Brussels, 29/07/2016 (Agence Europe) - “Slow but sure”: that is how we could describe the progress made by the European Commission on increasing the number of women in decision-making roles. According to the annual report presented to the College of Commissioners on Wednesday 27 July, eight Directorates General are not doing so well, however.
The Commission set itself the target in July 2015 of having women occupying 40% of senior and middle management posts before the end of its mandate. Since then, it has made slight progress. In November 2014, 27% of senior manager level posts were held by women and 31% of middle management posts; the figures are now 30% and 33% respectively.
With regard to new appointments, 18 senior management posts out of 44 went to women between 1 November 2014 and 1 July 2016. For middle management roles, there have been 49 new recruits who have been women out of a total of 115. The increases have been particularly significant for Director General and Deputy Director General posts: the number of Director General posts held by women rose from 17% and 24% and from 10% to 29% for Deputy Directors General.
After the College of Commissioners meeting, Commissioner for the Budget and Human Resources Kristalina Georgieva stated: “We are breaking our glass ceiling and I am very, very happy with this. A lot of thought went into the decision to focus on decision-making posts because it is there where we are weakest and where we wanted to send out a message. Nonetheless, we still have a lot of work to do”.
The downside, however, can be found in the significant differences that exist between Directorates General. The commissioner acknowledged: “There are some of them that are doing fantastically well and others that are not achieving exactly brilliant results”. She has made a commitment to work with the latter. These Directorates General are DG Information Technology (DIGIT), DG Humanitarian Aid and Civil Protection (ECHO), DG Environment (ENV), the External Policy Instruments (EPI) Service, Internal Market (GROW), Internal Audit Service (IAS), Antifraud Office (OLAF) and the Secretariat General (SG).
In her speech, Commissioner Georgieva did not speak of the state of progress in discussions on quotas for women in major European companies. The Commission, three years ago, proposed a 40% quota of women for non-executive posts on the boards of directors in major European companies listed on the stock exchange. This dossier, however, appears to be blocked at the Council of Ministers, with opposition being voiced by Germany, Slovakia, United Kingdom, Poland, Denmark, Croatia, Sweden, Estonia, Hungary and the Netherlands. (Original version in French by Sophie Petitjean)