The Commission on the Status of Women is “instrumental in promoting women’s rights, documenting the reality of women’s lives throughout the world, and shaping global standards on gender equality and the empowerment of women.”1
It is the principal global intergovernmental body exclusively dedicated to the promotion of gender equality and the empowerment of women, and is a functional commission of the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) of the United Nations.
ECOSOC was established in 1946, in order to promote, report on and monitor issues relating to the political, economic, civil, social and educational rights of women. Mothers’ Union has consultative status with ECOSOC.
Each year, Mothers’ Union attends the Commission’s annual two-week session in New York, with a delegation of members and staff. We work alongside a range of other NGO’s representing the voice and views of our members and promoting the empowerment and equality of women, and influencing and advising Government delegations from various member states. This is with the intention that each year at UNCSW, member states sign up to a set of agreed conclusions, which they will then implement with their own Governments.
A guiding principle of the Commission is to:
“...raise the status of women, irrespective of nationality, race, language or religion, to equality with men in all fields of human enterprise, and to eliminate all discrimination against women in the provisions of statutory law, in legal maxims or rules, or in interpretation of customary law.”
With consultative status, Mothers' Union has an important role to play in making sure that the voice and needs of our members and women around the world are present in these agreed conclusions, and in holding Governments to account after UNCSW to ensure action is taken to uphold these.
Last year's UNCSW 2019
The sixty-third session of the Commission on the Status of Women took place at the United Nations Headquarters in New York from 11 to 22 March 2019.
- The priority theme was on “social protection systems, access to public services and sustainable infrastructure for gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls”.
- The review theme was on “women’s empowerment and the link to sustainable development (agreed conclusions of the sixtieth session)”.
Mothers’ Union Policy Advisor Mary Santo attended this year’s UNCSW, joined by June Butler MBE (All Ireland President and Zonal Trustee for Ireland on the Worldwide Board).
 UN Women, Commission on the Status of Women, accessed 20 July 2018