By Doris Bingley, Malta national council of women and CWN regional focal point, Europe. --The first meeting of the Malta Task Team was held on 23 October 2009 in preparation of the Commonwealth Plan of Action Mid-term review (MTR).  This was a good way to ensure the effective completeness of this exercise. The task team was composed of representatives from the Ministries, NGOs and Civil Society.The Task Team identified data sources and information to complete the survey questionnaire.
Feedback was good but not complete by any means. The NWM was requested to ask The Commonwealth Secretariat for an extension so as to get more data from various sources.  Participants received information on the CPoA and MTR process via a power point presentation.
As relevant parts of the questionnaires were sent to departments, feedback and many queries were received, among them questions on Gender Responsive Budgets, as the majority of Civil Servants had never heard of it.
I realised that training needs to be done throughout the Public Sector on GRBs. Though the National Council of Women had been writing to Ministers and High Officials and sending recommendations to Government requesting  Gender Responsive Budgets in Malta,  this obviously is not enough. We need help to organise a substantial awareness campaign on GRB and how it works.
I had time to talk about previous WAMMs and the forthcoming 9Wamm, the Gender Assembly of the CPF and the CWN.
My hope is that Malta will send NWM representatives to these gatherings and also to New York.
Best regards, Doris