Upholding human rights in times of crisis and pandemics: gender, equality and non-discrimination
- Author(s):
- Parliamentary Assembly
- Origin
- Text
adopted by the Standing Committee, acting on behalf of
the Assembly, on 13 October 2020 (see Doc. 15129, report of the Committee on Equality and Non-Discrimination,
rapporteur: Ms Petra Stienen).
1. The Covid-19 pandemic is more than
a global health crisis. Its impact on human lives around the world has
already been devastating, with millions of people infected and hundreds
of thousands dead. But its ramifications have also extended far
beyond the realm of health. The pandemic has affected the functioning
of our democracies and impacted human rights across the spectrum.
It has inflicted severe damage on the global economy, destroying
or imperilling the livelihoods of millions of people.
2. The crisis has cast a harsh spotlight on structural inequalities
already present in our societies. Women, over-represented in the
health and care professions, have played a disproportionate role
on the medical and care frontlines, while often remaining invisible
as experts in these fields and under-represented in government bodies
set up to deal with the crisis and in the media. People living in
institutionalised settings, including many elderly people and persons
with disabilities, have been highly vulnerable to the virus. Racialised
people, including people of African descent, Roma, migrants and
their children, as well as LGBTI people, have been disproportionately
affected due to persisting inequalities in health status and access
to healthcare. These inequalities are often caused in large part
by socio-economic status, racism, marginalisation and deeply ingrained
discrimination in fields such as housing, employment and education.
3. The pandemic has not simply brought existing structural inequalities
into the open, however, it has also exacerbated them. While government
responses to the pandemic have generally been taken with the legitimate
purpose of protecting public health, a one-size-fits-all approach
has often been taken, with little or no consideration being given
to how different groups or different situations might need to be
accommodated.
4. As a result, many measures taken have aggravated inequalities,
cut some people off from vital services and exposed others to new
dangers. People’s ability to implement preventive measures such
as frequent handwashing and physical distancing depends directly
on their living conditions, in particular where they lack access
to running water or where several generations live together in an
overcrowded space. Yet many governments failed to provide assistance
to people in these situations. The linguistic needs of persons belonging
to national minorities, and the need to provide information to persons
with disabilities in a format accessible to them, were also rarely
taken into account, particularly in the early stages of the pandemic.
5. Lockdown measures increased the risks of domestic and gender-based
violence, as women were confined to their homes with their abuser.
At the same time, women’s shelters and other support systems and services
became less accessible. In parallel, the focus on emergency responses
to the pandemic left many without access to essential healthcare
services, for example in the field of sexual and reproductive health rights.
After years of progress towards gender equality, in many countries,
women have shouldered even greater burdens during the crisis due
to the combination of childcare, home schooling, unpaid care work
and household tasks.
6. Lockdown enforcement measures have often targeted populations
already affected by ethnic profiling, while closures of public spaces
and reductions in public transport services have penalised persons
in lower socio-economic categories who have no alternatives at their
disposal.
7. The closure of non-essential businesses during lockdowns has,
moreover, amplified structural discrimination against groups already
over-represented in lower-paid and less secure jobs or working in
the informal economy, including women, people of African descent,
Roma and Travellers, migrants and LGBTI people, whose livelihoods
have been restricted or cut off altogether, and who have been put
at increased risk of poverty. Others have been forced to continue
working in unsafe conditions. Young people’s access to the labour
market has been halted and the closure of schools hit first and
hardest children with disabilities and those children who had the
least access to electricity, necessary IT equipment and the internet;
those who did not speak the official language of the country fluently;
and those whose parents were least able to provide additional support.
The socio-economic impact of the crisis risks having long-term effects.
8. The Parliamentary Assembly condemns the fact that some political
and religious leaders have actively stigmatised and incited hatred
against certain groups in the context of this crisis, depicting
them as vectors of contagion or even as the cause of the pandemic
itself. It deplores the fact that the pandemic has led to increased
manifestations of racism and prejudice against many groups, including
people of Asian origin, Roma and Travellers, people of African descent,
migrants and LGBTI people.
9. Following the Black Lives Matter demonstrations in the United
States, large, peaceful protests were held in many European cities
to denounce racism and police violence. Many observe a link between
these demonstrations and feelings of exclusion, fear of more control
by the police and increased awareness of systemic discrimination
and institutional racism that were exposed during the Covid-19 crisis.
10. The Assembly underlines that it is not enough to see and understand
where things have gone wrong; it is not enough to recognise the
structural inequalities that have left some far more exposed than
others and that have wreaked much greater havoc on livelihoods among
some groups. The discriminatory effects of the pandemic will not
disappear overnight. If we do not respond to the lessons we have
learned, these effects will persist in the medium and longer terms,
and those most harmed by the current crisis will also be the hardest hit
by the next one. Governments must ask themselves: when we designed
measures to respond to this crisis, who was at the table to discuss
and debate decisions and emergency laws? What data did we have at
our disposal? Whom and what did we miss? How can we ensure that
we do not miss them again?
11. It is by no means certain when the pandemic will end. Some
countries are still facing high numbers of new cases, and clusters
have reappeared in countries where the situation appeared to be
under control. But work must now begin to improve responses and
bring about the transformation to a more inclusive society that this
crisis demands.
12. In light of these considerations, the Assembly calls on all
Council of Europe member States to:
12.1 sign and ratify, if they have not yet done so, the Council
of Europe Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence against
Women and Domestic Violence (CETS No. 210, “Istanbul Convention”),
the European Social Charter (revised) (ETS No. 163), the Additional
Protocol to the European Social Charter Providing for a System of
Collective Complaints (ETS No. 158), the Framework Convention for the
Protection of National Minorities (ETS No. 157) and the European
Charter for Regional or Minority Languages (ETS No. 148);
12.2 strengthen their efforts to implement and promote these
treaties in line with the Assembly’s
Resolution 2289 (2019) “The Istanbul
Convention on violence against women: achievements and challenges”,
Resolution 2262 (2019) on
promoting the rights of persons belonging to national minorities and
Resolution 2196 (2018) on
the protection and promotion of regional or minority languages in
Europe;
12.3 in the case of States already parties to the European
Social Charter (revised), expand the scope of the provisions by
which they undertake to consider themselves bound.
13. The Assembly calls on Council of Europe member and observer
States, as well as those enjoying observer or partner for democracy
status with the Parliamentary Assembly:
13.1 in order to guarantee that immediate crisis responses
are comprehensive and inclusive and take full account of the diversity
of our societies and of the differing impacts that the same measures
may have on different groups, to:
13.1.1 ensure that crisis
response bodies not only bring together the necessary technical expertise
but are also gender-balanced and representative of the full diversity
within society, and that they regularly consult equality bodies,
civil society organisations and experts active in researching and
promoting equality;
13.1.2 base the measures taken to respond to crises on objective
data, collected and disaggregated by grounds such as gender, “race”,
national or ethnic origin, sexual orientation, gender identity,
sex characteristics, disability, age and health status, while fully
respecting international standards on the protection of personal
data, and with full respect for the principles of confidentiality,
informed consent and voluntary self-identification;
13.1.3 plan, budget for and provide from the outset additional
support to persons who will need it, such as speakers of minority
or non-official languages and persons with disabilities, in order that
they have equal access to information about measures they can take
to protect themselves from the crisis and about new obligations
stemming from it;
13.1.4 plan, budget for and provide from the outset additional
support to persons who may face particularly negative consequences
due to measures taken in response to the crisis, or new barriers
to accessing services on which they depend, as a result of their
gender, “race”, national or ethnic origin, sexual orientation, gender
identity, sex characteristics, disability, age and health status;
13.1.5 place the safety of victims of gender-based and domestic
violence at the heart of all measures and policies taken in response
to crises;
13.2 as regards the recovery period, to:
13.2.1 ensure
that teams working on recovery measures are gender-balanced, diverse
and inclusive, that they take an evidence-based approach and plan,
budget and provide for differential measures to be taken wherever
necessary to guarantee equality and non-discrimination, as outlined
above with respect to immediate crisis responses;
13.2.2 encourage businesses to maintain and strengthen measures
in place to promote diversity and inclusion in access to employment
and in the workplace, in line with the Assembly’s
Resolution 2257 (2019) on
discrimination in access to employment and
Resolution 2258 (2019) “For a disability-inclusive
workforce”;
13.2.3 ensure that work on and investment in preparedness for
future crises is comprehensive and inclusive;
13.2.4 promote intergenerational and interethnic solidarity in
the various fields adversely affected by this pandemic;
13.3 in order to strengthen measures taken to address existing
structural inequalities, to:
13.3.1 ensure that equality
data are regularly collected and disaggregated by grounds such as gender,
“race”, national or ethnic origin, sexual orientation, gender identity,
sex characteristics, disability, age and health status, while fully
respecting the Council of Europe’s data protection standards;
13.3.2 mainstream equality into all aspects of their work;
13.3.3 systematically use gender-sensitive and similar equality-sensitive
budgeting tools to assess the impact that measures will have on
different groups in the population and the effectiveness, efficiency
and relevance of these measures;
13.3.4 strengthen national equality bodies and ensure that they
have the necessary competences, resources and legal and structural
guarantees to carry out their work independently.
14. The Assembly calls on all national parliaments to mainstream
equality issues into the work they undertake in response to the
Covid-19 pandemic, and beyond it, by:
14.1 ensuring that the composition of any parliamentary inquiry
bodies set up to examine government and other responses to the pandemic
is gender-balanced, diverse and inclusive;
14.2 considering advocating for the establishment of an inquiry
specifically focusing on the equality issues thrown into the spotlight
by the pandemic itself, and those aggravated by government responses to
it;
14.3 using their role in scrutinising the work of executive
authorities to question the government regularly about the inclusivity
of measures taken in response to the pandemic, and the work of the
bodies designing and evaluating these measures;
14.4 ensuring that equality and non-discrimination issues are
systematically integrated into all parliamentary work, using a holistic
and intersectional approach.
15. The Assembly calls on political parties and their leaders
to:
15.1 ensure that their own membership
and governing structures are gender-balanced, diverse and inclusive
up to and including the highest levels, taking full account of the
recommendations made in texts it has previously adopted, and in
particular its
Resolution
2111 (2016) on assessing the impact of measures to improve
women’s political representation and
Resolution 2222 (2018) on promoting diversity
and equality in politics;
15.2 condemn and work to prevent all forms of hate speech,
in line with its
Resolution
2275 (2019) on the role and responsibilities of political
leaders in combating hate speech and intolerance.
