A temporary female quota system is necessary to achieve gender balance in the labour market and decision-making roles, several women agreed during a seminar to mark International Women's Day.
The speakers, mostly women, reluctantly agreed that the quota was a necessary evil that would help address the poor participation of women in politics and public office.
This is the first time a consensus seems to be emerging in support of some sort of positive discrimination in favour of women, with representatives of the two major political parties and other organisations starting to lean towards this idea.
In 2004, Prime Minister Law-rence Gonzi said he disagreed with quotas for women's participation in public life adding they should only be contemplated if all other strategies for greater representation failed.
He was at the time reacting to comments by former Opposition Leader Alfred Sant who suggested quotas would address the "deficit" in female participation.
Although women's participation in the job market has increased since then - by 4.2 per cent since 2005 - Malta still ranked last among EU countries last year. According to the most recent World Economic Forum, Malta ranked 89th out of 134 countries on the Equality Index. This was mainly because of the low economic participation of women in the labour market and the dismally low number of women in politics.
Speakers during yesterday's seminar, organised by the General Workers' Union, stressed they preferred if women were chosen for their skills, rather than their gender. They, however, recognised this would entail a cultural change the country could not afford to wait for.
Anna Borg, from the University's Centre for Labour Studies, pointed out that just eight per cent of Malta's MPs were women. Research showed that for a group to be properly represented there had to be at least a 30 per cent participation rate.
Research also showed that two out of three successful candidates in general elections had been elected before. This further diminished the chances of women being elected.
"It's about time we do something to help women get elected to political posts... The natural cycle is taking too long," she said, as she called for a quota system.
Clare Thake Vassallo, representing the National Council of Women, said she agreed with the quota principle to encourage women to take on decision-making roles.
"At least, we will get used to seeing women in these posts," she said, adding there was the need for a culture change to address the root of the problem.
Boys and girls, for example, should be raised as equals without gender stereotyping.
"Women need to shake off the 'sacrifice culture' through which they feel they have to sacrifice their career for their children. Let's keep in mind the children belong to both mother and father. We will reach our goal of equality when we stop seeing men and women in terms of their gender and start seeing them as people first and foremost," she said.
Labour Party executive secretary Lydia Abela, Nationalist Party Council president Paula Mifsud Bonnici, Labour spokesman on equality Justyne Caruana and PN whip David Agius (the only male speaker) agreed that some form of positive discrimination was necessary to increase women's political involvement.
"Personally, I don't agree with quotas... but some sort of measures have to be taken to address this democratic deficit," Dr Mifsud Bonnici said. Marlene Mizzi, from Labour's business forum, said she too disagreed with quotas in principle. However, this did not mean they were not necessary.
She cautioned that the quota system was "a double edged sword" since women could be expected to perform three times as much and the shortcomings of an individual woman risked being generalised to women in general.
Moving on to the issue of maternity leave - which the European Parliament's Women's Rights Committee proposed should be extended to 20 weeks - most women present agreed with the increase from the present 14 weeks. They, however, recognised this could backfire against women as employers may think twice before employing a female.
Joe Farrugia, director general of the Malta Employers' Association, said employers could not commit themselves to support the extension of the maternity leave.
"We need to make sure the relative expense of employing a man or a woman is the same," he said, speaking as a member of the audience. The MEA was the only organisation represented by a man during the seminar.
Ms Borg pointed out that 60 per cent of university graduates were female, however women's participation in the job market stood at 38 per cent. Clearly, graduates were being lost along the way. One of the factors was they were made to choose between their family and career.
This meant the government was losing over 60 per cent of women from the labour market after having invested in their education.