WOMEN’S SECTION
The CATUS Women’s section was constituted in 2002 in order to safeguard the protection and improvement of women’s rights as well as their social position.
Within its scope of work, Women’s Section performs activities aimed at empowering women, increasing their visibility and representation in the trade union organs, improving gender equality, equality in case of employment, protection of women’s rights and protection of maternity, abolishing discrimination.
In order to enable women to meet all the demands and responsibilities in the working environment Women’s Section has organized numerous seminars. Some of the seminar topics were: ‘Social cooperatives as a possibility for employment’, ‘Labour legislation and women in the period of transition’, ‘Empowerment of women’s position in the trade unions’, ‘Mobbing’, ‘Women can do it!’, ‘ILO Conventions’, ‘European integrations and women’s status’, ‘Social dialogue and collective bargaining’, ‘Strategies and negotiation techniques: main gender equality points in collective bargaining’, ‘ Non-violent communication and harmonization of family and professional responsibilities’, ‘Protection from harassment at work’, ‘From the ban on discrimination to the recognition of equality’, ‘Women’s social status - the influence of mobbing in the professional life – the trade union role in improving the most vulnerable groups’. There were also four round tables with the topic – ‘Participation of women in the informal sector’ as well as round tables on topics – ‘The problem of women whose work is no longer needed’ (where a brochure with the same name was presented), ‘Legal amendments to the pension and disability insurance – new economic and social status of women’ and ‘Ban on harassment at work – law and practice’.
Within the project ‘Decent Work – Decent Life’ four case studies about the women who work in the informal sector in four cities - Vranje, Bor, Niš and Kragujevac were carried out. There was also one case study about the women in Kruševac whose work is no longer needed.
Every year, the CATUS Women’s Section celebrates March 8 – The International Women’s Day - promoting the global campaign ‘Decent Work –Decent Life’ initiated by the International Trade Union Confederation. Street manifestations are organized in many cities in Serbia, polls conducted and promotional materials and information about women’s trade union and labour rights distributed. Citizens can also leave messages with recommendations about how the women’s position should be improved.
Women’s section asked the public to support the proposal for the re-examination of amendments to the Law on Pension and Disability Insurance because they directly affect the position of women. To that end, the Petition was signed by 17,000 citizens supporting the requests of the Section.
Five brochures – ‘Position of women in Serbian labour and social legislation’, ‘Informal economy in the Republic of Serbia –study case of Vranje’, ‘Decent work’, ‘Redundant women workers –study case of Kruševac and municipalities of Brus, Ćićevac, Ražanj and Varvarin’, ‘Social status of women and harassment at work’, promotional materials ‘Stop the informal work!’, and ‘Decent work’ as well as leaflets about objectives and tasks of the Section were issued with the help of SOLIDAR Suisse/Swiss Labour Assistance SLA - Office in Serbia.
The CATUS Women’s section, being the member of the ITUC and PERC women’s networks, actively participates in the work of the International trade union school for women which is organized every year in October.
Since its constitution the Women’s section has had a successful cooperation with the Directorate of Gender Equality within the Serbian Ministry of Labour and Social Policy, the NGOs dealing with the issues of gender equality, SOLIDAR Suisse/Swiss Labour Assistance SLA – Office in Serbia and Friedrich Ebert Foundation, which all helped the organization of seminars, platforms and round tables.
The highest organ of the Section is the Conference consisting of 36 members. Since 2010 the President of the Section has been Djurdjica Jovovic, member of the CATUS Council and President of the Trade Union of Employees in Science and Research of Serbia.
