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Document 52022IP0072

    European Parliament resolution of 10 March 2022 on gender mainstreaming in the European Parliament — annual report 2020 (2021/2039(INI))

    OJ C 347, 9.9.2022, p. 139–149 (BG, ES, CS, DA, DE, ET, EL, EN, FR, HR, IT, LV, LT, HU, MT, NL, PL, PT, RO, SK, SL, FI, SV)
    OJ C 347, 9.9.2022, p. 128–138 (GA)

    9.9.2022   

    EN

    Official Journal of the European Union

    C 347/139

    P9_TA(2022)0072

    Gender mainstreaming in the European Parliament — annual report 2020

    European Parliament resolution of 10 March 2022 on gender mainstreaming in the European Parliament — annual report 2020 (2021/2039(INI))

    (2022/C 347/11)

    The European Parliament,

    —

    having regard to Articles 2 and 3 of the Treaty on European Union and to Articles 8, 10 and 19 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union,

    —

    having regard to Articles 21 and 23 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union,

    —

    having regard to the Council of Europe Convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence (Istanbul Convention), which entered into force on 1 August 2014,

    —

    having regard to the Commission communication of 5 March 2020 entitled ‘A Union of Equality: Gender Equality Strategy 2020-2025’ (COM(2020)0152),

    —

    having regard to the Commission proposal of 2 July 2008 for a Council directive on implementing the principle of equal treatment between persons irrespective of religion or belief, disability, age or sexual orientation (COM(2008)0426 — the horizontal anti-discrimination directive),

    —

    having regard to the Commission proposal of 14 November 2012 for a directive of the European Parliament and of the Council on improving the gender balance among non-executive directors of companies listed on stock exchanges and related measures (COM(2012)0614 — the women on boards directive),

    —

    having regard to Directive (EU) 2019/1158 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 20 June 2019 on work-life balance for parents and carers and repealing Council Directive 2010/18/EU (1) (the work-life balance directive),

    —

    having regard to the European Court of Auditors report of 2021 entitled ‘Gender mainstreaming in the EU budget: time to turn words into action — Special report No 10, 2021’,

    —

    having regard to the European Ombudsman’s report of 17 December 2018 on dignity at work in the EU institutions and agencies,

    —

    having regard to the European Parliamentary Research Service (EPRS) study of 2021 entitled ‘Gender mainstreaming in the European Parliament: state of play’,

    —

    having regard to the 2021 study commissioned by Parliament’s Policy Department for Citizens’ Rights and Constitutional Affairs at the request of the Committee on Women's Rights and Gender Equality (FEMM) entitled ‘Gender equality: economic value of care from the perspective of the applicable EU funds’,

    —

    having regard to the Women in the European Parliament brochure of 2021,

    —

    having regard to the workshop of 16 March 2021 requested by FEMM entitled ‘Applying gender mainstreaming in the EU recovery package’,

    —

    having regard to its resolution of 13 March 2003 on gender mainstreaming in the European Parliament (2),

    —

    having regard to its resolution of 18 January 2007 on gender mainstreaming in the work of the committees (3),

    —

    having regard to its resolution of 22 April 2009 on gender mainstreaming in the work of its committees and delegations (4),

    —

    having regard to its resolution of 7 May 2009 on gender mainstreaming in EU external relations and peace-building/nation-building (5),

    —

    having regard to its resolution of 15 January 2019 on gender mainstreaming in the European Parliament (6),

    —

    having regard to its resolution of 24 November 2016 on the EU accession to the Istanbul Convention on preventing and combating violence against women (7),

    —

    having regard to its resolution of 28 November 2019 on the EU’s accession to the Istanbul Convention and other measures to combat gender-based violence (8),

    —

    having regard to its resolution of 26 October 2017 on combating sexual harassment and abuse in the EU (9),

    —

    having regard to its resolution of 11 September 2018 on measures to prevent and combat mobbing and sexual harassment at workplace, in public spaces, and political life in the EU (10),

    —

    having regard to its resolution of 21 January 2021 on the EU Strategy for Gender Equality (11),

    —

    having regard to its resolution of 17 December 2020 on the need for a dedicated Council configuration on gender equality (12),

    —

    having regard to its resolution of 26 November 2020 on stocktaking of European elections (13),

    —

    having regard to its resolution of 21 January 2021 on the gender perspective in the COVID-19 crisis and post-crisis period (14),

    —

    having regard to Rule 54 of its Rules of Procedure,

    —

    having regard to the report of the Committee on Women’s Rights and Gender Equality (A9-0021/2022),

    A.

    whereas gender equality is a core principle of the EU; whereas gender mainstreaming is a globally recognised strategy to ensure the integration of a gender perspective when designing, implementing and evaluating all policies, programmes and measures in order to promote gender equality and combat discrimination; whereas gender issues are present everywhere, including in areas that have not been the focus of attention, such as taxation, trade and the green transition; whereas gender equality must be achieved using a cross-cutting approach that integrates all areas of work within Parliament;

    B.

    whereas despite gender equality progress in some areas, women still suffer gender-based discrimination in the public and private spheres and much room remains for improvement, including on the fragmented implementation of gender mainstreaming across policy areas and institutions at the EU and national level;

    C.

    whereas gender discrimination often intersects with other types of discrimination on other grounds, which leads to multiple and compounding forms of discrimination against specific groups, which operate and interact with each other at the same time in such a way as to be inseparable;

    D.

    whereas gender-mainstreaming measures include, among others, quotas, work-life balance measures, anti-harassment policies, gender-responsive recruitment procedures, gender impact assessments, gender indicators, gender budgeting and gender-responsive evaluations to adopt gender-responsive legislation, the use of gender-neutral language and gender-responsive communication;

    E.

    whereas the OECD defines gender balance as ‘an equitable distribution of life’s opportunities and resources between women and men, and/or the equal representation of women and men’;

    F.

    whereas the European Institute for Gender Equality (EIGE) defines horizontal segregation as the ‘concentration of women and men in different sectors and occupations’;

    G.

    whereas the progress in addressing sexual harassment and sexual violence after four years of the #MeToo movement is not sufficient and much remains to be done within the EU institutions and beyond; whereas research shows that harassment is more widespread than commonly believed and is significantly under-reported;

    H.

    whereas gender mainstreaming must also be applied in the budgetary process; whereas gender-responsive budgeting does not just consist of funding explicit gender equality initiatives, but also understanding the impact of budgetary and policy decisions on gender equality and adjusting public expenditure and revenue accordingly; whereas budgetary resources and the provision of services should be allocated according to the data-driven identification of needs, including qualitative data on gender impacts;

    I.

    whereas the European Court of Auditors has pointed out that the EU's budget cycle has not adequately taken gender equality into account; whereas the Court of Auditors has recommended that the Commission assess and report on whether Member States' recovery and resilience plans address gender equality;

    J.

    whereas all EU institutions are guided by the Treaties and the 2020-2025 EU gender equality strategy; whereas Parliament should be a leader for other parliamentary bodies in its promotion of gender equality, learn from the best practices of other parliamentary bodies in gender mainstreaming its structures and processes and take into account good examples of gender-mainstreaming implementation in the public and private sectors and civil society; whereas gender mainstreaming is still not yet fully integrated into Parliament’s practices and rules (15); whereas in the hearings organised by most of Parliament committees between the beginning of the current term and November 2020, women accounted for under 50 % of those present; whereas for the Committees on Agriculture and Rural Development, Fisheries, Petitions and Employment and Social Affairs, among others, the proportion was below 25 %;

    K.

    whereas work-life balance in Parliament has been greatly affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, and, facilitated by digital tools, has often resulted in longer working hours for both Members and staff; whereas working from home is not a substitute for childcare; whereas Parliament, as an employer and institution that functions as a role model for society as a whole, can benefit from a motivated workforce and healthy environment and employees should have access to work-life balance throughout their entire careers;

    General remarks

    1.

    		 Reaffirms its strong commitment to gender equality and endorses gender mainstreaming as one of its official policy approaches to ensure it; regrets the fragmented implementation of gender mainstreaming across policy areas and institutions at the EU level; stresses that gender equality is a joint responsibility that requires action by all EU institutions, Member States and agencies, in partnership with civil society, women’s organisations, social partners and the private sector;

    2.

    		 Underlines that women represent half of the population and are, therefore, diverse exposed to intersecting forms of discrimination; stresses that measures to ensure gender equality need to incorporate an intersectional approach with the aim of leaving no one behind and eliminating all forms of discrimination, including intersecting forms; stresses the need to also create participatory processes that involve all relevant actors and combine top-down and bottom-up approaches;

    3.

    		 Welcomes the increasing number of women involved in politics, but stresses that we are far from reaching gender parity and that women with a public profile, such as politicians and activists, are often the target of harassment with the intention to discourage their presence in public life and decision-making spheres; stresses that no feminist legislation or policies that aim to achieve gender equality in all areas can be designed without the presence of women in the decision-making process; recalls the importance of having a gender-responsive working environment to improve the representation of women at all levels of Parliament, including in political groups and MEPs’ offices;

    4.

    		 Notes the lack of quantitative and qualitative data on gender mainstreaming within the EU institutions beyond data on the number of women in different positions; calls, therefore, for the compiling of comprehensive gender statistics and commits to creating qualitative indicators on gender equality to collect additional gender-disaggregated data in order to continue improving gender equality;

    5.

    		 Welcomes the EIGE’s ‘Gender-sensitive parliaments’ toolkit that focuses on five key areas to be addressed: equal opportunities to enter the parliament, equal opportunities to influence the parliament’s working procedures, adequate space on the parliamentary agenda for women’s interests and concerns, the production of gender-sensitive legislation and compliance with the symbolic function of the parliament;

    6.

    		 Welcomes the adoption of gender action plans by all Parliament committees; notes, however, the lack of monitoring and implementation of these plans; calls therefore on the committees to monitor their gender action plans in order to measure progress and ensure their implementation; emphasises that Parliament’s Gender Mainstreaming Network is responsible for mainstreaming a gender inclusive approach into the environment and work of committees and delegations;

    7.

    		 Welcomes the new provision of Parliament’s Rules of Procedure, adopted in 2019, that establishes the obligation to adopt a gender action plan aimed at incorporating a gender perspective into all Parliament’s activities at all levels and stages; welcomes the adoption of a gender action plan in July 2020 and a roadmap for its implementation in April 2021; requests the preparation of reports regularly monitoring the progress made in implementing the gender action plan; regrets that the gender action plan and roadmap are not publicly available and that most of the measures included are formulated as principles without clear targets and obligations, which indicates a lack of political engagement with their implementation;

    8.

    		 Calls for an even stronger structured cooperation between all EU institutions in applying gender mainstreaming in order to better achieve gender equality; believes that Parliament and the political groups should join forces to improve gender equality and fight against anti-feminist and anti-gender movements, which are also always anti-democratic, both in Europe and worldwide;

    Opportunities to enter Parliament

    9.

    		 Notes that the percentage of women Members has slightly decreased since the end of last term from about 39,6 % to 39,1 %; welcomes Parliament’s leadership in this area, nevertheless, including its progress on female political representation, which is higher than the 30,4 % average across the national parliaments of the Member States and is significantly higher than the worldwide average of 25,2 % for national parliaments; welcomes that some Member States and political parties have introduced rules to ensure gender balance in their electoral lists and insists on the need to ensure gender balance through zipped lists or other equivalent methods in the upcoming revision of the EU electoral law (16), so that female and male candidates have an equal chance to be elected;

    10.

    		 Encourages the Member States to take account of the need for gender inclusive parliaments when drafting revisions to their electoral laws; further encourages national political parties to introduce quotas when deciding on electoral candidates, even if the law does not provide for it; calls for support mechanisms and best practices to be shared with political parties to that end; stresses that in order to ensure the presence of women candidates, internal party organisation and procedures must be gender responsive by including measures such as, explicitly addressing gender equality in party rules, establishing gender quotas for decision-making roles and ensuring the existence of well-functioning forums for lobbying, advocacy and discussion, including women’s wings and committees;

    11.

    		 Regrets the lack of gender-responsive recruitment procedures in Parliament and asks that Parliament’s services and political groups advance these procedures in order to avoid discrimination and increase the presence of women in areas where they are under-represented, both in the administration and political groups; requests the adoption of concrete measures to bridge the gap;

    Opportunities to influence Parliament’s working procedures

    12.

    		 Welcomes the fully gender-balanced Bureau of Parliament with 8 female Vice-Presidents out of 14 and 2 female Quaestors out of 5; notes, however, that only 3 out of 7 of Parliament’s political groups have women as chairs or co-chairs, 8 out of 25 committees are currently chaired by women and 15 out of 43 delegation chairs are women; calls for gender balance in the leadership of committees, delegations and political groups to be improved; welcomes the amendment to Rule 213(1) of Parliament’s Rules of Procedure requiring the bureau of each committee to be gender balanced; regrets, however, that this amendment will enter into force only at the opening of the first part-session following Parliament’s next elections, due to be held in 2024;

    13.

    		 Calls for gender balance to be ensured at all levels of plenary, committee and delegation work, including when appointing coordinators, rapporteurs and shadow rapporteurs and when distributing speaking time;

    14.

    		 Requests that measures to tackle horizontal segregation be put in place to ensure gender balance in different committees and put an end to the gendered concentration of portfolios, whereby areas with a higher proportion of women are less valued;

    15.

    		 Calls on the political groups and their secretariats to establish internal rules and other relevant measures, such as codes of conduct and gender-mainstreaming tools, trainings and monitoring to ensure gender equality in their internal functioning, especially as regards appointments and the distribution of roles and responsibilities; calls for best practice guides and advice, including trainings for staff and Members on gender mainstreaming, to be made available to political groups so that they can better understand and implement the concept of gender mainstreaming in their internal functioning;

    16.

    		 Calls on the relevant Directorates-General to ensure that the selection of study authors is gender balanced;

    17.

    		 Notes that despite all the progress and efforts made, gender equality at all management levels of Parliament’s administration has not yet been achieved; welcomes the fact that, at directors level, parity has been reached, but regrets that women represent only 23,1 % of Directors-General and 39,3 % of Heads of Unit; commends, in this regard, Parliament’s administration’s target to have women make up 50 % of middle and senior manager positions and 40 % of top manager positions in the administration by 2024; calls for women to be prioritised for recruitment when they are under-represented and the respective merits of the candidates are equal; stresses the need to build and strengthen gender expertise at the management level; calls for mentorship programmes to be implemented;

    18.

    		 Requests the collection of data on vertical and horizontal representation of the staff of the political groups and of anonymised data on pay gaps for Members’ assistants and group and administrative staff to ensure pay transparency;

    19.

    		 Requests that gender-disaggregated data on the proportion of parliamentary staff who are working part-time be gathered in a regular manner; calls for action to be taken on the basis of existing data (17) in order to address the significant imbalances and assess how Parliament can provide additional support should staff wish to return to full-time work;

    20.

    		 Stresses that workplace harassment constitutes a serious attack on a person’s psychological and physical health and can make them feel insecure at work and, in some cases, prevent them from doing their work; notes that women are far more likely to be exposed to sexual harassment than men; considers that, despite all efforts taken so far to ensure a zero-harassment policy, there are still cases of sexual harassment in Parliament and efforts to prevent sexual harassment should be increased; reiterates, therefore, its calls to implement the following measures in order to improve anti-harassment policies:

    (a)

    publish the external assessment carried out on the Advisory Committee dealing with harassment complaints concerning Members;

    (b)

    carry out, by external and transparently chosen auditors, an independent evaluation of Parliament’s existing Anti-Harassment Committee dealing with complaints about sexual harassment among staff with regard to its effectiveness and, if necessary, any modifications to be proposed as soon as possible and before the end of this legislative term in order to ensure independence from political influence and gender balance and avoid conflicts of interest in the existing structures;

    (c)

    ensure a more comprehensive and holistic analysis of complaints and remedies and change the composition of the Advisory and Anti-Harassment Committees to ensure that independent experts with proven expertise in tackling harassment issues in the workplace, including doctors, therapists and legal experts, are formal members with full voting rights;

    (d)

    introduce mandatory anti-harassment training for all Members and make it easily accessible, including through making the training available in all official languages or with interpretation and targeting outreach activities at individual delegations and political groups;

    (e)

    introduce compulsory training on Parliament’s zero-harassment policy for all people working on Parliament’s premises on a regular basis, which will provide them with the tools to recognise and report all forms of harassment, including and in particular, sexual harassment, as well as with tailored information about available support structures, which will make these support structures more widely known and easily accessible;

    21.

    		 Commits to guaranteeing a good work-life balance for Members, group staff, accredited parliamentary assistants and administrative staff, such as by adopting working hours conducive to work-life balance and engaging with the Commission and the Council to establish a common solution for meetings involving the three institutions; requests a revision of the work-life balance measures in order to improve and strengthen the current framework, while taking into consideration, inter alia, the effects of teleworking in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic and balancing flexible working structures with the requirements of a well-functioning and strong Parliament;

    22.

    		 Calls for increased non-transferrable maternity and paternity leave for Parliament’s staff after welcoming a child, for a total of six months for each parent to be taken during the first year; stresses that the six months of parental leave should be available within the first three years of a child’s life; regrets that when taking parental leave, staff of EU institutions only receive a fixed allowance rather than 100 % of their salary, which is a major disincentive to using this leave; calls for parental leave to be fully remunerated; welcomes the allowances that are available to the families of Parliament employees;

    23.

    		 Demands, in particular, that maternity, paternity and parental leave be recognised for Members of Parliament through an amendment to the Statute for Members of the European Parliament; requests, in addition, the implementation of solutions that guarantee Members the ability to continue working while on maternity, paternity or parental leave, such as maintaining the possibility of remote voting while on leave or exploring the possibility of a temporary replacement, which would ensure that constituents would not be unrepresented while their Member is on leave and that Members would not be under pressure to return to work immediately; stresses that the decision to make use of a temporary replacement would be the choice of the relevant Member;

    24.

    		 Calls for Parliament’s services to examine the impact that menopause has on the working life of Parliament employees; stresses that this should be evidence-based and include guidance on medical and lifestyle management of midlife and menopausal symptoms using national and international guidelines; calls for menopause to be considered in sickness and attendance management policies;

    Prominence of the gender perspective in parliamentary activities

    25.

    		 Welcomes the work of FEMM, the High-Level Group on Gender Equality and Diversity and the Gender Mainstreaming Network as leading bodies in ensuring gender mainstreaming in Parliament; calls, however, for closer and more structured cooperation and coordination between these bodies, especially in extraordinary circumstances such as the COVID-19 crisis and its aftermath, through regular meetings to share information and issue joint thematic reports;

    26.

    		 Welcomes a new initiative of the Conference of Delegation Chairs to invite all delegations to appoint members to be in charge of gender mainstreaming and commends the cooperation between the Gender Mainstreaming Network and the Members responsible for gender and diversity in the delegations;

    27.

    		 Calls for the inclusion of the Gender Mainstreaming Network in the Rules of Procedure to reflect its role promoting gender mainstreaming in the activities of parliamentary committees and delegations; requests that the necessary resources to carry out its functions and produce relevant recommendations be put in place; calls for the inclusion of a standing discussion item in the agendas of committee meetings;

    28.

    		 Welcomes the EIGE training session for Members on gender impact assessments and gender budgeting, which was tailored for Parliament; encourages closer work with the EIGE by delivering regular trainings on gender mainstreaming for Members, group staff, parliamentary assistants, parliamentary services and staff of committee secretariats; recalls the importance of offering programmes adapted to the concrete needs and knowledge both at the political and the administrative levels;

    29.

    		 Points out that FEMM, as a fully fledged committee in charge of women's rights and gender equality, works on many horizontal issues that often touch the work of other committees; notes that the inclusion of FEMM’s suggestions in the form of opinions or amendments varies across other committees; welcomes the roadmap’s commitment to collecting, through the relevant services and bodies, clear indicators to measure whether the input from FEMM is being incorporated into the work of other committees and the final position of Parliament; calls for the systematic, transparent and accountable monitoring of the integration of FEMM's suggestions, which is essential to ensure that the principles of gender equality and gender mainstreaming are properly implemented;

    30.

    		 Stresses the importance of the amendments that FEMM produces in its opinions to ensure gender mainstreaming; requests, in the context of own-initiative reports, the improvement of cooperation between committees in establishing the timetable to ensure sufficient time between when the draft report of the leading committee is available and the committee vote in order to allow FEMM to produce its position in the form of amendments to the draft report; stresses that Members in the Gender Mainstreaming Network are responsible for including gender-mainstreaming measures in their committees; regrets that this work is very ad hoc thus far and believes that it should be implemented on a more structured basis;

    31.

    		 Calls for all committee and delegation missions to be gender balanced and for the gender equality and women’s rights dimensions to be examined; calls, in addition, for the inclusion of meetings with organisations promoting gender equality in mission programmes;

    32.

    		 Welcomes the commitment in the gender action plan and roadmap to ensure that all committees and other bodies organising hearings, workshops and conferences include gender-balanced panels and experts qualified to examine the gender equality and women’s rights dimensions of the specific area of focus; asks for the establishment of clear targets to implement this provision;

    33.

    		 Praises Gender Equality Week, which took place for the first time in 2020 at Parliament, in which all parliamentary committees and delegations were invited to hold events addressing gender equality in their areas of competence; welcomes the continuation of this successful initiative and the fact that 16 committees and 6 delegations participated in and 21 events were organised for the 2021 edition; calls for all bodies of Parliament, including the committees and delegations who have not yet done so, to join and contribute to this initiative, which raises awareness and reinforces cooperation, on a regular basis;

    34.

    		 Asks the Gender Mainstreaming Network, the High-Level Group on Gender Equality and Diversity, FEMM and the Committees on Budgets and Budgetary Control to develop and adopt dedicated guidelines to implement gender mainstreaming and gender budgeting;

    35.

    		 Welcomes the EPRS study on gender mainstreaming in Parliament; notes, however, that the EPRS needs to repeat this study regularly and on the basis of quantitative and qualitative gender statistics and data disaggregated by gender, which should be collected systematically and made available by Parliament’s services under its gender action plan and roadmap;

    36.

    		 Welcomes the translation of the gender-neutral language guidelines into all official EU languages; regrets the lack of implementation of these guidelines and requests additional awareness-raising actions and specific trainings for Parliament’s lawyer-linguists; requests a regular revision of the guidelines and their translations in order to guarantee that they reflect developments in each language and remain accurate;

    37.

    		 Commits to ensuring the allocation of enough funds and human resources to gender mainstreaming and improving the cooperation and coordination between the various bodies working on gender equality and diversity in Parliament;

    Delivering legislation with a gender perspective

    38.

    		 Stresses the importance of gender impact assessments for the design of legislative proposals and gender-responsive evaluations of legislative initiatives; regrets that gender impacts are rarely addressed as part of the Commission’s impact assessments and that the Commission’s impact assessment guidelines for the 2021-2027 multiannual financial framework (MFF) recommend that gender equality should be taken into account in policymaking, only when it is ‘proportionate’ to do so; asks the Commission to change its approach, carry out and publish a gender impact assessment for each legislative proposal and include explicitly gender-related objectives and performance indicators in its proposals; commits to carrying out a gender impact assessment for each legislative own-initiative report with the aim of including a gender perspective; commits to researching new methods and tools for improving gender mainstreaming in the legislative process;

    39.

    		 Regrets that, overall, gender mainstreaming has not yet been applied across the EU budget and the budget’s contribution to achieving gender equality has not been adequately monitored; calls for a systematic implementation of gender mainstreaming in the EU budget; underlines that a gender perspective must be integrated at all levels of the budgetary process in order to use revenues and expenditures to achieve gender equality goals; welcomes the actions envisaged in Parliament's gender action plan and roadmap on gender budgeting and requests the implementation of them as soon as possible;

    40.

    		 Commends Parliament’s negotiators on the inclusion of gender mainstreaming as a horizontal principle in the 2021-2027 MFF; welcomes, in particular, the Commission’s commitment to put in place a methodology to measure the relevant expenditure of programmes funded through the 2021-2027 MFF by the end of 2022 at the latest; calls on the Commission to improve accountability and budgetary transparency, apply the new methodology to all EU funding programmes and implement gender budgeting in the midterm review of the current MFF; urges the Commission to act on the recommendations of the European Court of Auditors in this regard;

    41.

    		 Welcomes that the general objective of mitigating the social and economic impact of the COVID-19 crisis, in particular on women, and the requirement to include an explanation of how the measures in the national recovery and resilience plans would contribute to gender equality, were included in the Recovery and Resilience Facility Regulation (18); regrets, however, that FEMM’s call to include a specific chapter on gender equality in national plans was not included; highlights that gender-responsive reporting and gender-mainstreaming measures cannot be replaced by social tracking and social investments alone; believes that gender equality deserves its own mainstreaming methodology as part of the Recovery and Resilience Facility and recalls that the EIGE has developed a suitable methodology;

    42.

    		 Calls on the Commission to closely monitor the implementation of the Recovery and Resilience Facility, in particular as regards the existing provisions linked to gender equality, and to include relevant indicators in the recovery and resilience scoreboard to monitor the impact of national plans on gender equality and the amount of funds allocated and spent to support this goal; highlights the need to mainstream gender equality into the architecture of the EU’s economic governance and the European Semester;

    43.

    		 Regrets that several EU funding programmes with significant potential to contribute to gender equality such as the European structural and investment funds, the common agricultural policy and Erasmus did not take gender equality effectively into account;

    44.

    		 Stresses that social dialogue is a key instrument for all parties involved in decision-making processes and is thus essential for improving gender equality across the EU institutions;

    45.

    		 Calls on the Commission to strengthen the institutional framework for supporting gender mainstreaming and translate its commitment to gender mainstreaming into specific actions; asks the Commission to adopt an implementation plan for gender mainstreaming in each policy area;

    46.

    		 Regrets that the Commission has no fully fledged strategy for training on gender mainstreaming, and offers only a single, non-mandatory introductory course to its staff; urges the Commission to develop a training strategy on gender mainstreaming, ensure that training is available to all staff and make full use of the EIGE’s tools and expertise on gender mainstreaming;

    47.

    		 Calls on the Commission to systematically disaggregate data by gender upon collection and take the gender dimension into account when evaluating and reporting on EU programmes; calls on the Commission to include in upcoming legislative proposals the requirement to systematically collect gender-disaggregated data and relevant gender equality indicators for all programmes and to include gender-responsive monitoring and evaluation requirements; highlights the importance of gender-responsive monitoring and evaluation in order to better achieve the goals of gender mainstreaming;

    48.

    		 Regrets the Council’s lack of commitment to delivering legislation with a gender perspective and reiterates its requests to unblock the EU ratification of the Istanbul Convention, the horizontal anti-discrimination directive, which will ensure that the intersectional dimension is taken into account when combating gender discrimination, and the women on boards directive;

    49.

    		 Urges the Member States to fully transpose and implement the work-life balance directive and calls on the Commission to monitor it effectively;

    50.

    		 Reiterates its call for the Council and the European Council to establish a Council configuration on gender equality, as the EU needs a platform for intergovernmental exchange on gender equality and a formal forum for the ministers and state secretaries responsible for gender equality, in order to strengthen gender mainstreaming across all EU policies and legislation, develop dialogue and cooperation between Member States, exchange best practices and legislation, unblock negotiations on the main files related to gender equality, deliver common responses to EU-wide problems and ensure that gender equality issues are discussed at the highest political level;

    51.

    		 Calls for gender mainstreaming to be better and more efficiently implemented in the Conference on the Future of Europe, through increased coordination between the relevant parliamentary bodies to strengthen the gender dimension of the working groups’ contributions and of the debates and proposals of the conference plenary;

    52.

    		 Calls, in addition, for measures ensuring gender mainstreaming and for specific targeted measures to achieve gender equality, such as legislation, recommendations and policies related to gender-based violence, pay transparency and care;

    Gender equality and diversity in the symbolic function of Parliament

    53.

    		 Stresses that, for Parliament to be gender-sensitive, it should be aware of and pay attention to the symbolic meanings conveyed within and by the institution through its communications strategy and the design of physical spaces; requests that its efforts in these areas be stepped up;

    54.

    		 Requests that concrete targets to ensure gender balance when naming and renaming Parliament’s buildings, rooms and other physical spaces be adopted;

    55.

    		 Welcomes the commitment in the roadmap to carrying out an analysis of the spaces dedicated to childcare within Parliament’s premises, including breastfeeding spaces, and requests a commitment to redesigning them if necessary once the agreed upon previous analysis of their current status has been produced;

    56.

    		 Requests that an analysis of the distribution and design of Parliament’s toilets be carried out to assess the need to adapt them to the requirements of all genders, including through measures such as introducing gender-neutral toilets and increasing the number of toilets with individual trashcans and sinks to facilitate the use of menstrual cups and other sanitary products;

    57.

    		 Asks for Parliament’s communication strategy to be revised, including through measures such as establishing a protocol to mourn victims of femicide and revising Parliament’s website to include a specific section on gender equality on the home menu, relevant information about key files, such as the EU’s ratification process of the Istanbul Convention, and an update of the information on Parliament’s history and composition to take gender into account;

    Concluding remarks

    58.

    		 Reiterates its call for an audit (19) to be carried out to map the current situation in terms of gender equality and gender mainstreaming and make recommendations for both the political and administrative sides of Parliament’s activities; suggests that this audit should cover all the areas and indicators developed in the EIGE’s ‘Gender-sensitive parliaments’ toolkit and identify the rules that facilitate or block gender equality in each area of analysis, with the aim of updating Parliament’s gender action plan and roadmap; calls for the inclusion in this audit of a gender impact assessment on implementing a fixed gender balance requirement across all parliamentary structures, including committees, delegations and missions;

    59.

    		 Points out that some areas covered by the gender action plan and roadmap are inherently linked to the political organisation of the groups and therefore need a political deliberation involving all groups; calls for the establishment of a temporary working group under the Conference of Presidents, composed of representatives of each political group and chaired by Parliament’s gender-mainstreaming standing rapporteurs to steer the work in that area, implement this resolution and coordinate with the High-Level Group on Gender Equality and Diversity, Parliament’s Bureau, FEMM and the Gender Mainstreaming Network, where relevant; encourages the political groups to establish this working group by mid-2022;

    o

    o o

    60.

    		 Instructs its President to forward this resolution to the Council and the Commission.

    (1)  OJ L 188, 12.7.2019, p. 79.

    (2)  OJ C 61 E, 10.3.2004, p. 384.

    (3)  OJ C 244 E, 18.10.2007, p. 225.

    (4)  OJ C 184 E, 8.7.2010, p. 18.

    (5)  OJ C 212 E, 5.8.2010, p. 32.

    (6)  OJ C 411, 27.11.2020, p. 13.

    (7)  OJ C 224, 27.6.2018, p. 96.

    (8)  OJ C 232, 16.6.2021, p. 48.

    (9)  OJ C 346, 27.9.2018, p. 192.

    (10)  OJ C 433, 23.12.2019, p. 31.

    (11)  OJ C 456, 10.11.2021, p. 208.

    (12)  OJ C 445, 29.10.2021, p. 150.

    (13)  OJ C 425, 20.10.2021, p. 98.

    (14)  OJ C 456, 10.11.2021, p. 191.

    (15)  Ahrens, P., ‘Working against the tide? Institutionalizing Gender Mainstreaming in the European Parliament’, Gendering the European Parliament: Structures, Policies, and Practices, eds. P. Ahrens and A. L. Rolandsen, Rowman & Littlefield International, 2019, pp. 85-101.

    (16)  In accordance with Article 223 TFEU and the electoral law of the EU as it is laid down in the 1976 Electoral Act concerning the election of the representatives of the European Parliament by direct universal suffrage of 1976, as amended in 2002 (OJ L 278, 8.10.1976, p. 5).

    (17)  As compiled in the Women in the European Parliament brochure of 2021.

    (18)  OJ L 57, 18.2.2021, p. 17.

    (19)  OJ C 323, 11.8.2021, p. 33.

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