Street harassment could be taken far more seriously in France (Picture: Getty)

Wolf-whistling and other street harassment should be turned into a criminal offence, says France’s gender equality minister.

The country’s new gender equality minister Marlene Schiappa has called for proper legislation to ‘frame the situation’ of street harassment so it’s taken seriously.

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Schiappa, a 34-year-old feminist and mum-of-two, has set up a parliamentary working party aimed at changing the law.

‘We’re in a grey zone,’ said Ms Schiappa. ‘Nowadays, when a woman is whistled at in the street, insulted or followed, that’s not classed as an assault or harassment because there are no elements of proof.




‘There is no point filing a complaint against X because the details are not sufficient. It’s absolutely necessary to frame the situation and to get rid of the definition of harassment that we have today.’

Ms Schiappa added: ‘We will create a new offence, to define its contours, the evidence and the sanction – a spoken warning and then a fine.’

Schiappa answers deputies during the weekly questions to the government at Assemblee Nationale on July 5, 2017 in Paris, France. (Picture: Getty)

Ms Schiappa is a former blogger, she was bought into President Emmanuel Macron’s new En Marche ! (On the Move!) movement earlier this year.

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She said there was a legislative gap between ‘consensual seduction’ and ‘sexual assault which is an offence’.

Ms Schiappa added: ‘There are places where you may feel comfortable when you are a woman,’ she said. ‘One often takes the example of the Chapelle-Pajol district where a woman will think twice before putting on a skirt.

‘But it is not a question of stigmatising part of the population, or certain neighbourhoods, because this behaviour can appear anywhere and everywhere.’

Surveys have shown a concerning level of women being harassed on public transport (Picture: Getty)

In turn, French barrister Gilles-William Goldnadel accused Ms Schiappa of trying to ban ‘heavy Latin chat-up lines,’ and would solely succeed in clogging up the court system.

Surveys have revealed that virtually all French women have been harassed on public transport at one stage or another.

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In 2015, a poll of 600 women in Paris found that ‘every female user of mass transit has been a victim’ of harassment.

Half of the women said they first experienced harassment when they were under the age of 18.

The survey was handed to a French women’s rights ministry in April 2015.

President Macron pledged to bring this problem to an end during his election campaign earlier this year.

Critics also accuse Ms Schiappa of secretly being an erotic fiction writer who regularly demeans women with her steamy books – a charge she refuses to comment on.

Conservative publications said books allegedly written under the name of ‘Marie Minelli’ were pornographic and insulting to women.

Ms Schiappa’s new working committee is made up of four women MPs, and one man, their report is expected before the end of the year.