Speaking Commissioner A. Diamantopoulou European Parliament Women's Committee 21/09/99<

Introduction

I am here today to hear your views about the future course of European policy in respect of Equal opportunities.
I would like to say a few words, at the beginning of our discussion, about:
· The progress we have made at European level in terms of achieving real equality between women and men
· The main challenges we are going to face over the coming years
· The specific commitments that I intend to make regarding our work over the coming year. Progress at European level To start with, many things have been achieved in terms of political commitment at European level:
· With the Amsterdam Treaty we have reinforced Community competencies in gender equality by the inclusion of articles 2 and 3 formalising the Community commitment to gender mainstreaming, and by the modification of the new article 141 extending the principle of equal treatment for equal work to work of equal value
· Within the employment guidelines we have brought significant improvements in the Member States' adoption of gender mainstreaming, made specific policy recommendations on national policies, and strengthened commitments further with our proposals for the year 2000 guidelines.
· And within the articles 2 and 4 of the new ESF regulation, we have moved from a position where women were a target group to one where there is a general, formal, legal obligation to promote gender mainstreaming in all activities, with the necessary counter-part support for positive action by the Member States.
· We have brought the fourth action programme close to completion. This provides us with a rich range of practical experiences that we will be drawing upon in the development of future policy.

Challenges
It is a fact that significant steps have been made but I would like to underline that there is still a very long way to go. Not just in terms of equal opportunities in the labour market, that is the rates of employment, and unemployment,working conditions, access to careers and career development and equal pay - but also in terms of public policy generally, including the issue of more women in decision-making positions.
I believe in the two-track approach to equality between women and men. This demands both a mainstreaming of equality objectives across all policy areas, and the development of specific actions concerning women. Together these can address the longstanding inequalities which still structure much of the economic and social life in the Union. The challenge now is to turn these general commitments into real, measurable action and achievements.
The new Treaty provides this opportunity. Further steps can, and must, be taken, covering not only my own responsibilities, but those of the College as a whole.
I intend to pursue this work in full co-operation with the Parliament, the Social Partners and relevant non-governmental civil service organisations. Obviously, I intend also to co-operate closely with the Member States. Their full involvement is vital for achieving our objectives.

Commitments
The specific, immediate, commitments I wish to make today are three-fold. The first is to establish a new framework programme on gender equality for the period 2001 to 2005. This new programme should aim to strengthen and further develop the actions already developed in the previous four programmes. However, it should have a new, more global and distinctive character – a framework programme within which all Community policies can effectively work for gender equality.
My second commitment is to act on the basis of article 141 and to fulfil the Commission's promise to withdraw the current proposal on the table, and present a new one. This would amend the 1976 Directive on equal treatment by specifying better some of the existing provisions, and by including new provisions not covered by the old proposal on important issues, including sexual harassment at the workplace. My third commitment is to present a proposal that would redress the balance in the representation of women in the Committees and expert groups set up by the Commission. Women's participation in decision making is an important area where real progress needs to be made -starting with our own Institution, where the presence of women in many committees or expert groups is almost non-existent.

Conclusion
In conclusion, having presented you with my immediate commitments, I would like to stress the fact that this is only the beginning. Thank you for your attention and I look forward to your reactions and suggestions for our common work over the next five years.

The Other Half f e a v of E u r o p e n