Country report, gender equality : how are EU rules transposed into national law? : Lithuania 2016

The Republic of Lithuania is a unitary state where legislative authority is vested in the central government. The regulatory authority is vested in the Parliament (the Seimas), whereas the implementation and execution of legislation belongs to the main competences of the Government (Vyriausybė) and its ministries and agencies. The Parliamentary Human Rights Committee supervises the implementation of the equal opportunities policies and assesses legislative initiatives in this field. Draft legislation is mainly drafted by the Ministry of Social Security and Labour, which is in charge of the implementation of the principle of equal treatment at the level of the Executive. The independent Equal Opportunities Ombudsperson is appointed by Parliament and is entrusted with supervising the implementation of equality legislation. He/she is the head of a public authority - the Office of the Equal Opportunities Ombudsperson - which is also responsible for the implementation of the principle of equal treatment on the number of other grounds. The legislation in the form of ordinary laws (istatymai) is adopted by Parliament. The ordinary laws constitute the major instrument to establish imperative rules in the area of equal treatment. Resolutions (nutarimai) of the Government of the Republic of Lithuania make up a limited source of the gender equality law in Lithuania since they may regulate relations between individuals only in cases and to the extent determined by the ordinary laws.