Example - Area 3

Area 3: Women’s interests and concerns have adequate SPACE on the parliamentary agenda

Domain 1: Gender mainstreaming structures (e.g. groups/bodies)

Measures that can be adopted in this domain
  1. Ensure sufficient human resources and a dedicated budget for the activities of the gender equality committee.
  2. If the gender equality committee does not have full legislative power, assess possibilities to enhance its legislative capacity.
  3. Ensure that parliamentary committees appoint representatives to the gender equality committee. Representatives should ideally be gender balanced and tasked with facilitating dialogue between committees and the gender equality committee.
  4. Ensure that gender mainstreaming is not the sole responsibility of the gender equality committee and it is instead embedded in the mandate of all parliamentary committees.
  5. Support the work of women’s caucuses, networks and other working groups that foster internal cooperation on gender equality and gender mainstreaming in the parliament with adequate human and financial resources.
Relevant groups that can lead these measures
  • The parliamentary bureau can work with relevant committees (i.e. those that govern the budget of the parliament) to allocate funds for the activities of the gender equality committee.
  • Chairs of parliamentary committees can ensure cooperation between their committee and the gender equality committee.

In the European Parliament, the Committee on Women’s Rights and Gender Equality (FEMM Committee) is responsible for promoting, monitoring and protecting women’s rights in the EU and in non-EU countries. The FEMM Committee ensures equal opportunities, the tackling of gender-based violence and discrimination, and the implementation of gender mainstreaming. In addition, in 2004 the High-Level Group on Gender Equality and Diversity was established. The High-Level Group promotes and implements gender mainstreaming in the European Parliament’s activities, structures and bodies, and works closely with other parliamentary bodies, and specifically with the FEMM Committee. Furthermore, in 2009, the European Parliament established the GMN[1]. The GMN is chaired and coordinated by the FEMM Committee. This network was established to share information and best practices and is composed of representatives of each committee and delegation of the parliament. All European Parliament committees appoint one of their members as a representative in the GMN[2].

Domain 2: Gender mainstreaming tools in parliamentary work

Measures that can be adopted in this domain
  1. Conduct regular gender equality training and gender mainstreaming training for MPs to provide them with the relevant knowledge and skills to include a gender perspective in their work (including a module on gender and intersecting inequalities).
  2. Ensure that all committees implement gender budgeting in their own policy areas, and that gender budgeting is implemented in relation to the national budget and the internal budget of the parliament.
  3. Ensure that all committees implement ex ante gender impact assessments in their own policy areas. (See EIGE’s checklist for gender-sensitive screening of proposals for EU directives).
  4. Create an internal policy within the parliamentary procurement framework on gender-responsive public procurement. The policy can advance gender equality considerations when purchasing works, supplies or services on behalf of the parliament.
Relevant groups that can lead these measures
  • The high-level working group or committee (overseeing the gender equality action plan) can work with the permanent gender equality office (in the administration), as well as with external gender experts to develop guidance and conduct training for MPs on gender mainstreaming in legislative work, gender budgeting and gender impact assessments.
  • Committees responsible for parliamentary procurement (e.g. budgetary control committee and gender equality committee) can create an internal policy on gender-responsive public procurement, together with the procurement department (in the administration).

The Swedish Parliament’s action programme for gender equality (2018–2022) states that the working group for gender equality must carry out awareness-raising activities to increase MPs’ knowledge on gender equal political participation and decision-making[3]. The plan also intends to carry out a training session on gender and leadership for the chairpersons of the parliamentary committees and the EU committee.

All 20 standing committees (and most sub-committees) of the European Parliament have adopted gender mainstreaming action plans. These plans are listed and accessible on the gender mainstreaming webpage of the FEMM committee[4]. While these plans are generally brief, they typically outline the commitments of the committees to achieve gender balance in their leadership structures, promote gender mainstreaming within their work and monitor and evaluate the gender mainstreaming actions outlined. For example, the action plan on gender mainstreaming of the Committee on Budgets (BUDG Committee) describes measures to integrate gender budgeting into the committee’s activities. This includes measures to conduct a gender-sensitive assessment of budgets and integrate a gender perspective at all levels of the budgetary process[5].

In Austria, the women’s advancement plan for the Parliamentary Directorate (2021–2026) includes measures to ensure gender-responsive public procurement[6]. Section 6 of the plan states that: all tenders must be written using gender-neutral language; requirements for project roles in tenders must be formulated in a way that does not disadvantage women; applications, particularly from women, during a legally stipulated form of absence from work must be considered in equal regard with other applications; and a copy of the advertisement for a tender must be sent to the equal treatment officer before publication or internal announcement.

Domain 3: Gender mainstreaming tools for parliamentary employees

Measures that can be adopted in this domain
  1. Integrate training on gender equality (including with an intersectional perspective) into the onboarding and compliance training of parliamentary employees.
  2. Develop training programmes to improve the capacities of parliamentary employees on gender mainstreaming, with specific reference to gender impact assessments and gender budgeting.
  3. Commission a study on the gender pay gap among the parliamentary workforce and share the results publicly.
  4. Establish procedures to ensure pay transparency for parliamentary employees.
  5. Develop tools to ensure equal pay for equal work of equal value between women and men in line with the EU’s Pay Transparency Directive[7]. For example, parliaments can develop gender-neutral job classification systems (to determine pay structures and employee pay outcomes), report on the pay gap between women and men in all their diversity and carry out equal pay audits[8].
Relevant groups that can lead these measures
  • The HR department of the parliamentary administration and the permanent gender equality office (in the administration) can work with external gender experts to conduct training on gender equality, and specific gender mainstreaming tools such as gender impact assessments and gender budgeting.
  • The executive committee or board of the parliamentary administration can commission a study on the gender pay gap among employees.
  • The HR department of the parliamentary administration can also establish a gender equality policy for parliamentary employees and develop tools to ensure pay transparency.

In Spain, the gender equality plan of the National Parliament includes measures to organise annual training on equality between women and men, on the use of gender-sensitive language, and on gender-based violence and harassment for staff of the institution, with mandatory training for HR staff[9]. The plan also includes measures to develop an ‘information note’ for experts and organisations that deliver training to staff, focusing on the need to incorporate a gender perspective into training materials and to develop materials that avoid sexist language and gender stereotypes. In its annual monitoring reports, the plan states that the parliament will include sex-disaggregated data on the participants of this training.