Independent MEP Marian Harkin this week joined EU Justice Commissioner Viviane Reding in calling for compulsory gender quotas for listed companies in Europe, noting that “the time for lip service on equality is over”.
“Commissioner Reding is right to push for this legislation,” argued Ms Harkin, who added that European companies have simply not tried hard enough to enforce the voluntary quota system already suggested by the Commission. “At the current rate, it would take 40 years before gender balance was attained on boards,” she explained.
Ms Harkin continued that “a number of European countries, in particular France and Norway, have successfully introduced mandatory quotas for non-executive boards, so I see no good reason why this should not now be pushed as a real catalyst for change at pan-Europe level.”
However, the North and West MEP cautioned that quotas are not a panacea for improving all aspects of gender equality, and Member States must remain vigilant to the possibility of tokenism among the executive cadre.
Furthermore, Ms Harkin believes that quotas are most effective when they are time limited - in other words, beyond a certain point, quotas should be discontinued, particularly if statistics indicate that the envisaged equality targets are being hit.
“Really quotas give us an opportunity to change the prevailing culture, and once that happens, it becomes the norm. There should be nothing remarkable about women and men having roughly equal representation on boards - it should simply be the way we do business.
“However, the real litmus test for whether gender equality is being achieved is the number of women being nominated to executive as well as non-executive boards,” she said, adding “I believe that Commissioner Reding's proposals will prove important steps on the road to achieving both.”
