SPD on equality and diversity

The SPD wants to introduce an equal pay law and create incentives in the public sector for a fairer split of unpaid care and family work. The public sector is meant to serve as a model for the rest of the economy.

The SPD wants a law on equal pay. Women and men should earn the same for the same work. The public sector should offer ways for couples to share family work more fairly. Work should fit better with family life.

The Kompetenzzentren Frau und Beruf (competence centers for women and work) are to become central contact points for employees and employers on family-friendly work. The platform also backs shorter and inclusive working-time models, fair wages and upgrading poorly paid service jobs. It supports the demand to abolish fixed-term contracts without objective justification. In the party's view, these goals do not conflict with greater prosperity.

The SPD wants to guarantee access to abortion care and make it part of medical training and continuing education. Abortions should be available free of charge. The party also backs repealing Section 219a at the federal level.

Women should decide for themselves about a pregnancy. The SPD wants enough doctors who offer abortions. An abortion should cost nothing. Doctors should be allowed to give information openly. Counseling should be available everywhere, also online.

The platform counts free abortions as part of reliable health care. The SPD wants to take effective action against so-called sidewalk harassment by abortion opponents. Counseling centers are to be available statewide and able to advise online in the future. Repealing Section 219a would let doctors provide public information about abortions without fear of prosecution.

The SPD wants the public service to reflect a more diverse society. People with a migration background should find it easier to enter state employment, and promotion rules are to be checked for disadvantages to women.

More people with a migration background should work for the state. The SPD wants to remove hurdles in hiring and careers. Women should find it easier to become leaders. So the SPD will check the rules for promotions.

The criteria used to assess promotions would be reviewed to see whether they structurally disadvantage women. The goal is equal access for women to leadership positions. The state as an employer should also strengthen intercultural openness, attract people with a migration background to public service, and remove barriers to hiring and career advancement.

The SPD wants to protect and strengthen Jewish life in North Rhine-Westphalia. The reporting office for antisemitism is to become permanent, and further reporting offices for other hate-motivated incidents are to be added.

The SPD wants to protect Jewish people in the state better. There is an office where people can report hatred of Jews. This office should stay for good. New offices should record other kinds of hate. Synagogues and mosques should also get more protection.

The program announces that the office of the state's antisemitism commissioner will be strengthened further. Protection and security measures for religious sites, especially synagogues and mosques, and for other sensitive places are to be expanded. Antisemitic incidents are to be made more visible and pursued more firmly. New and existing reporting offices are to coordinate so that no duplicate structures arise. The SPD also wants to deepen its exchange with churches, Jewish communities and Islamic associations.

The SPD wants to create an anti-discrimination law and set up a state anti-discrimination office. In addition, public administration is to open up interculturally, and municipalities are to get support for their own anti-discrimination plans.

The SPD wants a law against discrimination. Discrimination means treating people unfairly, for example because of where they come from. The state should get its own office for this. The office advises, does research and informs the public. Government offices should also become more open to everyone.

The state office is to work as a network, advising, researching and above all reaching the public. Municipalities are to receive advice and funding to develop anti-discrimination plans. In the public sector, the SPD plans non-discriminatory application and access procedures as well as culturally sensitive training. The program names a society free of discrimination and with fair opportunities as its goal.

The SPD wants a law to ensure that women and men are equally represented at all political levels. In addition, the state and municipalities are to pay attention to gender-fair and gender-neutral language.

There should be as many women as men in politics. The SPD wants to make a law for this. The state and the cities should also watch their language. The language should address all genders equally.

The program justifies the plan with the goal of removing inequalities between the genders. Equal representation is to apply to every political level. On language, the SPD's concern is that differences between the genders should not already show in how people are addressed.

The SPD calls for all women and girls in need of protection to have a legal right to free admission and shelter. To that end, it wants to expand women's shelters and counseling centers with state money and launch a state action plan against violence.

Some women and girls experience violence. They should have a right to a free place in a shelter. The SPD wants more women's shelters and counseling centers. Women with disabilities should also be able to reach this help easily.

The state action plan is to cover help, counseling and prevention across the state and follow the Istanbul Convention, a European treaty against violence toward women. For women and girls with disabilities, the SPD wants more accessible shelters and independent counseling centers, meaning more than just removing physical barriers. Counseling against forced marriage and the round table against the genital cutting of girls are also to be expanded. The program also counts cyberbullying as violence, and support services are to be adapted to it.

The SPD wants to fund meeting places and groups for queer young people in cities and rural areas and also support services for queer seniors. Pride (CSD) festivals across the state are to receive stable base funding.

Queer people are, for example, lesbian, gay or trans. The SPD wants to fund meeting places for queer young people. This applies to cities and to villages. Older queer people should also get services. Pride festivals should take place all over the state.

Queer child and youth work is to be included in youth funding plans, supplemented by digital services. Providers of elder care are to be made aware that care should take queer people's needs into account as a standard; the SPD also wants to support leisure activities, counseling centers and cross-generational housing projects. In companies, diversity management workshops and workplace networks are to be supported. Queer life is to become more visible together with the association Tourismus NRW, so that the state becomes a preferred travel destination for the community.