News
News from the Care Front
January 2007
Christiane Nüsslein-Volhard, the only scientist amongst the German female
Nobel Prize winners, has invested her prize money in a
foundation that
supports outstanding young, women scientists who have children. To enable these
young mothers to have both a successful career in research and a satisfying
family life, the foundation pays a monthly allowance of 400 Euro that is to be
used for hiring a child carer and/or a home helper.
According to Nüsslein-Volhard, it is not unusual for young researchers to
spend 12 to 14 hours per day in the lab. They have to devote enormous amounts of
extra time and this is simply impossible for many young mothers. Unfortunately,
part-time careers are out of the question if women want to make it to the top in
fields such as the experimental sciences and medicine.
This underlines the fact that to bring about real change in terms of gender
equality, strategies aimed at bridging the gender gaps in economic sectors and
professions where women are underrepresented must be combined with practices
that help to reconcile work and private life. EQUAL has developed good practices
that have made a real difference to the lives of parents or people with care
responsibilities. At the same time, these models have helped to prevent female
potential seeping away. This tends to happen whenever women with children or
dependent family members cannot access the labour market because of a lack of
care services or when other women give up their careers because they can no
longer cope with their multiple tasks as employees, carers, wives and home
makers. Thanks to EQUAL flexible, affordable and easily accessible care services
for children and other dependants have contributed to creating a more
satisfying work-life-balance for thousands of women and men throughout Europe.
In many cases, these good practices have also succeeded in convincing men to
take a more equal share of housework and unpaid care at home. For political
decision-makers and other key players interested in turning their good
intentions of improved gender equality into action, a wealth of good ideas and
practical examples is only a few clicks away – on the
equal opportunities pages of the EQUAL website and particularly, in the
section on "Reconciliation".
In line with the efforts of many EQUAL Development Partnerships and National
Thematic Networks on Reconciliation, the European Women's Lobby is currently
leading a campaign to
advance equality between women and men through improved provision of care
services in the EU. The campaign calls for real social contracts to be
established between governments, women and men that will commit everyone
involved to work towards full access to economic and social rights which
requires child care to be provided as one element of those social services that
are offered to the general public in the overall interest of
society. An e-petition is available for signing, which will be forwarded
to the President of the European Commission and to the EU Heads of States and
Governments, at the meeting of the European Council in spring 2007.
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