Debate: The gender perspective in the COVID- crisis and post-crisis period - The EU Strategy for Gender Equality - Closing the digital gender gap: women’s participation in the digital economy
Date: THURSDAY, 21 JANUARY 2021
Speaker: Frances Fitzgerald
Country: Germany
Language: EN

I suggest that each one of you has felt, perhaps this very minute, that your life has been put on pause, halted, stilled, silenced. The tragedy is that in each of our nations, to a greater or lesser extent, health care has been put on pause, halted, so cancer treatment and access to sexual and reproductive health services have declined. Never again. We must regard this as the opportunity to act like never before in the field of health and build a functioning health union. It’s time to get to work, and I have to say that President von der Leyen has made an excellent start. As we consider those who receive health care, let’s consider those who deliver it, the ones who got sporadic applause as they got us through this crisis: the 76% of health-care workers who are women, the 93% of childcare workers who are women, the 95% of domestic cleaners who are women, and the 86% of personal care workers who are women. Sporadic applause for them? No, not nearly good enough. Commissioner, we are asking you to bring forward pay transparency text urgently. No more gender pay gap for the heroes of this COVID story. But for women workers everywhere, we must do better. We must learn from the last crisis and ensure that Next Generation EU takes account of gender bias. Building and construction are important to turn an economy around in a swift way, but it leaves women behind because men generally do the constructing. Commissioner and Minister, you must put women at the front. As the Commission examines the national action plans for Next Generation EU, we must make sure they are inclusive of women because, when women lose paid employment, they lose just one of their jobs. They go home and go back to the second job and the third job, caring. We know the stories over the past few months: women struggling to find time to sleep in between working, caring for family, home schooling and housework. We must be crystal clear: working from home is not a substitute for childcare. Implementation of a work-life balance will be required to change this. But I believe that the EU can do more: harnessing EU funds for care infrastructure, collecting data on the situation of carers across the EU, and sharing best practice. Surely, Commissioner, it is time for a new European care strategy, and we ask you to bring forward a proposal. Let’s not kid ourselves that work, home schooling, pastimes and housework are all that goes on behind closed doors in lockdown. The truth is that children and women are particularly often imprisoned with the violent in their own homes.  Member States must pivot services to help and support them, ensuring that law enforcement and courts have their backs, but also that civil society can provide the essential services of phone lines and shelters. It can’t wait, this shadow pandemic, it cannot be put on hold. The EU must combat violence against women, ratifying the Istanbul Convention, adding violence against women to the list of Euro-crimes, and putting in place a strong legal framework to tackle all forms of gender-based violence. Women are dying and we must intervene. If Europe is to be a leader in the quest for human rights and equality, we must work with our global partners to support and empower women around the world. We must make Team Europe a shining light for women and girls across the world, a byword for a brighter post—COVID future. Colleagues, now we must look to the future. COVID has taken so much from us, our daily routines, our moments of joy and so many, heartbreakingly, family, friends, neighbours. Yet we will re-emerge, helped by vaccines. We shouldn’t be aiming at normal; we should be aiming at so much better than normal: a greener future, a more digital future, a gender—equal future. That means reaching out and bringing women to the table. It’s been said that women’s rights are human rights. Similarly, women’s contributions are human contributions, lifting all people to a place where they can see a better future.  One final point. This is a comprehensive and detailed report and I ask colleagues to give it wide support across this Parliament today, but a report is just words on paper without a concrete commitment to implementation. So I have two questions. First, Commissioner Dalli, will you pledge to read the report and reflect on the calls to the Commission? Can you pledge to consider follow—up action based on the recommendations? To the Council, Minister, can you pledge to circulate this report for consideration by Ministers as part of your priority topic on gender equality? Can you pledge to hold a discussion amongst Ministers on it? To both the Council and the Commission, I think your promise today to build back better on gender equality will be key post—COVID because, as we know, we are united in diversity.