Status of Women committee  That may be because the analysis aspect is mandated by means of a report to Parliament. There is no commitment towards a concrete measure before and after. The obligation to report and the analysis are already provided for. However, a budget measure or a measure to determine the actual impact on the situation are not mandated, strictly speaking.

Status of Women committee  Yes, this is done through an interim report required by law. The report outlines the achievement of the objectives as defined in the plan, as well as the implementation of the various processes that go along with this work, specifically regarding statistics. The Institute is responsible for preparing the plan in collaboration with the members of the interdepartmental group.

Status of Women committee  Okay. I cannot tell you exactly what percentage of the entire federal budget is allocated to the equality issue. As for our department, part of our budget is dedicated to gender mainstreaming. We use that money especially to support the entire training process, since we work with external consultants.

Status of Women committee  Yes.

Status of Women committee  Is the question for a witness from New Zealand or from Belgium?

Status of Women committee  We think that collaboration between the political and administrative levels is essential. That is key for us. The fact that the process is made mandatory is critically valuable to us, because this is our main support at the beginning of the session. There is a law and the government must commit to implementing this strategy, to automatically adopt the plan.

Status of Women committee  The analysis is mandatory by law. The act institutionalizes the process and makes mandatory this gender analysis, which we call gender mainstreaming. This the the term used to describe the integration of the gender dimension, or the comparative analysis. It is therefore mandatory.

Status of Women committee  This is part of the upstream process for a series of policies that are set out in the federal plan, as I said. In any case, the act makes it possible to apply this approach to all ministers involved, including—and this is for us one of the important points of this law —in matters where usually we do not talk about the different situations of men and women.

Status of Women committee  I am not sure I quite understand the question. Are you asking whether we take into account other factors, not just gender? Did I understand correctly that the question is about intersectionality?

Status of Women committee  I will probably not provide a definition of the word “gender”. For us, the focus is on the comparison of the respective situations of women and men. When analyzing specific policies, such as social integration, we will consider whether we are dealing with a disadvantaged target group, the poorest women, and we will cross-tabulate the data.

Status of Women committee  I am Carine Joly, an advisor at the Institute for the Equality of Women and Men. I am responsible for what we call the gender mainstreaming unit, that is to say, the mainstreaming of gender equality. The Institute is particularly responsible for overseeing the strategy. My colleague Nicolas Bailly, who is also a member of the unit, and I will give you an overview of the implementation of gender mainstreaming at the Belgian federal level.