The first session was introduced by PES Women president Zita Gurmai. She said: ‘Europe is facing multiple challenges but we have not yet underlined enough the impact of the crisis on women; be it women’s employment, women’s wages, reconciliation of private and professional life or growing violence against women, we can not let the right-wing austerity-only approach let unravel the gender equality advances we have achieved over the past years. This is why PES Women is campaigning on ‘Equal Pay, it’s about time!‘.
PES deputy Secretary General Marije Laffeber spoke during the session on equal burden sharing between men and women. She said: ‘the introduction of gender mechanisms and legislation alone is not enough. A mentality change is needed to get a better burden sharing. We have to educate children starting from a very young age to break the traditional stereotypes’.
The school is organised by the Central and Eastern European Network for Gender Issues in cooperation with the Center for New Initiatives, with the sponsorship of the Olof Palme international center.
