Equal opportunities between men and women: 4th action programme 1996-2000. Interim Report

Without debate, the European Parliament adopted the resolution by Lissy Gröner (PSE,DE) on the interim report of the Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions on the implementation of the medium-term Community action Programme on equal opportunities for men and women (1996 to 2000). The Parliament regrets that the Commission has not evaluated the various projects and their value as regards the improvement of equal opportunities in the target areas of employment, education and training. It calls on the Commission to submit to it an evaluation report during the first six months of the year 2000 and, in addition, an annual report on the programme's implementation. The report emphasises that the appropriation of EURO 30 million entered in the budget to cover the programme's 5 years is woefully inadequate for promoting equality between men and women. The Parliament calls in particular for: - an analysis during the second half of the programme of the legal, social and economic position of women in the applicant countries of Central and Eastern europe with a view to that position being brought into line with the position of the EU; - the targeted promotion of women in the field of employment to be implemented principally under the ESF (a minimum of 15% of appropriations) and ERDF Structural Funds; - projects undertaken as part of the EU's LEONARDO and SOCRATES programmes and of the Fifth Framework Programme of Research to be used to promote equal opportunities; - the use of benchmarking by all European, national and regional institutions in the implementation and further development of the European Employment Strategy with a view to ensuring the permanent promotion of women under the "equal opportunities" pillar and to stepping up gender mainstreaming in the other three pillars. Finally, it calls on the Commission to develop gender-awareness courses and ensure that they are attended by decision-makers, to draw up gender-specific statistics in all the relevant areas, to develop an equality index and, in its annual report on equal opportunities for 1999, to give a breakdown of the appropriations devoted to projects to benefit women in the programmes referred to and to indicate what progress has been made in the establishment of equal opportunities.�