Guidelines Gender Equality Policy: A Strategy for Success in the ...

5B. Guidelines for the negotiations on legislative proposals in the Councilworking groupsThe impact of legislation on women and men can vary in intensity from one act to another.At EU level, an assessment of the impact of a given legislative proposal should already havebeen carried out by the European Commission before the draft is introduced in the Councilworking group. It would be sensible to request or demand this impact assessment from theEuropean Commission. In any case, the gender relevance of the legislation should be discussedat the time the proposal is introduced.It is quite possible for individual proposals to have no gender relevance. This outcome should berecorded by the Chair in suitable form (footnote, note in the minutes of the meeting, etc.).If the envisioned legislative proposal has a different impact on women and men, one object of thesubsequent negotiation rounds of the Council working group will be to scrutinize the proposal todetermine the precise reasons for this potentially different impact on women and men and drawthe necessary conclusions. This should be done within the normal Council working groupframework and comply with the normal format for Council documents.Example 1One outcome of the work could be to address the different impact on women and men in aparagraph of the preamble:… The Council notes that men still have few opportunities to better reconcilefamily and career by availing themselves of their right to parental leave.Employer and employee representatives are called upon to address this issue intheir negotiations.Example 2In the case of Directives, one outcome of the work could be to expressly call for gender-sensitivetransposition into national law.

6C. Guidelines for the planning and staging of eventsThe German EU Presidency will set specific accents and stress specific focal areas in eventssuch as specialist conferences, meetings of experts, workshops or other formats.In a social Europe that seeks to reach its citizens, these events are important not only from aspecialist perspective. They can also afford an opportunity to deliberately supplement the givencontent with an element that enhances public acceptance: immediate relevance for women andmen and for gender equality.In order to achieve this, the following suggestions should be borne in mind:• Childcare services should be offered as needed and as possible at all of theaforementioned events staged on the occasion of the German EU Presidency. This shouldbe taken into account in calls for tender.• Equal numbers of women and men should be invited as experts wherever possible• O verall, attention should be given to ensuring a balanced distribution of executive tasksbetween women and men. A balanced number of men and women should chair the workinggroups of the aforementioned events. Where sensible and possible, consideration could begiven to the idea of co-chairs (one man and one woman) in order to underscore the fact thatthe given topic involves and is addressed by women and men alike.• The “functional tasks” associated with an event (welcoming address, chairing of themeeting, reporting, summary/outlook) should be distributed equally between women andmen.• All topics should also be discussed in terms of their potentially different impact on womenand men.• The documentation of the event should be gender-sensitive, e.g. charts, graphs, diagramsand statistics should be disaggregated by sex, first names should be written out, andgender-inclusive language should be used.