Proposition 54K1436

Projet de loi portant assentiment à la Convention du Conseil de l'Europe sur la prévention et la lutte contre la violence à l'égard des femmes et la violence domestique, faite à Istanbul le 11 mai 2011.

General information ¶

Submitted by

MR Swedish coalition

Submission date

Nov. 4, 2015

Official page

Visit

Status

Adopted

Requirement

Simple

Subjects

sexual discrimination gender equality domestic violence international agreement position of women women's rights sexual violence

Voting ¶

Voted to adopt

Groen CD&V Vooruit Ecolo LE PS | SP DéFI ∉ Open Vld N-VA LDD MR PVDA | PTB PP VB

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Discussion ¶

Dec. 3, 2015 | Plenary session (Chamber of representatives)

Full source

I refer to the written report.

The Istanbul Convention is the most advanced and comprehensive set of international standards for combating violence against women. It is therefore an important step that we are taking today in this Parliament, based on a text that comes from the Council of Europe and that Belgium already signed in September 2012.

It is the first legally binding instrument at European level that covers different areas, including prevention, protection and support, material law, procedural law, immigration but also international cooperation.

It is a global convention that tends to provide answers to this, oh how important, problem that we all know. And because the figures are challenging in this matter, I will quote a few of them.

According to a European Union report, one in three Europeans has been victim of physical and/or sexual violence at least once in their lives, and this since the age of 15. One in seven women has experienced at least one act of violence committed by their partner, or former partner, in the course of the past year. According to Amnesty International, 50% of Belgians know of at least one person who has suffered severe sexual violence, a violation of fundamental rights that is not sufficiently ⁇ due to prejudice and the social reproach it causes.

Finally, more than 48,000 women and girls whose nationality is that of a country where the excision is practiced live in our country. Among them, slightly more than 13,000 were considered very likely already cut and slightly more than 4,000 as potentially at risk of cut. About 500,000 people in the European Union have suffered genital mutilation.

Through this ratification, your government manifests what I would call a political will to adopt new concrete measures to combat this violence. This ratification must mean an expansion of actions to combat violence against women but also an expansion of measures to address the specific violence represented by rape, honour crimes and mutilation.

We are not a bad student in this area. However, it would be interesting to point out in which area specific work still needs to be done to meet the many requirements of the Convention in our country. My colleagues and myself regularly question Ms. Sleurs about the policy she is pursuing in this matter.

So far, we have not seen much new in the fight against violence against women, but also in the fight against discrimination. Both are closely linked.

A new national action plan against all forms of violence is expected. This new plan for 2015-2019 is to extend its scope to sexual violence, namely rape, sexual harassment and prostitution. We are looking forward to it.

The ratification of the Istanbul Convention by our country, I repeat, will have to result in an even more ambitious and even more effective policy in the fight against violence against women. I can assure you, my group will not allow it to be otherwise.

Mr. Speaker, Mr. Minister, Ladies and Gentlemen, this is a ⁇ important topic that we are discussing now.

There seems to be consensus on this issue. But even in Europe, we are very far from counting. The Polish parliament ratified the convention with 254 votes against 175 and 8 abstentions. And the current government is among the opponents to the vote of this ratification.

At the time, at the time of ratification, the Polish Episcopate expressed itself in these words: “The convention is based on the extremist and neo-Marxist gender ideology.” And the ratification, I imagine, will be done unanimously.

This Istanbul Convention will be ratified, while it was signed in Istanbul, a city located in a country that has recently experienced debates.

We saw this last year with the statements of the Turkish minister that one could not represent a laughing woman. As a result, hundreds of thousands, even millions of photos of laughing women were taken. I think this is an excellent answer, a nice nose foot that has been addressed to this minister and to his prohibition vehemence.

This debate is therefore very important. On the other hand, I would like to greet Ms. Elke Sleurs, Secretary of State who, contrary to what Mr. Sleurs just said. Blanchart is working on that.

On the proposal of my colleague from the Open Vld, Nele Lijnen, we have begun to work on the issue of violence against women and are finalising a series of hearings. In this regard, Mr. Blanchart, the Minister will come to us very soon to explain his intentions in this regard. That is to say how much we, Belgian parliamentarians, must accompany the very positive action that has been under way for many years in our country.

The Council of Europe Convention on the Prevention and Combating of Violence against Women and Domestic Violence, adopted on 7 April 2011. I can say that four years have passed. Why did it have to wait so long? Because the ratification process ensures that it must first pass through the different assemblies that sit in Belgium. It seems to me that the very last to ratify this text was the Joint Community Commission in July 2015.

I thank Minister Reynders for asking the Committee on Foreign Relations to address this point even before his general policy note, which we will discuss next week. Therefore, we will not be the last to complete the ratification.

As my colleague Blanchart said, it is important and essential that men speak, not only women. Indeed, this is a problem of our humanity, of which women are victims, but it is men who are often responsible. We need to put an end to all the elements of this violence against women that address very different topics: forced marriages, female genital mutilation, sexual violence, including sexual assault, rape, harassment, physical and psychological violence, including moral harassment, abortion and forced sterilization, and so-called honour crimes. These are points on which we should absolutely not negotiate. It is also for this reason that our fight against Daesh must be unlimited because it is a society that wants to reproduce everything we hate, all the situations we want to fight against.

We should be ⁇ proud to bring together this bill of ratification. Hopefully we will be unanimous. In any case, on behalf of the MR group, I can say that we are proud to be able to do this with enormous enthusiasm.

Mr. Speaker, colleagues, we have been waiting for this bill for a very long time, because we have been a party asking for years, and today it is finally here in the plenary session. I think the importance of this convention should not be underestimated. Several colleagues have repeatedly said this today, so I agree with it.

The Convention has important objectives, such as the protection of women from all forms of violence, as well as the prevention, prosecution and eradication of such violence. Other objectives include eliminating discrimination against women from society and promoting equality between men and women. It also includes the establishment of a framework for the protection and support of all victims of violence, the promotion of international cooperation and the support and assistance to organisations and law enforcement institutions, in order to reach a comprehensive approach to the problem. The provisions in the Convention are very specific and we can therefore also actually make an impact in practice.

We do not only prove lip service to the principle of equality between women and men. That is important. I will give a few examples that I have also cited in the committee. Governments are required to take certain preventive measures, such as training professionals to deal with victims, conducting prevention campaigns on a regular basis, and developing programs to rehabilitate perpetrators of domestic violence. This includes concrete protective measures, such as allowing a temporary home ban as a punishment for perpetrators of domestic violence, the obligation to provide a sufficient number of shelters that are sufficiently geographically spread. There is much to eat and drink at the convention that we will approve today.

We will follow the treaty very closely, including to ensure that Belgium will effectively respect the provisions of that treaty. We fought for that.

Through this path, I would like to once again thank the Institute for Gender Equality, the Women’s Council and all women’s organizations that have contributed to make this possible today.

I think the approval today is symbolic, because there is still a lot of work to be done in the store. More than ever, we need to showcase in our society that equality between men and women is essential.

Finally, we have ratified the Istanbul Convention. Because some states have done their homework far too late, we are among the last countries in Europe with this approval. That is of course regrettable. It looks like a climate deal.

We have reached this point, Mr. Minister, we are ratifying a comprehensive, multidisciplinary treaty to ensure that women are protected from all forms of violence and that violence against women and domestic violence can be prevented and prosecuted, so that we can eradicate that violence. Ms Lijnen has already pointed out that all forms of discrimination against women are included in this Convention.

We are happy that we have reached this point because it is a ⁇ important treaty, also for our country. In the Committee for Social Emancipation – Mr. Flahaux already mentioned – we are conducting a long series of hearings on rape. We see people from the judiciary, the welfare world, the civil society and the police. Despite all the efforts and the goodwill of many organizations and actors in our country, it is becoming clear to us week after week that we still have a lot to improve on our Belgian legislation in that area. The implementation on the ground is also subject to many improvements. I think of sanctions, prevention and promoting preparedness for reporting.

I understood from the policy note of the State Secretary for Equal Opportunities that she really wants to do this work. In any case, we have our support for that. Rape is just one example. There are many other forms of violence. There is still work to be done in the store.

This convention is also important because it enables us to reach a harmonisation of what is criminal in this regard, because even within Europe the policy in this area still differs too much from each other.

In short, we hope that this convention will contribute to bringing fewer women to live in fear in the future, and I hope that this is the beginning of a great collaboration of all of us to make this work together.

Mr. Speaker, of course, our group also recognizes the importance of this Istanbul Convention, the ratification of which has taken four years to wait. It is a very important treaty because it is a binding treaty. We also look forward to what the National Action Plan will do in this regard, as it is about preventing, protecting and prosecuting violence against women.

We heard yesterday in the committee that the national action plan will be launched next week by Secretary of State Sleurs. I hope that it will be fully embedded in the Istanbul Convention, a treaty that has been concluded in full consultation with all European organisations for the protection of women and against violence against women.

I hope that its application will be further discussed and that the national action plan will also demonstrate it. It is very important that Belgium succeeds the implementation through Parliament, as it is very exceptional that Parliament is mentioned as a stakeholder in a treaty, this is made very explicitly in Article 70 of this treaty. This means that there will be annual national inquiries from a committee of experts of the Council of Europe, specially appointed in this Istanbul Convention.

It is important that Belgium delegates someone into that committee of experts, so that we can learn from best practices, from the exchange between different countries. Today, however, I notice that this has not yet been implemented. I think that we should first appoint the Institute as the coordinator of this treaty, we should delegate someone into the Committee of Experts and the Parliament should be very explicitly involved in the implementation and application of the treaty.

Mr. Speaker, dear colleagues, it is not because I come to the tribune that my speech will be longer than that of others, but I must confess to you that I do not like to take the speech by turning my back or by not seeing certain interlocutors in this room.

I actually turn my back to the president, but it is he who has chosen to stand there, to be above everyone. Remember the additional step that has been placed. We added a walk so that, when you see us on television, you see the president at the same time. It is a clever president who has thought about this. This is not from today, but from a previous legislature. I let you guess who it is. We will do a quiz.

Mr. Speaker, Mr. Minister, dear colleagues, this Istanbul Convention is ⁇ important because it is a tool for combating violence against women, but it is also a binding tool. However, I think that Belgium needs constraints in order to be mobilized in concrete policies to fight, in this case, against violence against women. Although we are a democratic country, convinced of gender equality and the necessity of this fight against violence, in fact, in 2013, 162 people died as a result of domestic violence. There are eight complaints per day for rape and there are, on our territory, 8,000 women mutilated and 4,000 girls or women at risk of genital mutilation.

This means that our policies, our mobilisations, our social and political organization are not yet able to prevent this violence that is being exercised against women.

The fact that this convention is a binding instrument will undoubtedly force us to put in place concrete tools for prevention, protection, prosecution and integrated policy. It is well known that daily vigilance is needed to ensure that, in the event of a complaint, the victim is properly taken into account, that justice actually acts and really follows these complaints and that there are concrete measures against the perpetrators of these violations.

Yesterday, we discussed in the Health Committee the general policy note 'equal opportunities' in which an important chapter is devoted to the fight against violence. We have had the opportunity, opposition as a majority, to recall this concern and this need not only to have plans but that they actually concrete themselves through policies and active and proactive vigilance.

This convention is also an instrument that should encourage us to represent Belgium in the GREVIO expert group and should allow our parliament to be in permanent interaction with the government, with these experts and the parliaments of other Member States.

Ecolo is pleased that after three years, we finally decided to sign the consent to this convention in the House.

The movie "The Suffragettes" is currently on the screen. This beautiful and interesting film reminds us of the slogan created by Emmeline Pankhurst in 1898: "Deeds not words!". I think this convention is a message that it also sends to us.

Mr. Speaker, very briefly, I would also like to emphasize, on behalf of my group, the full importance of this Convention on Violence Against Women. I am convinced, our group is convinced that whenever women take on a more important part in human societies, societies evolve rapidly. Gender equality is one of the foundations of rapidly progressing human societies and the fight against violence against women is also a very important element.

Our colleagues have said that there is something to sweep in front of our door. We can ⁇ , through binding instruments such as this convention, further improve the situation in our country in particular, but also in all countries of the Council of Europe.

I am happy today that we can approve such a convention, which is an indispensable tool for democracy and for the future of our human societies.

Mr. Speaker, Mr. and Mrs. Ministers, dear colleagues, we have been waiting for this moment for more than three years, that we were waiting for the Istanbul Convention to finally be ratified by all our federal entities and therefore, in the end, by the federal.

Belgium has always invested in the fight against violence against women. However, on April 30, we learned that domestic violence would no longer be considered a priority in the National Security Plan 2016-2020.

The acceptance of the Istanbul Convention will thus prove to the victims that we will not abandon them. This agreement was even more urgent as our numerous efforts on gender equality could not be challenged by our institutional complexity. I am therefore grateful to each level of power for having, in this case, assumed its responsibilities.

This text is a fundamental instrument in the fight against violence against women in Belgium but also around the world.

For these violations spare no social environment, no culture, no generation. It is an evil of humanity that must be eradicated. We can no longer accept that one in three women in the world is beaten, mutilated, victim of sexual violence or abused during their lifetime.

We can no longer accept that violence against women remains the leading cause of death among women aged 15 to 44. We can no longer accept that in Belgium, one in ten women is a victim of a rape and dares to file a complaint.

Furthermore, we had to continue the momentum initiated on March 5 in this same assembly with the adoption of our proposal for a resolution on the fight against early and forced marriages in the world and, in particular, in the partner countries of the Belgian Development Cooperation.

The Istanbul Convention is the first binding instrument to create a legal framework for preventing violence against women and domestic violence, protecting victims and bringing perpetrators to justice. Prevention, protection, repression, these are the three keywords of this convention!

This framework emphasizes, therefore, the training of the reception staff of the first-line services, the increase of the offer of victim reception places, on affective and sexual education in schools, on the judicial follow-up of rape complaints, on the fight against stereotypes, as many points my party has always firmly defended.

The implementation of the Istanbul Convention will enable the optimal implementation of the Multiannual Action Plan to combat gender-based violence, coordinated by the Institute for Gender Equality. It will also give a famous accelerator to all our equal opportunity policies. It will finally allow to open the right of asylum to women who are subject to violence in their country or who are at high risk of being subjected to violence if they are sent back there – I call the Secretary of State, Mr. Francken, to be very attentive to this point – which, in the asylum crisis we know today, constitutes a considerable advance.

For all these reasons, my group will support this project of consent, which is all the more fundamental as the degree of advancement of a society has always been measured at the height of the place granted to women and their rights. I would like to thank the three gentlemen who spoke on behalf of the women. This is a very positive sign. I’m going to see the movie “The Suffragettes.”

First and foremost, I would like to thank all the political groups. The bill was approved in a committee with unanimous vote. I hope that the same reasoning is followed here.

What is new, many have recalled, is the binding nature of this convention.

It is clear that the vote that will take place today has a lot of importance, but the National Action Plan has a little more. We will need to translate this action plan into concrete measures.

I would like to add that Belgium will continue to play its role on the international stage in the fight against violence against women.

Furthermore, as we have just been re-elected to the Human Rights Council, we will have the opportunity, starting next January, to play an even more active role, especially in the framework of the Universal Periodic Reviews, in an attempt to persuade a number of partners to move in the same direction. But, today, the essential thing is that the text can, after all the federal entities, be voted at the federal level, with hopefully the unanimous support of parliamentarians.