Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2010-10-18-Speech-1-033"
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"en.20101018.13.1-033"2
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"Madam President, this is not a good time for motherhood, but even less so for fatherhood.
This is the debate that we will have during the vote on Wednesday. I am in favour of supporting the report by Mrs Estrela, and I am in favour of the majority of this House doing exactly the same, because if not, we will be risking not only the health of working mothers, but also the welfare state that we have worked for so long to achieve in Europe.
This is because some political forces and some business groups are still stuck in an old-fashioned perception that having children is exclusively women’s work.
Well, ladies and gentlemen, that is not the case. Not in any way. It is a social responsibility that should be borne collectively by the whole of society. That is what we are talking about today. That is what we are discussing: who has to bear the responsibility and the cost of having children, who must also be our future?
Obviously, only women can get pregnant and give birth. No one is disputing that. What we are discussing here is women being the only ones who have to bear that cost in their professional lives and shoulder that responsibility in their personal lives.
At the end of the last parliamentary term, we had the opportunity to make a giant leap forward on this issue at European level, and we were unable to do so because a large proportion of this House – the most conservative section of this House: groups from the Group of the European Peoples Party (Christian Democrats) and the Group of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe, some delegations, not all, but some delegations – prevented it. This prevented mothers today from having more rights. We should not forget that.
What we have on the table today is a fresh opportunity to correct part of that problem. The Estrela report, which has already been adopted by the Committee on Women’s Rights and Gender Equality, is a good point for compromise and consensus, which I believe we should support on Wednesday when we vote.
It gives more rights to working pregnant women in Europe, it ensures that their salaries are maintained, and it also obliges fathers to take their share of the responsibility, as well as ensuring that pregnant women will not lose rights if they move between European Union countries. All of this is important, and we should not, under any circumstances, lose sight of it.
If, during the votes on Wednesday, we lose some of these fundamental points, I think it is important that we are clear and that European parents are clear that it has not happened by chance, and that the argument of the economic crisis cannot be used in such an important context.
There is obviously a crisis, and we need to take responsibility for it. Mothers, however, do not have to take any responsibility for it. This is understandable if we realise that we are not talking about a cost, but an investment. It is an investment in the future and in much healthier societies."@en1
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