4 December, 2014Stopping violence against women and children should be integral to IndustriALL’s work, said Christine Olivier in her opening remarks to the Women’s Committee meeting in Tunis on 3 December.
The meeting is taking place during the 16 days of no violence against women and children campaign, which began on 25 November.
“If non-violence is a measure of the development of society then we are in trouble,” said Olivier, who is Chair of IndustriALL’s Women’s Committee, adding that 35% of women worldwide have experienced physical or sexual violence.
“Combatting violence against women and maternity protection should be a part of the normal work of women’s committee and every industrial director and regional office,” said IndustriALL’s general secretary, Jyrki Raina before adding that women’s concerns are already integrated into projects and the women’s budget has been increased.
The general secretary’s proposal that all men should take an oath against violence against women at the 2016 IndustriALL Congress, was strongly endorsed by the Committee.
In 2014, three regional conferences proposed adopting a 40 per cent quota for women’s participation at all levels of IndustriALL. All three conferences, in Latin America, Asia-Pacific and Sub-Saharan Africa, had more than 30 per cent women’s participation.
Assistant general secretary, Monika Kemperle, highlighted the stalled discussion in Europe, where members are considering a 20 per cent quota for women:
“Women are under-represented in Europe. We are seeing women’s representation going down,” she said.
The meeting was reminded of the political agreement reached at IndustriALL’s 2012 founding congress, where IndustriALL committed to improving women’s representation. Currently a third of IndustriALL’s executive committee is made up of women (20 out of 60).
The debate has since moved on to push for 40 per cent quota of women at all levels of IndustriALL. In addition, progress has been made in electing one woman and one man as co-chairs of the IndustriALL sectors.
“Why 40 per cent? We want to change the face of our industries, which we will only do if we have women there. Our IndustriALL sister organizations IUF and UNI both have a 40 per cent quota for women,” said Raina.
The meeting decided that “Strengthening our rights, safety and participation in decision-making” should be the theme for the 2015 Women’s World Conference in Vienna, Austria.
The revised survey on women’s representation amongst affiliates was raised at the meeting. The survey has been sent out three times. There were 200 responses out of 700. In general, the survey showed that IndustriALL has between 20 and 30 per cent women membership according to the sector. Garment unions have women members of around 80 per cent, whereas some mining unions do not even have ten per cent women.
Action Points
- Policies to stop violence against women and improve maternity protection across all IndustriALL sectors
- All affiliates must send in their proposals for the Women’s Conference by 31 January 2015
- The Women’s Committee must set a clear strategy for its work – including a discussion on its role and inviting representatives from IUF and UNI for guidance on achieving 40 per cent women’s representation
- Organize an electronic discussion among Women’s Committee members to collect proposals and exchange information
- The next Women’s Committee meeting will be one day long before the ExCo.
- Funds must be allocated to train women as leaders.
- Take the proposal for the 40 per cent women’s quota forward and do the necessary lobbying.
The Chair will report to the Executive Committee on these and other points.