Debate: Council of Europe Convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence: EU accession
Date: TUESDAY, 14 FEBRUARY 2023
Speaker: Helena Dalli
Language: EN

This Parliament kept the EU’s accession to the Council of Europe’s Istanbul Convention high on the European political agenda for many years. Almost six years have passed since the EU signed this convention. Meanwhile, the situation for women has not improved. Violence against women and domestic violence remain a widespread pan-European phenomenon and a manifestation of discrimination against women. In order to address the data collection requirements of the Istanbul Convention, Eurostat is currently running an EU-wide survey on violence against women. The data collection spans four years and results are published in groups of countries depending on reported data. The recently published results from the first seven Member States show high prevalence. The proportion of women who have experienced unwanted behaviour of a sexual nature at the workplace in these seven EU countries ranges from 11% to 41%. These figures show why we need to step up our efforts, and this includes through the EU’s accession to the Istanbul Convention. I appreciate that there is a strong support in this House and across Member States towards this goal. I welcome the Swedish Presidency’s engagement and the prioritisation of the EU’s accession to the Istanbul Convention, as well as the ambition to progress the negotiations towards an EU directive combating violence against women and domestic violence. Let us use the momentum and move towards the ratification of the Istanbul Convention at a Union level now. The Commission stands ready to support. We have taken concrete actions beyond the legislative framework. The Commission learnt from years of implementation of the Istanbul Convention, as well as the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women in several EU Member States that this complex phenomenon requires a comprehensive approach. In this regard, your call for enhanced support to civil society organisations working with the women victims of violence has been addressed. Under the EUR 1.55 billion Citizens, Equality, Rights and Values funding programme, the Daphne strand is dedicated to preventing and combating – at all levels – all forms of gender-based violence against women and girls, including online violence, and to supporting and protecting all direct and indirect victims of such violence. The Daphne strand was substantially increased in comparison to its predecessor, the Rights, Equality and Citizenship Programme, with an expected EUR 200 million specifically dedicated to combating gender-based violence throughout the course of the programme. Currently a call for proposals is published with an envelope of nearly EUR 25 million, which aims to select intermediaries to re-grant funding to civil society organisations active at local, regional and national level to prevent and combat gender-based violence. This re-granting mechanism will make EU funding on gender-based violence more accessible for grassroots civil society organisations. By the end of the year, Eurostat will publish further data from its EU-wide survey on violence against women in 18 Member States. This means we will have up-to-date, comparable data across the 27 Member States, thanks to your persistent and longstanding call for it. We know that a substantial number of violent experiences are not reported or officially recorded. It is therefore key to conduct population surveys in addition to administrative data to get the full picture. A comprehensive set of data will enable the Commission and the co-legislators to design and implement evidence-based policy and legal measures targeted to the needs of those exposed to violence. I thank this Assembly for its ambitious vision to achieve gender equality, eradicate all forms of discrimination against women, and with that, gender—based violence.