EU calls for gender balance on company boards
The Parliament.com, 08 March 2011
by Martha Moss
The EU has indicated it could press for legally binding quotas to increase the number of women on company boards.
In a joint article for the Parliament Magazine, commission vice-president for justice Viviane Reding and parliament president Jerzy Buzek said quotas could help "shatter the glass ceiling" for women.
Writing ahead of international women’s day on 8 March, they highlight figures showing that only one in 10 board members in the EU, and only three per cent of chief executives, are female.
Reding and Buzek point to the almost 20 per cent increase in the number of women on supervisory boards in Norway after quotas were put in place.
"Quotas are controversial for some. But you cannot quibble with the results in the countries that have introduced them," they say.
"Quotas can help us achieve a breakthrough. But let’s be clear: they should be transitional and a measure of last resort."
If there is "no credible progress" under a system of self-regulation, the pair argue that "Europe would need legally binding quotas that can be enforced". "The ball is now in the companies’ court," they say.
Calling for ambitious targets to see 30 per cent of boardrooms female by 2013, they say this figure should rise to 40 per cent by 2040.
"In an ideal world, businesses would achieve this voluntarily," they write. "But we also stand ready, starting in 2012, to intervene with regulatory pressure if this is absolutely necessary."
Also writing as part of the Parliament Magazine’s feature on women’s day, Eva-Britt Svensson, the chair of parliament’s women’s rights committee, calls on the EU to do more to prevent gender-based violence.
"The EU needs to live up to its responsibility to stop the violence against women," she writes, calling for an action plan on the issue.
Rada Boric, of the European Women’s Lobby, also says a comprehensive strategy is needed to tackle violence against women, while Louise Johnson of Scottish Women’s Aid calls for civil society to get involved in the campaign against domestic violence.
