1. Introduction
1. On 12 November 2010, the Standing Committee, acting
on behalf of the Parliamentary Assembly, adopted
Resolution 1781 (2010) on
a minimum of 30% of representatives of the under-represented sex
in Assembly national delegations. This resolution amended Rules
6.2
.a and 7.1.
b of the Rules of Procedure and laid
down new conditions regarding gender representation, by strengthening
the existing provisions to ensure a more balanced participation
of women and men. These new provisions entered into force upon their
adoption. By letter dated 6 December 2010, the Secretary General
of the Parliamentary Assembly informed the speakers of the parliaments
of member states of the changes that had been made, so that they
could take due account of these changes when appointing their delegations.
2. At the Assembly sitting on 24 January 2011, Mr José Mendes
Bota, chairperson of the Committee on Equal Opportunities for Women
and Men, and several members of the Assembly challenged on procedural grounds
the still unratified credentials of the delegations of Montenegro,
San Marino and Serbia to the Parliamentary Assembly, in accordance
with Rule 7.1.b of the Rules
of Procedure, on the ground that the delegations in question comprised
no female representative, in violation of Rule 6.2.a.
3. The second sentence of Rule 6.2
.a provides
that:
“National delegations shall
include the under-represented sex at least in the same percentage
as is present in their parliaments and, at a very minimum, one member
of the under-represented sex appointed as a representative”.
4. The failure to include at least one member of the under-represented
sex as a representative in a national delegation is explicitly acknowledged
in Rule 7.1.
b of the Rules
of Procedure as a ground for challenging the credentials of the
delegation in question:
“Credentials
may be challenged by at least ten members of the Assembly present
in the Chamber, belonging to at least five national delegations,
on stated procedural grounds based upon: … the principles in Rule
6.2, that national parliamentary delegations should be composed
so as to ensure a fair representation of the political parties or
groups in their parliaments and should include in any case one member
of the under-represented sex, appointed as a representative”.
5. The Committee on Rules of Procedure, Immunities and Institutional
Affairs must therefore examine whether the composition of the delegations
of Montenegro, San Marino and Serbia violates the principles set out
in Rule 6.2.a of the Assembly’s
Rules of Procedure.
6. Under the terms of Rule 7.2, as amended by
Resolution 1698 (2009) on
amendment of various provisions of the Parliamentary Assembly’s
Rules of Procedure, “[i]f the committee concludes that the credentials
should be ratified, it may submit an opinion to the President of
the Assembly, who shall read it out in the plenary sitting of the
Assembly or the Standing Committee, without debate. If the committee
concludes that the credentials should not be ratified or that they
should be ratified but that some rights of participation or representation
should be denied or suspended, the committee’s report shall be placed
on the agenda for debate within the prescribed deadlines”.
2. Conformity
of the composition of the parliamentary delegations of Montenegro,
San Marino and Serbia with Rule 6.2 of the Assembly’s Rules of Procedure
7. The report of the President of the Assembly on the
examination of credentials of representatives and substitutes for
the 2011 ordinary session of the Assembly (
Doc. 12474) shows that the national
delegations of Montenegro, San Marino and Serbia do not include
any women as representatives.
2.1. Credentials transmitted
by the delegations concerned
2.1.1. The credentials
of the members of the Montenegrin delegation sent on 6 December
2010
8. In accordance with Articles 25 and 26 of the Statute
of the Council of Europe, the Montenegrin parliamentary delegation
is entitled to three representatives and three substitutes. According
to the report of the President of the Assembly on the examination
of credentials of representatives and substitutes for the 2011 ordinary
session of the Assembly, the Montenegrin parliamentary delegation
is composed as follows:
Representatives:
Mr Neven GOSOVIC (Socialists People’s Party)
Mr Džavid ŠABOVIC (Social Democratic Party)
ZZ...
Substitutes:
Mr Obrad GOJKOVIC, (Socialist People’s Party)
Mrs Valentina RADULOVIC-ŠCEPANOVIC, (Democratic Party of Socialists)
Mr Ervin SPAHIC, (Social Democratic Party)
9. Following receipt of the Montenegrin delegation’s
credentials, the Secretary General of the Parliamentary Assembly
contacted it. No letter was sent to the President of the Assembly
to provide an explanation. However, the Secretary General of the
Assembly was informed orally that it had not been possible to change
the delegation in the interval because of the difficulties that
would be caused by the equal need to maintain political balance
in the delegation.
10. At its meeting on 24 January 2011, the Committee on Rules
of Procedure had an exchange of views with Mrs Radulovic-Šcepanovic,
member of the Montenegrin delegation. She indicated that the delegation
would be modified in due time for the Assembly’s April part-session,
since a vacant seat of representative needed to be filled following
the appointment of the holder to the newly appointed government.
2.1.2. The credentials
of the members of the San Marino delegation sent on 7 January 2011
11. In accordance with Articles 25 and 26 of the Statute
of the Council of Europe, the San Marino parliamentary delegation
is entitled to two representatives and two substitutes. According
to the report of the President of the Assembly on the examination
of credentials of representatives and substitutes for the 2011 ordinary
session of the Assembly, the San Marino parliamentary delegation
is composed as follows:
Representatives:
Mr Marco GATTI (P.D.C.S.)
Mr Fiorenzo STOLFI (PSD)
Substitutes:
Mrs Assunta MELONI (Alleanza Popolare)
Mr Pier Marino MULARONI (DdC)
12. Following receipt of the San Marino delegation’s
credentials, the Secretary General of the Parliamentary Assembly
contacted it. In a letter to the President of the Assembly dated
21 January 2011, Mr Marco Gatti, chairperson of the delegation,
said that the San Marino delegation was committed to the principle
of equality of the sexes and to complying with the Rules of Procedure
as rapidly as possible. However, he regretted that the current wording
of the rules failed to take account of the “objective problems of
micro-states”, which were also required to secure a balance of political
groups within the delegation that reflected the current composition of
parliament. Mr Gatti also stated that given the time set for the
entry into force of the amendment to the rules it had not been possible
for the political parties to give detailed consideration to this
important change, with a view to achieving a solution in time for
the first part of the 2011 session. Consultation between the political groups
with a view to changing the composition of the delegation for the
first part of the 2011 session had not been possible in the time
available. Finally, Mr Gatti said that micro-states faced specific
problems when forming their delegations if they were to take account
of all the conditions laid down in the Rules. The San Marino delegation
comprised only two full members – one from the majority and one
from the opposition – and one woman (from the majority) was included
as a substitute.
13. At its meeting on 24 January 2011, the Committee on Rules
of Procedure had an exchange of views with Mr Stolfi, member of
the San Marino delegation. He confirmed the above-mentioned information
and insisted on the fact that changing the composition of the delegation,
which results from an agreement among the political parties represented
in the parliament, requires time.
2.1.3. The credentials
of the members of the Serbian delegation sent on 17 December 2010
14. In accordance with Articles 25 and 26 of the Statute
of the Council of Europe, the Serbian parliamentary delegation is
entitled to seven representatives and seven substitutes. According
to the report of the President of the Assembly on the examination
of credentials of representatives and substitutes for the 2011 ordinary session
of the Assembly, the Serbian parliamentary delegation is composed
as follows:
Representatives:
Mr Miloš ALIGRUDIC (Democratic Party of Serbia)
Mr Željko IVANJI (G17 Plus)
Mr Cedomir JOVANOVIC (Liberal-democratic Party)
Mr Dragoljub MICUNOVIC (Democratic Party)
Mr Tomislav NIKOLIC (Parliamentary group “Forward Serbia”)
Mr Branko RUŽIC (Socialist Party of Serbia)
Mr Dragan TODOROVIC (Serbian Radical Party)
Substitutes:
Mr Mladen GRUJIC (New Serbia)
Mr Miloš JEVTIC (Democratic Party)
Ms Nataša JOVANOVIC (Serbian Radical Party)
Mr Bojan KOSTREŠ (League of Social Democrats of Vojvodina)
Ms Elvira KOVÁCS (Alliance of Vojvodina Hungarians)
Mrs Vjerica RADETA (Serbian Radical Party)
Mrs Nataša VUCKOVIC (Democratic Party)
15. Following receipt of the Serbian delegation’s credentials,
the Secretary General of the Parliamentary Assembly contacted it.
In a letter to the President of the Assembly dated 19 January 2011,
the Speaker of the Serbian National Assembly, Mrs Slavica Djukić-Dejanović,
emphasised the commitment of National Assembly members to equality
between the sexes but said that the National Assembly was in parliamentary
recess until March 2011 so there was no procedural means of changing
the delegation’s composition. Mrs Dejanović also stated that the
Serbian national delegation, elected on 2 February 2009, comprised
seven representatives and seven substitutes, including four women
who were all very actively involved in the work of the Assembly
and its committees. Mrs Natasa Vuckovic was vice-chair of the Socialist
Group and a member of the Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights
and Mrs Elvira Kovacs, who had been an Assembly rapporteur on numerous occasions,
was vice-chair of the Group of the European People’s Party and a
member of the Committee on Culture, Science and Education.
16. At its meeting on 24 January 2011, the Committee on Rules
of Procedure had an exchange of views with Mrs Vuckovic, member
of the Serbian delegation, who confirmed the information given by
the Speaker of the National Assembly. She indicated that the delegation
would be modified in due time for the Assembly April part-session,
as soon as the National Assembly resumed its session.
2.2. Assessment
17. The challenge to the delegations of Montenegro, San
Marino and Serbia is based on their failure to comply with the provision
requiring delegations to appoint, as a representative, at least
one member of the under-represented sex (Rule 6.2.a of the Rules of Procedure). In
view of the composition of the delegations as shown above, and the
tables submitted by the delegations showing the representation of
men and women in the respective parliaments and their parliamentary
delegations, it is clear that women come into the category of under-represented
sex.
18. Article 25 of the Council of Europe Statute states that members
(representatives or substitutes) of the Assembly from Council of
Europe member states shall be “elected by [their] parliament from
among the members thereof, or appointed from among the members of
that parliament, in such manner as it shall decide”. The Rules of
Procedure lay down certain conditions that have to be met regarding
the composition of delegations, with reference in particular to
the balanced representation of political parties or groups and the appointment
of members of the under-represented sex.
19. The three delegations that are the subject of this challenge
clearly fail to meet the condition established in Rule 6.2.a that national delegations should
include at least one member of the under-represented sex appointed
as a representative.
20. Reference should be made to the Assembly’s position in principle,
restated in its
Resolution
1585 (2007) on gender equality principles in the Parliamentary
Assembly, according to which national parliaments should ensure
that their national delegations to the Assembly comprise a percentage
of women in at least the same proportions as they are present in
the national parliament “with the aim of achieving, as a minimum,
a 30% representation of women, bearing in mind that the threshold
should be 40%”.
21. This is not the first time that the Assembly has had to deal
with a challenge of credentials related to gender representation.
In 2004, the credentials of the delegations of Ireland and Malta
were challenged on the ground that they did not comprise at least
one female member, which was an obligation under the Rules of Procedure
at that time. The Assembly had then decided
to ratify the
credentials of the Irish and Maltese delegations but with the suspension
of the voting rights of the members of the delegations concerned
in the Assembly and its bodies until the composition of those delegations
were brought into conformity with Rule 6.2.
a of
the Rules of Procedure.
22. In the explanatory memorandum in that report, the committee
considered that “it would go too far to declare in such a case the
whole national delegation as being not in conformity with the Rules
and to refuse ratification of the credentials of all members” and
that “the Assembly cannot itself select which of the seats allocated
to a national parliamentary delegation is not correctly filled and
cannot arbitrarily declare the credentials of a certain delegation
member as not ratified”.
23. The committee notes that for small parliaments, it may be
difficult to ensure that the composition of parliamentary delegations
complies with all the criteria laid down by the Rules of Procedure
– fair representation of parties or political groups and gender
representation. It notes, however, that the national delegations
of Andorra, Cyprus, Iceland, Latvia, Luxembourg, Slovenia, “the
former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia”, Malta and Monaco do satisfy
these criteria and that those which have experienced difficulties
have managed to resolve them. The committee also accepts that procedures
in certain parliaments do not enable them to easily amend the composition
of their parliamentary delegations insofar as those procedures provide for
the appointment of delegations for the whole duration of the legislature,
the consultation of or decision by the political groups, or the
need for the composition to be ratified in plenary session.
3. Conclusions
24. The Committee on Rules of Procedure, Immunities and
Institutional Affairs considers that the credentials of the parliamentary
delegations of Montenegro, San Marino and Serbia have been legitimately
challenged on the ground that the delegations concerned did not
comprise at least one female representative, in violation of Rule
6.2.a of the Rules of Procedure.
25. The Committee on Rules of Procedure could therefore take the
view that in this case, it should adopt the same position in respect
of these delegations as was adopted in 2004, having regard to
Resolution 1360 (2004).
26. In accordance with Rule 7.3 of the Rules of Procedure, the
committee may propose in its report:
- non-ratification of the credentials;
- ratification of the credentials together with depriving
or suspending the exercise of some of the rights of participation
or representation of members concerned in the activities of the
Assembly and its bodies.
27. Having considered the explanations given and bearing in mind
the assurances provided by the parliaments concerned, the committee
proposes that the Assembly ratify the credentials of the parliamentary delegations
of Montenegro, San Marino and Serbia, but suspend the voting rights
of their members in the Assembly and its bodies in accordance with
Rule 7.3.c of the Rules of
Procedure, with effect from the beginning of the Assembly’s April
2011 part-session, until the composition of these delegations is
brought into conformity with Rule 6.2.a of
the Rules of Procedure, insofar as it relates to the appointment
in a national delegation of, at a very minimum, one member of the
under-represented sex as a representative.
28. The committee also proposes that this suspension be automatically
lifted once the delegations concerned have modified their composition
so as to comply with Rule 6.2.a and
that the modifications in question have been ratified by the Assembly
or the Standing Committee.