4.3.1.3 The CEDAW Committee on the Dutch government’s (lack of) compliance

The Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (the CEDAW Committee) is established to monitor the implementation of CEDAW by the State Parties to this Convention.1 Each of the State Parties is obliged to2 submit periodically a report on the legislative, judicial and administrative or other measures they have adopted to give effect to the provisions of CEDAW.3

In February 2005, the Dutch government submitted its fourth periodic report. This report dealt with women in senior positions and top positions. It indicated that women were underrepresented in senior-, management- and decision-making positions. The government asserted:

The report concluded by stating that: ‘the primary goal (…) continues to be the proportional [emphasis added] representation of women in influential positions in all sections of society’, supported by several economic and rights-based arguments on promoting gender diversity.5

The CEDAW Committee responded to the fourth periodic report by empha­sizing its concern regarding: (i) the underrepresentation of women in ‘high-ranking posts in all public sectors’; (ii) the lack of information the Dutch government provided on the adoption of quotas; and (iii) the Dutch government’s position that it does not support adopting such quotas in order to accelerate participation of women, immigrants, refugees and minority women.6 The Committee urged the Netherlands to ‘take sustained measures to accelerate women’s full and equal participation in public life and decision-making, especially in high-ranking posts, (…) in the private and business sectors’.7

Moreover, the CEDAW Committee expressed its concern about inequality in wages: ‘women are concentrated in certain low-wage sectors and in part-time work and [that] a considerable wage gap between men and women persists’.8 The CEDAW Committee concluded by emphasizing that the Netherlands must make more effort to ensure equal opportunities for men and women in the labour market.9

In November 2008, the Dutch government submitted its fifth periodic report. The CEDAW Committee’s concerns that very few women occupy top positions in the Netherlands were reiterated.10 Although the government claimed an increasing progress in the proportion of women in top positions, it admitted that this progress was too slow.11 The government explained how the men/female diversity ratio could be enhanced within companies, by paying attention to the ‘added value of diversity for business and the economy in general’.12 With this, the government deliberately emphasized the importance of gender-diversity from an economic perspective.

In February 2010, the CEDAW Committee published its concluding observations with regard to the fifth periodic report of the Netherlands. According to the CEDAW Committee, the Dutch government had insufficiently addressed its recommendations, which highlighted also the low presence of women in high-ranking posts. The CEDAW Committee urged the Netherlands to take measures to address the previous recommendations that had not been (fully) implemented.13

The most recent report is the sixth periodic report, which was submitted by the Dutch government in December 2014. The government explained therein which measures it had taken with regard to stimulating a higher percentage of women in top-level positions.14 One of them is that, as mentioned in Section 4.1 and as will be further elaborated in Section 4.3.3 below, a temporary law was adopted stimulating large Dutch limited liability companies (i.e., NVs and BVs) to have a management board and a supervisory board comprised of at least 30 percent women and at least 30 percent men, which is called an ‘equal distribution of seats’.

The CEDAW Committee has not yet responded to the sixth periodic report.