madam president as many members have pointed out the progress of women's rights has moved steadily forward over a number of years
in the thirty years between the first elections to the european parliament and two thousand and nine when i was elected the representation of women has more than doubled
we now see women in major roles in politics business industry and the media
perhaps most importantly as a society we have come to appreciate the necessity of the role of women and to recognise their contribution winning equality along the way
however we need to be mindful of how far we push calls for more equality and in what areas
our concern should be to focus on what is still wrong today
in the uk women still account for under twenty of the members of parliament nearly half of the companies in the ftse two hundred and fifty have no females in the boardroom at all and only a fifth of all engineering science and it graduates are women
given the diverse nature of our societies this is clearly something that member states need to address without quotas and targets arbitrarily set at an eu level
however over and above representation there are thousands of women across the eu and indeed the world who endure violence exploitation and exclusion
they are the ones without a voice
it is those women who suffer from discrimination are deliberately discouraged from achievement or are victims of repression who surely deserve our absolute attention
