European Parliament and Non-Discrimination
The inclusion of Art 13 in the Treaty of Amsterdam empowered the European Community to "take appropriate action to combat discrimination based on sex, racial or ethnic origin, religion or belief, disability, age or sexual orientation." This was a unique and vitally important step for gay and lesbian rights in Europe. But, it was not enough in and by itself. It needed to be complemented by concrete measures, both in the legislative and the policy domain. The fact that this happened so quickly was undoubtedly partly thanks to a favourable political climate. This, however, was significantly aided by numerous MEPs who kept up the pressure on the European Commission and the respective member states to adopt new legislation. This commitment led to the adoption of two directives in the year 2000: the Employment Framework Directive, which obliges all member states to introduce legislation banning discrimination in employment on a number of grounds, including sexual orientation and the so-called race equality directive combating discriminations on the grounds of ethnic origin in various domains of EC competence, including employment and the provision of goods and services. This was complemented by a Community Action Programme to Combat Discrimination , involving the expenditure of EUR 100 million over the period 2001 to 2006, to fight discrimination in a number of areas, including sexual orientation.
MEPs have continued to play a vital role through
- monitoring the full implementation of the directives at member state level: the deadline for the Framework Directive passed on 2 Dec 2003 for old member states and on 1 May 2004 for new member states; yet, a great majority of countries has failed to implement the legislation satisfactorily
- focussing on discrimination in the labour market from a health and safety perspective (harassment)
- pushing for further legislative measures to ensure equal levels of protection across all grounds: see for instance LIBE Committee Report on new Gender Directive
- mainstreaming anti-discrimination principles across the EU’s programmes and instruments, e.g. EQUAL projects and sexual orientation discrimination
- working for the EP Intergroup, e.g. Hearing on implementation of the Framework Directive (Nov 2003)
