Women's Views on News |
| Beijing declaration could be watered down Posted: 06 Mar 2015 06:24 AM PST
Governments are currently in the midst of negotiating the Political Declaration that will be adopted on the first day of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW). But some states are calling for the deletion of references to the role of feminist groups in advancing gender equality and women’s human rights. With states watering down the language and weakening commitments, women are left with a declaration that says very little about the magnitude of the challenges we still face in achieving gender equality and the full realization of our human rights. Twenty years after the adoption of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, this version of the Political Declaration is not what women need. There has been tremendous progress toward gender equality and the realization of the human rights of women and girls. However, many of the gains that women and girls have made are under threat and women and girls worldwide face extraordinary and unprecedented challenges, including economic inequality, climate change and ocean acidification, and rising, violent fundamentalisms. At a time when urgent action is needed to fully realize gender equality, the human rights and empowerment of women and girls, we need renewed commitment, a heightened level of ambition, real resources, and accountability. This Political Declaration, instead, represents a bland reaffirmation of existing commitments that fails to match the level of ambition in the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action and in fact threatens a major step backward. Women's organizations and feminist organizations demand a Political Declaration that: 1. Expresses unequivocal commitments toward fully realizing gender equality, the human rights and empowerment of women and girls. The term "realize gender equality, empowerment and the human rights of women and girls" is used throughout the political declaration. The goal of ensuring the full enjoyment by women and girls of all of their human rights and fundamental freedoms is cross-cutting and emphasized throughout the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, not just in one chapter. In the Beijing Declaration alone, the goal of realizing the human rights of women and girls is affirmed in paragraphs 8, 9, 14, 15, 17, 23, 31, 32. Furthermore, the Platform for Action explicitly recognizes that gender equality is a matter of human rights (para 1) and in paragraph 2 states "As an agenda for action, the Platform seeks to promote and protect the full enjoyment of all human rights and the fundamental freedoms of all women throughout their life cycle." Governments cannot pick and choose when to respect, protect and fulfil the human rights of women and should not do so in this declaration. 2. Commits to accelerated implementation of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, along with the outcomes of the 23rd United Nations General Assembly Special Session, the Beijing+10 and Beijing+15 political declarations, the agreed conclusions and resolutions of the Commission on the Status of Women, as well as regional-level declarations on gender equality and the human rights of women and girls. 3. Commits to universal ratification and implementation of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women and regional-level treaties on the human rights of women and girls and gender equality. 4. Recognizes the critical and unequivocal role women's organizations, feminist organizations and women human rights defenders have played in pushing for gender equality, the human rights and empowerment of women and girls. Without feminist organizations, there would be no Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, nor progress in its implementation. Progress has occurred not because of the benevolence of governments, but because feminist organizations and women human rights defenders have fought for it, every step of the way. The attempt of governments to marginalize the role of feminist organizations these groups is an affront to women, everywhere. 5. Commits to create an enabling environment and resources to allow women's organizations, feminist organizations and women human rights defenders to be able to do their work free from violence. 6. Recognizes and commits to address the emerging challenges that are setting back our fight for equality and the realization of the human rights of all women and girls. These include increasing fundamentalisms, violent extremism, increased number of displaced persons, increasing inequalities within and between countries, and climate change and ocean acidification, among others. The evidence is clear: women and girls suffer the disproportionate impact of these challenges and without real commitment to address them, gender equality and the full realization of the human rights of women and girls is a pipe dream. 7. Ensures real accountability for governments including detailed measures to reform and strengthen public institutions to address the structural causes of gender inequality; ensuring an enabling economic environment for women's rights and gender equality beyond sector-specific financing and gender-responsive budgeting; creating national, regional and international systems that hold State and non-State actors, including multilateral institutions, to account for their role in perpetuating gender inequality and violations of the human rights of women and girls; and affirming the principle of international solidarity as the basis for international partnership between States for just, sustainable and equitable development. 8. Affirms the strong linkages between Beijing, Post-2015 and the Sustainable Development Goals. Realizing gender equality, empowerment and the human rights of women and girls will be critical for the success of the post-2015 development agenda. The Political Declaration should state unequivocal support for the stand-alone gender equality goal and targets as defined by the Open Working Group; recognize the centrality of gender equality, empowerment and human rights of women and girls for sustainable development; commit to fully implementing the SDG on gender equality and women's empowerment and ensuring a gender and human rights perspective throughout the post-2015 development agenda; and commit to gender-sensitive targets and indicators and ensure that gender is integrated into the means of implementation, financing and mechanisms for review, monitoring and accountability. 9. Recognizes the links between the human rights of women and girls and development. The Political Declaration must reaffirm the links between the human rights of women and girls and development, particularly as women and girls disproportionately are affected by the consequences of under-development. None of the three pillars of sustainable development – economic, social or environmental – can be achieved without the full participation of women and girls and without all of their human rights being fulfilled. When 61 million children, more than half of them girls, have no access to education, when 35 per cent of women have experienced either physical and/or sexual intimate partner violence or non-partner sexual violence, and when 1 in 3 girls in the developing world are married by 18, there is a clear failure of development and a serious denial of human rights. Anything less than the 9 points above would be a political failure, at a time when significantly more effort is needed to achieve the goals of fully realizing gender equality, the human rights and empowerment of all women and girls everywhere. Women’s organizations and feminist organizations are fighting to keep the final declaration substantive. But they urgently need your support. Please read the full statement and add your organization’s endorsement – and forward this plea. Thanks.  |
| Scottish Widows look at women’s money Posted: 06 Mar 2015 05:26 AM PST
Nearly one in five (17 per cent) of women claim to be the main breadwinner in their relationship, according to new research commissioned by Scottish Widows to mark its 200th anniversary. A study of 2,000 UK women found that their financial role in the family has evolved significantly in the two centuries since the insurer was established in Edinburgh to help secure the financial futures of the widows of Napoleonic war casualties. While a third (37 per cent) of women said their mothers were in charge of managing household finances while they were growing up, half (49 per cent) of women living with partners are solely responsible for this today. And 32 per cent of this group claim sole responsibility for funding day-to-day household expenditure, including energy bills, groceries, childcare and clothing, compared to just 13 per cent of their partners. Other households are more balanced, with 44 per cent of couples living together sharing the responsibility equally. The study suggests that financial independence is especially ingrained in the younger generation, with the proportion of women in relationships who claim to be the main breadwinner in their household rising from 17 per cent overall to 25 per cent among 25-34 year olds. This age group is also the most likely to keep finances separate from a partner, with more than half (52 per cent) admitting they do not share any bank accounts with their partner, compared to 39 per cent of women overall. And financial independence now starts earlier: on average UK women first feel financially independent at just 22 years old. But despite the move towards gender equality in relationship finances and among younger women, childcare continues to form a gulf between men and women, with two thirds (68 per cent) of women with children under 18 still primarily responsible for providing childcare. And two in five (42 per cent) women with children said they agreed with their partner to take a backseat in their career to provide childcare. A quarter (26 per cent) of women with children said having children has negatively affected their career progression, and 37 per cent feel it has reduced their financial independence. It is not just providing childcare that impacts women though, as a quarter (26 per cent) of women who live with their partners with children under 18 are also responsible for funding childcare, compared to fewer than one in 10 women (8 per cent) whose partners fund this. While over two thirds (69 per cent) of women living with a partner and contributing to childcare pay up to half of their salary towards it, 15 per cent claim the cost of having children looked after while they work amounts to more than half of their salary. Remarking on the changes, Jackie Leiper, ‘Women and Savings Expert’ at Scottish Widows, said: "When Scottish Widows was established in 1815 women were largely excluded from the workforce, couldn't vote, had no right to their own property – and yet today our research found that the average woman feels financially independent by the age of only 22. But, as she continued, despite the huge strides that women have taken with finances, it is clear that childcare remains a significant barrier when it comes to career progression. "We believe that both employers and the government should support families in balancing work and childcare responsibilities better," she continued. "As part of Lloyds Banking Group, we are committed to seeing women succeed in the workplace and ensuring everyone can find the right work-life balance and plan for a secure financial future." Scottish Widows was founded in 1815 as Scotland's first mutual life office, and was originally established in Edinburgh to support widows of the Napoleonic war. The Napoleonic era from 1793 – 1815 brought to battle the largest armies ever seen in Europe, costing more European lives than any other conflict before the First World War. Out of the one million men and boys who fought in the British army and navy, from a population of 14 million, 311,000 died. Around 50,000 Scottish volunteers were mobilised during the Napoleonic Wars. A quarter of the Scottish male population also served abroad in a military capacity between 1792 and 1815. At that time, with no welfare state, the death of a breadwinner could spell disaster for a family. Women were particularly vulnerable. They tended to be financially dependent on their husbands or other male relatives; in cases of serious misfortune, they could be left destitute. In March 1812, a group of eminent Scotsmen gathered in the Royal Exchange Coffee Rooms in Edinburgh to consider setting up 'a general fund for securing provisions to widows, sisters and other females’. Nearly 200 years later the Scottish Widows' Women and Retirement Report was set up. It has been tracking the shifting patterns of women's financial behaviour over the last decade and means the company has data showing how women are preparing for their futures compared to their male counterparts. In 2014 the 10th such report showed that while the number of women preparing adequately for retirement has reached a record high in the past 12 months, there is still some way to go to close the gender savings gap. Women put aside on average 30 per cent less a month for retirement than men, largely due to barriers such as ongoing differences in pay, or a greater tendency towards part-time working and career breaks. Behavioural factors, such as risk appetite, also have an important role to play. Calculations produced by Scottish Widows last year found that the differing ways in which men and women choose to save – and how the system rewards and incentivises this behaviour – mean that even when men and women save the same over a 40-year period, men can end up between £33,000 and £89,000 better off. And last year, Scottish Widows launched its Women and Finance campaign to shine a light on the inherent bias against women in the current savings system in the UK, and called on industry and government to do more to promote the financial needs of women.  |
| You are subscribed to email updates from Women's Views on News To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email delivery powered by Google |
| Google Inc., 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043, United States | |