Brussels, 29/05/2002 (Agence Europe) - At a meeting on 22 May with various women's movements on the theme of Building a Democratic Europe - Women's Convention, the European Parliament's Women's Rights Committee launched a debate over how women could be involved in building a Europe of welfare and how to get them interested in such issues. Anna Karamanou (PES, Greece), the Committee President, expressed her deep disappointment at the fact that women are such a minority on the European Convention since equal representation of men and women would have been a "natural consequence" of respecting the democratic values put forward by the EU. Ms Karamanou presented eleven concrete measures for combating sexual discrimination in tomorrow's Europe. This platform of minimum demands calls for the Charter of Fundamental Rights (that proclaims parity between men and women in Article 23) to be legally binding and a requirement for parity at all levels of political institutions be incorporated in the Treaties. MEP Ana Palacio Vallelersundi (EPP-ED, Spain), member of the Convention Praesidium, said she would present Karamanou's eleven measures to the Convention, saying she was surprised to see so few women on the Convention since its main challenge was to bring the EU closer to citizens. A lot remains to be done, she said, which proves the need for a meeting like this. Palacio also stressed the importance of dealing with sexual equality issues in the Convention work groups and raising such issues with civil society.
Odile Quentin, Director General of the European Commission's DG Employment, described the meeting as a serious reflection on the democratic deficit in Europe. Among the tools that could help add further equality she mentioned the Civil Society Forum a privileged body that will make a concrete contribution to the Convention's debates. Quentin also suggested setting up a technical expert group to identify areas where concrete progress could be made. Mary McPhail, representing the European Women's Lobby (EWL), rather than the EWL President Denise Fuchs, slammed the Convention 's lack of vision and innovation in appointing its Members. For the future, the EWL hoped that the right to sexual equality between men and women be strengthened and added to the Preamble to the future Treaty. Parity is needed as a precondition for democracy, she said. Maria Stratigaki, Vice-President of the Equal Opportunities Advisory Committee, said that the under-representation of women on the Convention was a step backwards in terms of the representation of women and men in the EU. The President of the European Association of Women Lawyers, Elisabeth Müller, said that her association's aim was to improve European women's rights legislation. She raised the issue of how to get women involved in the Convention's work and how to create a user-friendly exhaustive database of NGOs involved with women's rights. Sophia Spiliotopoulos, European Commission expert and Vice-President of the Association of Southern European Women wanted to be positive and noted that even though under-represented, women on the Convention were women of value and that equal involvement in decision-making was not an end in itself.
On the fringes of the meeting Belgian Socialist Anne Van Lancker MEP, Member of the Convention, called for the introduction of an equality chapter in the next Treaty, covering not just equality at work but also in education, health, consumer policy and decision-making. Van Lancker criticised male dominance at the Convention and called for a huge campaign involving women's organisations and academic experts to put equality on the Convention's agenda and to use the Convention to win the hearts of women for Europe.