Legislation for more women in leadership position having little effect

The legislation to get more women into leadership positions at Dutch companies was not effective enough. Too few companies feel the need to allow more women into their boardroom and a quota is the only solution, according to the Business Monitor Top Women 2020, NOS reports.

The law that companies should strive to have at least 30 percent women in their board and supervisory board was implemented in 2013. Still 90 percent of businesses do not meet that target. Last year, 67 percent of companies did not have a single woman on their board, and 43 percent had no women on the supervisory board.

"You had hoped that more companies would have worked on it. But that is not the case. It just really does not happen automatically," Caroline Princen, chairman of the Monitor Committee, said to NOS. According to her, the slight increase in the number of women in top positions is due to a small group of companies. 

Since the law was implemented in 2013, the number of women on executive boards increased from 7 percent to 12 percent. The number of women on supervisory boards increased from 10 to 20 percent.

The law expired last year. In 2019, the Netherlands' social and economic council SER advised that a quota be implemented for listed companies to have at least 33 percent women on their supervisory boards. Parliament will vote on such a quota soon.