The UCLG delegation of the Standing Committee on Gender Equality lead by the Chair, Anne Hidalgo, Vice-Mayor of Paris were received today at the UN Women Headquarters by the Executive Director Michelle Bachelet. This meeting was followed by a working session with different sectors of the dedicated UN agency for gender issues.
The delegation composed of Mrs Anne Hidalgo, Vice Mayor of Paris and Chair of the UCLG Standing Committee on Gender Equality, Mr Frédéric Vallier, Secretary General of CEMR, Mrs Olga Trostiansky, President of the CLEF (French Coordination for the European Lobby on Women), Carola Gunnarsdon, Vice-President of SALAR, Bibiana Aido-Almagro, former Spanish Minister for the Rights of Women and Special Advisor to Michèle Bachelet, and Mrs Emilia Saiz (UCLG) presented the work plan of the Committee approved by the World Council in Florence and made particular emphases on the need to ensure increasing participation of women in elected positions at all levels.
"We need to identify women local leaders all over the world and the champions that can help us implement equality". "I am very committed to establish a closer alliance with the global organization of local governments, with UCLG" said Michelle Bachelet.
Anne Hidalgo expressed the commitment of locally elected women to support UN Women to achieve progress around the world and stressed the need to ensure that women elected politicians remain in politics. "Their invaluable experience should be capitalized and shared with the future women and men leaders . Specialized training and support actions need to be developed, she said".
One of the core objectives of the joint work will be to include in the annual reports on the status of women produced by the UN agency, an overview of the representation of women at the local level.
The launch next 8 March of the European Observatory on Equality between Women and Men carried out by the European Section, CEMR, and building on the work of the European Charter, was announced by the Vice-President of Swedish Association of Local Governments.
The topics of safer cities, gender budgeting and capacity building were also addressed as important axes for synergies and joint action.
The Standing Committee has further invited UN Women to work towards the Global Conference that will be hosted by the City of Paris at the end of January 2013.