Paris mairie fined for appointing too many women to top jobs

The Paris mairie has been fined for hiring too many women to management roles in 2018, contravening rules on gender equality.

France's civil service ministry (ministère de la fonction publique) has issued a €90,000 fine to the Paris City Hall after 11 out of 16 senior management or leadership jobs were given to women that year, a representation of 69%.

“This very high figure contributes strongly to the feminisation of senior management and managerial jobs…” The ministère de la fonction publique stated in its annual review of balanced appointments.

“However, it does not meet the legal target of 40% of appointments of each sex in these jobs,” the review concluded.

The fine has been met with confusion at the Paris mairie. Antoine Guillou, Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo’s assistant in charge of human resources, called it paradoxical.

“In short, we are being punished because we are catching up too quickly! However, we are demonstrating that parity in positions of responsibility can be achieved quickly when the will is there,” he tweeted.

A new law was introduced last year to prevent this situation occurring again in the future.

The 2019 loi de transformation de la fonction publique states that there will not be a penalty for employers who appoint too many men or women to top jobs in a given year as long as it does not lead to an overall imbalance.

This would apply to the Paris mairie, where 47% of people employed in senior management positions overall are women.

This law was introduced too late to spare the mairie from being fined for its 2018 hires.

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