The EU’s priorities for the 68th session of the UN Commission on the Status of Women

Question for oral answer O-000056/2023

to the Council

Rule 136

Robert Biedroń on behalf of the Committee on Women’s Rights and Gender Equality

Subject: The EU’s priorities for the 68th session of the UN Commission on the Status of Women

A delegation from the European Parliament’s Committee on Women’s Rights and Gender Equality will attend the 68th session of the UN Commission on the Status of Women (CSW68) in March 2024. CSW68 will focus on accelerating the achievement of gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls by addressing poverty and strengthening institutions and financing with a gender perspective.

1. What are the main points of the EU’s position at CSW68? How will interinstitutional cooperation be improved to ensure that Parliament is not sidelined, particularly during negotiations and in the conclusions, and that its priorities are incorporated? When will Parliament receive the EU position paper?

2. What can be done to ensure a strong, coordinated EU approach and an ambitious commitment, including specific measures, to guarantee real progress towards gender equality in this area? How can we promote, implement and enforce existing and future policies to correct those economic structures that keep perpetuating gender inequalities with a view to addressing the multiple major causes of women’s poverty, which include women’s over-representation in precarious low-paid and part-time work and under-representation in decision-making roles, interruptions in women’s careers to care for children or older people, the pay and pension gaps, and pink poverty, including period poverty?

3. How is the Council planning to accelerate the implementation and enforcement of the international commitments that have already been made, and what new measures and budget commitments are planned in the fight against women’s poverty and social exclusion, taking into account all forms of discrimination, in order to achieve progress on gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls, in all their diversity? What are the consequences of failure to deliver on the commitments? What monitoring mechanisms are in place, and how are stakeholders being held accountable?

4. What concrete EU-level actions does the Council plan to take to address women’s poverty? How will effective measures be made available to the most vulnerable in an accessible and efficient way? How will gender mainstreaming be strengthened, and how will gender budgeting principles be employed and enforced to address this issue more effectively?

Submitted: 30.11.2023

Lapses: 1.3.2024