Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2004-10-28-Speech-4-020"
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"en.20041028.2.4-020"2
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"Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, I would like to add two observations to the question tabled by Mrs Záborská:
Firstly, a lot of research has shown that women have borne the main part of the burden of transition in the new Member States, both from the psychological point of view and the socio-economic point of view. This is also closely linked to the feminisation of poverty. Both unemployed and employed women run the risk of poverty. As far as employed women are concerned, this applies in particular to the lowest paid professions and is primarily the result of the fact that women’s pay has long been around 25% lower on average than men’s pay. This is not an exception but an average that applies to virtually the whole of Europe.
In the case of unemployed women, it is the elderly in particular who find themselves in the most complex and difficult situations. In some countries, time spent raising children has not been taken into account and this particularly applies to single mothers.
It has also been shown that the opportunity to get out of the poverty trap is reduced where there is little work and long-term unemployment, and that the opportunity is further reduced the longer a person has been unemployed. In my home country of Slovakia, according to the latest statistics issued by the Statistics Office and calculated according to Eurostat methods, up to 21% of the population is at risk of poverty or lives below the poverty line.
My second observation is that one of the most important dimensions in sustainable development is the social dimension, and poverty in particular. The feminisation of poverty is not a problem restricted to the new Member States. Moreover, it is quite clear that poverty amongst women often results in the social exclusion of children, thereby impacting on the future prospects of the new generation.
I also support the view that these questions are urgent, including the need to strengthen gender-specific statistics within the framework of building a knowledge-based society. I also agree that certain countries, and in particular the governments of certain countries, are attempting to make light of the problem of poverty, as if it were a symptom of personal failure.
I expect the European Commission to take a more robust policy in this respect too."@en1
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