Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2007-06-19-Speech-2-071"
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"en.20070619.6.2-071"2
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"Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, this report marks a further milestone in the European Year of Equal Opportunities for All. We see from the Green Paper on Demography that the life stages of young people – of students of both genders, that is – are being completed later when it comes to work and family, and women have seen in this process the opportunity to have, by means of ‘second chance’ education, a better life, a life of their own choosing, and they have seized that opportunity.
Women, accounting for 59% of those who complete higher education, have in that respect overtaken men, but the position is nowhere near as favourable when it comes to decisions taken later on, where the glass ceiling again comes into play, and only 43% of doctoral candidates are women, with the figure falling to a mere 15% for professorships, and lower than that – to 8% – in Germany. Is anyone surprised, then, that women, particularly academics, are more and more likely to decide against having children?
We need to work towards overcoming gender stereotypes and the social divisions between the worlds of women and men, and must adopt measures to improve compatibility between family and working life, for example by means of affordable facilities. That point has been made, and I am glad that the Commissioner has expressed the intention of doing something about this, but, with the best will in the world, that is not on. What is needed is for pressure to be brought to bear. People will decide for themselves how many children they want, or, indeed, whether they want to have any at all. I do not know whether young academics will be aware of our debate here today, but we have to respect their right to come to their own decisions, and make the choice easier for them.
We also have to respect the desire of more and more people today to live alternative lifestyles and their abandonment of the traditional family model; I might add that that most needs to be taken into account by our governments, not least the government in Poland, and it makes me positively furious that the Poles are yet again standing aloof from this. Many friends of mine in Poland have asked me to make this point today, and I stand here to speak out for the people in Poland who have the same right to free personal choice as anyone else."@en1
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