Following the success of the first edition, launched by the Women’s Rights and Gender Equality Committee in October 2020, the European Parliament is holding a second European Gender Equality Week from 25 to 28 October. The Members of the Committee for Economic and Monetary Affairs encourage progress and change in EU politics as well as financial and economic governance.

Brussels

statement

gender balance (T)

REGNER, Evelyn (S&D, AT)

Committee on Women's Rights and Gender Equality

PIETIKÄINEN, Sirpa (EPP, FI)

GYŐRI, Enikő (NI, HU)

FITZGERALD, Frances (EPP, IE)

YON-COURTIN, Stéphanie (Renew, FR)

PETER-HANSEN, Kira Marie (Greens/EFA, DK)

TINAGLI, Irene (S&D, IT)

Women in Finance and Economics: Statements by members of the EP Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs

Title: Statements by members of the EP Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs

SOUNDBITE (English), Irene TINAGLI (S&amp;D, IT), Chair of the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs, In the European Union, we have made a lot of progress on gender balance. We have many women now in top positions in the economic governance of the Union. But still a lot has to be done in many financial institutions, in the private sector, but also in central banks, in ministries of finance of the member states... Women are still heavily under-represented and so we will keep fighting and we will do that not just for women, but for building a better European Union.

SOUNDBITE (English), Frances FITZGERALD (EPP, IE), Member of the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs, In the seven hundred and fifty billion EU Resilience and Recovery Facility, the Parliament always supported clear gender budgeting measures, including gender impact assessments. Gender equality in economic and financial affairs is absolutely imperative. The data shows the strong economic argument for empowering women and how it is so critical for the European economy and its people. The ECON Committee must redouble its efforts to improve female participation both in the financial services sector and in the economic sector as a whole.

SOUNDBITE (English), Sirpa PIETIK&#196;INEN (EPP, FI), Member of the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs, It's important to have women as MEPs, as directors of central banks, as economic decision makers and economists, and this is a question of equality and quality. Equality because, of course, women are human beings and human rights are their rights, and they should have the same possibilities to advance on the decision making and on their careers. But the second reason, this is the quality part; men are not better than women, and women are not better than men. But we need definitely the diversity of opinions, diversity of the experience, education and the life stream where you come from to create the best possible economic policies and policies at the general.

SOUNDBITE (English), Evelyn REGNER (S&amp;D, AT), Member of the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs, It is, above all, women who are hit by the corona crisis. Women are doing the homeschooling, women are caring about the elderly, women are in those jobs that were so important to run the whole economy, and the ECON Committee was fully aware of that when we negotiated the RRF, the Recovery and Resilience Fund. It is important that we have a gender sensitive distribution of all this EU money that is invested right now in order to build up again our economies and to make the whole society resilient. We need real gender budgeting and we start with gender sensitive distribution.

SOUNDBITE (English), St&#233;phanie YON-COURTIN (Renew, FR), 2nd Vice-Chair of the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs, The socio economic aspects of COVID 19 have fallen disproportionately on women. We must make sure that the recovery addresses the issue of gender discrepancy. After Christine Lagarde at the ECB, Natasha Cazenave of ESMA, Petra Hielkema at EIOPA, we've just appointed a fourth woman at the top of the financial European industry, Verena Ross named at the head of ESMA. Things are changing slowly, but they are changing in the right direction. Let's not be dazzled with these high profile appointments. Women are still under-represented in economic and financial affairs. Let's move again in the right direction.

SOUNDBITE (English), Kira Marie PETER-HANSEN (Greens/EFA, DK), Member of the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs, Worldwide, only one in five financial leaders are women, and this is not because we're not part of the financial sector. Actually, we comprise around half of it, but it's because we are not at decision making tables that we're not in leadership positions and that we can't smash the glass ceiling. So for Gender Equality Week, our pledge is to secure more women in financial positions and to secure that we actually take the right to sit at the table.

SOUNDBITE (English), Enik&#337; GY&#336;RI (NI, HU), Member of the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs, Being a woman has never been an issue for me during my career. I served as an ambassador, state secretary and now as an MEP. I firmly believe that men and women are equal and they should work in two ways. No women should be excluded from a job when applying, and no men should feel badly and apologizing for being a man when applying for a job.