Arni Hole, Director General Ministry of Children, Equality and Social Inclusion Norway

Transcription

1 Arni Hole, Director General Ministry of Children, Equality and Social Inclusion Norway Istanbul, April 25 th 2012: Good Human Resources (HR) practises at the workplace. Thank you for hosting this important event and for inviting me to present some Norwegian experiences. A core issue is how to develop sustainable societies by making use of all available and educated talents, from both genders, from all stratas of society. Good and practicable legislation is necessary, along with adequate methods for analyzing effects of fiscal and financial policies with gender glasses. Strong Work Enviroment Act for protection and predictability in work life, is needed. Rights and duties should be agreed upon, both at national and business level A strong Gender Equality Act, setting standards for a non-discriminatory working environment, is basic. Protection of pregnant women against job hazards and the right to return after parental leave to the same job, is vital. As are legal and economic structures (universal systems) for reconciling work and family life, securing that both women and men can combine careers and children not to be forced to choose either or. Further: Equal pay for work of equal value (the ILO convention from the fifties ), insurance and pension policies, as well as good practises /systems for reporting annually to the top management or the board of governors on gender equality status, using gender disaggregated statistics.(in N. we have a legal, positive duty to work for and report annually on GE, in all types of businesses and public institutions. Gives transparency ) Diversity measures in recruitment and mentor-adept programs are useful to promote young persons (both women and men) to leadership, As are trainee-programs, different welfare measures and if possible, early child care institutions close to the work site. Other good practises would be life-long learning routines, on the job-training combined with educational classes in local colleges, flexible hours, ICT possibilities to work from home offices if the business is of that kind, the right to negotiate part-time if there is care-taking at home or in combination with further education/vocational training.setting gender balance targets in all such programs.

2 Talents and competances are divided evenly among the genders. The public investments in education should have a return to society and business. A gender equal, not gender biased work life is the best way to harvest that return on educational investments. Social trust and radical individualism could be seen as a paradoxes, but those two values are at the very heart of Nordic capitalism. The Nordic Countries represent nations with very high individual autonomy, and yet the State is strong in each country. Social trust and accountability are strongly intertwined with developping a welfare society and securing gender equality. There are distinct historical roots; I mention only a few explanations here. The willingness to legislate on social matters - from Parliaments, since early 1900, even before The duty of Government to have all law proposals on a broad public hearing for et least 3 month before going to Parliament; all stakeholders should be heard, in writing. Today we publish all of these on our websites. Transparency! Democracy! A strong, free labour movement and a a strong women s movement, pushing the State for social reforms Consultations between the state and the social partners, the Tripartite cooperation as ILO recommmends (in Norway: Very strong;76 years back, called the Main Agrement, including also gender equality/family issues) on all major social reforms Investing in free education for everyone,not means tested The accepted value of paying taxes - from all back to the common good/universal systems (health care, pensions, sick insurance, disability pensions, parental leave, early child care,etc). With a strong accountability for what is in return. Social trust! The importance of the civil society and NGOs in developing social strategies In Norway: The primacy of individual autonomy (both genders) has been institutionalized through a plethora of law and policies affecting us: Interdependency within the family has been minimized through individual taxation of spouses.

3 Family law reforms have revoked obligations to support elderly parents. Care for the elderly and minimum pensions for all, are public matters and matters of dignity Paid parental leave (47 or 57 weeks), with a 12 week quota for the fathers; not tranferable to mothers; both parents have to qualify in worklife before birth Daycare for all children (from one year to six)to an affordable price, makes it possible for parents with small children to work, an immense step for women! Norway is small nation with an open economy, competing strongly on a global level. One of the worlds s highest levels of women working :79 % of women between 16 and 66 are in the workforce and employed; and still a remarkable high fertility rate in an aging Europe, 1.95 Most of what I have mentioned here, is in place, Norway scores very high on indexes of GE and Human Rights, we have 40 % women in Parliament, 39 % in local elected bodies, parity in Cabinet and so forth. Why did we need (in 2003) to introduce more legislation, called quotas, for the boards of governance in corporate sector? 2003: We saw 62 % of the university graduates beeing women. We saw women making up % of middle managers in private sector and likewise in the State sector (ministries and national bodies) even in top management. But, we saw very, very few women on the elected boards of governors for the large companies, listed on the Stock Exchange. Only 7 %We saw very little transparency in board-room decisions. We did not see many women on the boards of ordinary, private companies, either. We did not see the expected return on investment in free education. Diversity was not embraced, all talents were not exploited by the large companies. They did not mirror the buyers in the markets: More than half of purchase decisions in families beeing taken by women! Most women working, with their own income; wasn t that an unexplored path to investigate for products and services? What could be done to push the speed of gender equality in corporate and other sectors? We looked around for experiences:

4 The legal regulation for at least 40 % of each gender from 1988 (in the GE Act) for appointment of all public committees, councils, working groups, boards of inspection, formal delegations out of Norway had worked well. Sanction: A Ministry will not get such appointments through Cabinet, if no gender balance. The similar legal regulation in the Municipal Act from 1993: All committees and working groups appointed by the elected municipal body (429)/ as well as the elected regional bodies, should have no less than % gender balance. Sanction:The County Governors (18) inspect and monitor. The State sectors and municipal sector, already set targets for recruiting women leaders, promoting traineeships, mentor-adept programs for competition for top jobs. Even large companies did so, 10 years ago. But nothing really happened in the large companies boardrooms! As though they were not a part of societal development and democracy The Government decided to put out a note for public hearing, on gender balance Regulations for 4 types of companies: The public LTD with a broad spread of shares (listed ones), the wholly State owned, the intermunicipaly owned companies and some others. (later we have regulated all the many small municipaly owned companies providing services to the citizens, as well as the large cooperatives in agriculture, forestry, fisheries, consuming/food retail and housing). We did not propose to regulate gender balance for jobs. That would be illegal in Norway. The new laws concerned elections or appointment to boards of governors. Contra-arguments of great ferocity were produced by the private sector: The intervening state! No women to be found, women will not take on such resp, we have to flee Norway as to prosper.. However, the majority of hearings were pro, and in March 2003 we submitted the legislation to the Parliament, which voted pro, with great majority/truly bipartisan, in Nov of the company law amendmends were enforced immediately with 2 years of transition, not the one for PLC s. Why? Because we thought they would sort it out themselves; with a sleeping law whip behind the door and gave them more time; but nothing happened. Then we enforced the regulation for the PLCs as well; and after another 2 years, they were all in place, with 40 % women elected to their board of governors.

5 The other regulated companies have 43 % women governors on average, and the private companies have 17 %, the latter without legislation measures. We decided to use the excisting sanctions for non compliance with legal requirements for how to set up a board (since 35 years back) Dissolvement by court, or a big fine. Nothing new, we simply added another criterium for legally operating boards : Gender balance. The National Business Register is handling the regulations; for all registered and operating companies, regardless of size and type. It is not a human right because you are born a woman to be elected to a board of a company. Most men do not sit on company boards. But it is a human right, as a woman, not to be discriminated against; to be seen and acknowledged as a competent person, eligible to board room strategic work. It is vital to businesses competitive edge to secure diversity; gender is one such parameter along with diversity in education, background, experiences, age, etnicity. As it is for Ministries and other public bodies to produce good governance. We do not employ quotas for jobs, we do not have quotas in the Electoral Law (even if many political parties have used voluntary gender quotas since the 80 s for their electon lists), and we did not legislate all types of companies (though we are looking into the largest of the SMEs now) The legal measures have been a success. And they did not cost a cent. They have increased fairness in representation, good management and changed he board-room cultures and increased profitability. Such regulations are mere tools, not goals. Lastly, I commend the large Federations of Business Employers for having set up wonderful training programmes like Female Future and Futura, for the recruitment of women to stand for elections to boards of governors.these programmes were set up after the regulations were passed in Parliament. Indeed politics have a role to play, to take the lead. Thank you.